WEN PL1326 15-Amp 13-Inch Spiral Benchtop Thickness Planer

The product's functionality is excellent; however, its 120V voltage requirement renders it unsuitable for the UAE and potentially the wider Middle East. I incurred a $100 expense purchasing a converter. Product descriptions should clearly specify voltage requirements. Despite this, the equipment itself is high-quality. I give 3 stars because of the 120v missing information provided.

I'm a retired professional with a Felder 741 combination slider, planer and shaper. If you know Felder, then I don't have to tell you they are one of the industry standards for accuracy. However, I'm sick of building a piece of fine furniture, only to discover that one last piece is too thick, or whatever. That means raising the jointer bed, cranking up the planer head, and in the process losing whatever was setup on the saw. Also, I've wanted a spiral cutter for the planer, but $1,000+ makes no sense when the Felder knives already do a superb job, and of course I would still have the changeover problem. I'v thought about a bench top planer, but that's also around a grand, so not happening. Anyway, I saw some reviews on the Wen 13" with a segmented cutter head. Odd looking cutter head, and the inserts are HSS instead of carbide, but at $400 for the one speed I decided to take a risk. I just unpacked and plugged in this morning. Connected to my 3hp Onida Gorilla using a 4" hose. I then ran a test using 1.5" air dried red oak. Results were a surprise, to say the least. Beautiful finish on both sides, even at the one speed, which is quite fast. No sign of of any cutters out of alignment. Almost no snipe - I did not adjust the tables. Dust collector gets most, but not all, chips. ( I also tried connecting a shop vac which was not that great, so I'd recommend a dust collector). Segmented cutter heads are supposed to be quiet, but brush motor noise makes it about as loud as a knife machine, at least in my opinion. Hearing muffs required. This is not a complaint. For $400 you can't have everything. Bottom line, I'm glad I bought this thing. Once the four sided cutters are dull I might upgrade to carbide, but we'll see. Sometimes HHS produces a better finish than carbide, so I might just buy another set of those, depending on how long the originals last. The question now is longevity. Machine seems solid and weighs 80 pounds, so for my needs it will probably be OK. We will see. Bottom line, doe a great job for less than half the price of a name brand. The machine turned out to be a pleasant surprise, producing an excellent finish.

This thing is a hoss of a machine. I was skeptical of getting this wen planer compared to other known brands but i'm sure glad i went with it. For the money, it's the best machine you can get for planing. Blades seem to last quite a while and i love that they can just be rotated once before replacing. Cutting performance is solid. If you're just starting out in woodworking, you can't really go wrong with this unit.

I agonized over this tool purchase more than any other in my well equipped woodshop. I bounced between this one and the (all hail the Yellow) Dewalt. Ultimately, I could not in my mind justify the considerable (like $700) cost difference assuming a similarly apportioned Dewalt with infeed/outfeed tables and a spherical head, and I have good experience with other Wen power tools, so I decided to take a chance on this. I honestly could not be happier! This is the best planer I've owned to date. Runs smoothly and cleanly and I have yet to experience any snipe using the attached tables. I could start a wood chip business with the large, curly pieces it produces so it's a use-outside-only affair until I get a healthy extraction system, but that's not a big deal as it is relatively portable. Sort of...it does weigh just south of 100 lbs but ergonomically placed handles make it manageable weight. My only concern was the depth-of-cut mechanism indicator is only a round pin in the middle of the planing area as opposed to the full width in the Dewalt, but I have not found it to matter as everything I plane is in the middle of the planing area anyway...go figure. With the cost of even 2/4 wood now it will pay for itself rather quickly as I can turn standard big box store construction lumber into usable woodworking stock easily.

My wife and I recently bought a CNC woodworking router and have started a part time business with it. We bought a lot of pine slab wood from an Amish saw mill and were using a heavy duty sander to finish the boards. This planer has made that job SO much easier. It leaves very little effort and leaves the wood very smooth so it takes very little finish sanding. You do get snipe near both ends of the wood, so either have to leave the boards long enough to cut the snipe off or use scrap boards of the same thickness in front and behind so the snipe is left on those boards. The directions say you can adjust the feed trays to stop this but I haven't really tried that. There is also a lot of sawdust scrap, so it really must be hooked up to a shop vac, which works very well. This planer is a little wider than a lot of them and even though 13 inches is kind of limiting, wider planers are MUCH more expensive. We've used it quite a bit over the last few months and it's still going as strong as when we got it without having to change blades yet. Very happy with it.

Worked well for planing a bunch of primed cedar someone gave me. I ran them through a couple times because I didn’t want to take too much off. I did have to sand them because they were finish material, but I saved a ton of time because I didn’t have to sand the paint off. Blades held up well. I’d recommend this planer.