If you machine is old and the feed rollers (both infeed and out feed) have never been replaced, they get hard and brittle and sometimes even a little out of round and they also start slipping just a little. Its hard to notice but its one of the big causes of snipe…. Don't panic the fixes are easy and not that expensive.
Your post doesn't say where your from but UPS goes everywhere so it shouldn't be a big deal.
There is a place in Bend, Oregon called Western Roller ((800) 541-2317) and they can strip and re-coat your rollers with an even better material than the machine came with. Just call them, tell them what you have and they will give you a price. Their absolutely awesome people to deal with, they can do any kind of feed roller like for planners and power feeds.
I get the coating that is semi-soft and it really grips the harder slicker woods like White Hardrock Maple or Northern White Oak and it REALLY grips any softer woods like poplar or anything else.
When you remove the rollers, there will be a square block at the end of each roller. You'll need to check these blocks, there's a hole in each one that a spring goes into, and make sure the hole isn't ovaled out and that the spring is still in good shape. If the blocks have the holes messed up you can't buy new ones from Ryobi but ANY machine shop can easily make you some. Order at least 1 extra set because with machine shops its all about the set up time !! Once you have new rollers re-installed preferably with new springs but that will depend what kind of shape yours were in, the only other adjustment to eliminate snipe is the rollers that are inserted into the
planner bed itself. They should be set just 1 red ******************** hair above the actual bed surface.
Another thing that helps eliminate snipe is when your feeding your material into the machine, give the material a slight bit of upwards pressure, not a bunch, just a little. And then do the same thing as the material exits the machine.
Let me know how it works out for you. at one time I had 8 of these machines, I've sold all but 2 to friends and employees and believe it or not every single one of them still works fantastically !!
These are by far the best tool Ryobi ever made.
The only replacement part that takes some due diligence to find is
the field and armature. You have to look in the schematics of older like 1990's Makita planers cause they used the same armature as Ryobi AH-115. Sorry, I used to have the exact Makita part number written down but I somehow lost the little piece of paper I had it written on. It was always one of those things I wanted to get around to filing in my tool parts folder, but I procrastinated too damn long !! Now I'm gunna have to do the search thing again. Once I come up with the part numbers I'll post them up on here..
I absolutely love these machines. I love the way they cut and stay true. I love the simplicity of the design and truthfully there just isn't that many parts that can break that can't be easily fixed and the fact that you really don't have to rely on Ryobi to get parts cause if you cant find the replacement part, there easy and inexpensive to have made or you can find similar parts that fit locally.
I'm starting to think about stalking up on knives cause I'm worried they will stop making them soon but I haven't really looked into the availability lately but from what I've been told their still readily available.
I think if they stopped making the knives we would all be in trouble cause they have a lot of notches and slots cut into the knives and would probably be pretty spendy to have to have them fabricated by a machine shop.
Fortunately, with the newer and smarter CNC machines that are out there today it probably wouldn't be as big of challenge for them as it was 20 years ago, but I still bet it wouldn't be cheap, It would be the CAD drawing and program design that would cost all the money, cutting the knife would be nothing.. . I guess if that day ever happens, I'll have to sell them online since I'll already have the CNC program and all they would have to do is load the machine with a High Speed Steel blank and hit run..
I did have 3 sets of knives done by Farr's Custom Carbide Cutting in Santa Ana, California, (714-972-1600 ask for Richard Farr and tell him Shaun Ragland referred you and he'll take good care of you) where they slotted in a good thick piece of solid carbide edge into the stock knives. Ryobi never offered carbide as an option, but man do they they stay sharper longer. I would guess 4 to 1 with HHS vs Carbide, its an amazing difference.
Richard Farr is an amazing talent when it comes to shaper cutter designs, Router Bits, or specialized saw blades for cutting anything special. He is also a sharpening GURU, the guy sharpens anything even spiral cutters for door planers and before I found Richard, I had to throw my dull spiral cutters away and they ain't cheap !!!.
I was having a really, really hard time cutting white rift oak plywood for a huge cabinet project we did (1.2 million for just fabrication and the delivery and installation was hourly) We tried every blade on the market and everything splintered this plywood to the point that it looked like a dog chewed the cut for us… It was just way too slow to have to tape and razor cut everywhere we needed to crosscut this material. I mean we're talkin units and units of plywood and thousands of cuts. Richard made me a 12" saw blade that had the thickest steel and the widest carbide teeth I'd ever seen, I think the kirf was a full 3/16th wide but that blade was as smooth as glass. I thought he had lost his friggin mind when I first saw it while picking it up, but when I tried it I was blown away how clean and smooth the cuts were, it was almost as good as sex, but not quite !!!.
Richard also designs and builds his own multi purpose shaper cutters with removable and interchangeable tips that save tons of money cause your investment allows you to do 4 or 5 different stick and cope cuts off one cutter head and their extremely safe and of the highest quality you'll ever see. The thing that I like about Richard is that if he makes you a shaper cutter, he'll make sure to get you set up with all the different slot cutters for the different door thickness's like for interior or exterior doors, even a slot cutter for french glass doors and he also sets you up with all the necessary rub bearings for any radius or elliptical work you may need to do.
If you buy a production cutter, first off its only going to cut one profile and then you have to shop around and piece meal all the slot cutters and bearings before you end up with a workable and complete set. Sometimes its really hard to find the right diameter slot cutters and bearings and you have to do all kinds of extra funky ******************** to make everything work and that can be a real time killer and a genuine pain in the rectom !!
I'm probably sounding like a salesman but I don't get anything by referring him, I just like his products and I like to see other people use really good tools. Farr's Custom Carbide Cutting (Richard Farr) is definitely a number to keep in your little black phone book for that special shaper cutter, router cutter or saw blade you may need some day, I just can't say enough about Richard and his talent as a blade maker, hes just a really incredibly talented and also a genuinely nice guy.
I've got cutters that he made for me in the early 80's and they are still just as perfect and easy to set up as the day I had him make them for me !!!
PEACE OUT !!!