when you said 65 year old tool I thought you were talking about me,then I realized I am only fiddy eight. No offense, but the skil gets a good rep because it was the best planer 65 years ago for surfboards. Just think all the people who tried shaping a foam or wood board with a skil and totally failed in this time frame. It is a great quality tool no doubt, but will it really make a person a better shaper? BTW , love your shaping room set up and the boards you are plowing. If I gave you an accurate planer I bet you could get the job done. Prolly a hitachi or mikita also. I suggest YOU are the reason why it works so well. Like most things it is the indian not the arrow.
My mind was blown away by a well known and respected shaper Ted Spencer who brought me a SUP shaped blank in the early 2000’s for wood plank vacuum bagging. one lb EPS foam, and just a beautiful mind blowing shaped board. I was selling EPS blanks full on in those days and asked where he bought the blank. He told me he bought a rectangular piece of EPS form the local EPS foam manufacturer and shaped it BY HAND with no power tools. I asked how many hours he spen on it and He said 40 hours to shape. He spoke to me about his design of this board and it was like he was speaking in tongues. Pretty much didn’t understand most of what he was talking about. All I knew is that I could no way do what he did without a wire cutter or profiler set up with router ,and an electric planer.
I am giving you all the credit for your success and stoked you have a very old, reliable, quality planer with sharpe blades.
Attached photos of Ted’s finished with wood board from12 or so years ago.
Nice shaping room. The 676 is exceptional among the whole Skil series mainly due to the motor. However, I must comment on your power cord wound around the hose. What kills these old motors is running too long a cord which increases the current dramatically. The higher current causes excessive brush arcing which will eventually short the motor. These old school motors have no thermal protection or other safeguards, they will try and pull whatever current is needed to keep them turning at 16K rpm until either the breaker trips or they’re on fire. Skil limited the cord length to 15 feet which is impractical for shaping, I have found that the maximum safe cord length is about 21 feet. Extension cords increase the current draw not just because of the length but also due to the extra connection point. Measure the current with the cord to an outlet and try not to exceed 10% of that when dressed along the vac system. By not winding the cord around the hose may save you 4+ feet at least.
Nice vac adapter on the Skil. There are several ways to get the cord to move as the vac hose stretches.
How much amperage does that Skil draw at 120vAC?
What Gauge are the conductors in the cord? 16?
I think such an awesome tool might be happier with a 12 awg cord feeding its motor.
Far too many people ignore the importance of clean tight electrical connections.
Caig DeOxit D5 can do wonders for mating conductive surfaces, and also lubricates the receptacle even if only applied to the male plug. Awesome product to have on hand.
Full strength is D100, but even these magic electrical juice products are not going to restore any lost spring tension inside the connector, and that can have profound effects on power tools.
If they are meant to run on 115v and only get 98 volts due to resistance on an old worn out cord with some broken stranding, and with poor connections… it is not going to be a happy motor and there is no doubt it will feel more powerful with a higher voltage reaching the motor.
The Rigid brand extension cords at home despot are 12 awg and super flexible, and can usually be easily adapted to become dedicated power cords. the diameter and stress relief at the tool itself likely the only issue.
The 676 is rated at 5.5 amps, and good ones draw anywhere from 2.1 - 3.0 amps with the factory cord (16 gage). When cutting foam, the current load is increased less than 0.25 amps. I won’t restore any 5.5 Skil’s if they are over 4.0 amps; if the brushes are good then it’s 99% probability that the motor is on its way out (despite a weak switch or cord). It doesn’t matter on the cord wire gage as long as it’s no smaller than 16, lower resistance from 14 or even 12 gage isn’t going to make much of a difference. It’s distance from the outlet so the only real way to judge this is to measure the current from the same outlet with and without any extension cord. This is especially true if the outlet is a million miles away from the breaker panel in a separate building, a high current problem could already exist at the outlet. Some high current issues are a result of mechanical problems like spun bearings and such, but by the time these can be measured as consistent high current, major mechanical damage is already done.
Another important issue with any metal housing tool like the Skil is to make sure it’s grounded both inside the tool and at the outlet. You don’t get just 2-3 amps if shorted but the full outlet breaker rating (usually 15), and it’s the amps that kill you not the voltage. Most electric chairs for executions did 7-12 amps back in the day before gas and injections. They did operate at 2,000 volts but only because it killed you faster than 110 volts so the witnesses didn’t have to watch too long (about 30 seconds). No witnesses in the shaping bay so you’ve got the time. Also if you run over the cord with the blades (Skil grounded) the breaker will trip before you get zapped but the cord will be arc-welded to the blades. This happens more often than you’d think.
I love the outline of that triple stringer in the background. Did you build that?
Pete, I’ve copied and saved your word of wisdom. The skil you built for me is still humming along. Many thanks.
Nice comments Charlie and so true. It’s definitely the Indian. Beautiful finished board. When I was young I hacked out my first few with a Surform and a sanding block in my Missouri St PB backyard. They weren’t as nice as that SUP but they surfed. Lowel
Yes a nice set up there. I recommend Pete c if you ever need anything done to your Skil.
Yeah I think I have seen those adapters somewhere else.
Leave it to Pete to come up with an example like the Electric Chair.
I totally agree with you.I couild give my 10 year old a $40 WEN planer and the Skil and the outcome would be the same. I just don’t think she could pick up the Skil :) Over the years I’ve gone through quite a few planers (more than I’d like to admit publicly). Most were due to me not taking care of the tools by overuse/abuse with dull blades, not blowing out/off and not replacing bearings in time and melt the plastic housing. I have a bunch of planers that i’ve collected over the past 30+ years of shaping. The first one waws the Skil 676 which I bought at the Sunset Drive-In Swapmeet in SLO for $50 that looked like it was used as a boat anchor. Other than replacing the bearings and brushes and keeping the blades sharp it has never failed. Also, I do like the Hitachi planer and the new modified WEN planer, but it just does have that **feel **that I have with the Skil.
Hi Pete-
Thanks for the advise. I may have to have you take a look at a couple of 676 and 190’s that I have to test the stater windings. Also, just wanted to plug your blade sharpening jig that works so well!!! Now I don’t have any excuses for not having sharp blades.
Yeah it’s one that I made in 2003 and someone brought it in to have me fix a few dings. I might have to pull a templete off it as I did not mark it on the board.
I have to give credit to Barry at Barry Snyder Designs for the help on setting up the swing out vacuum system!
Barry’s vac system is hands down the best I’ve ever seen. The floor outlets are genius. For the hard piping, I recommend using the gray PVC electrical conduit. This stuff comes in big diameters but the elbows and bends are much more gradual than water pipe (to easily snake wire through) which keeping things flowing better. All regular water fittings are compatible also.
Sorry about that electric chair analogy, but that’s the way voltage and current was taught to me back in 9th grade. It was indeed a hideous way to go but was also a part of the deterent factor. Here’s a bit more detail just for McDing: “…the prisoner’s eyeballs sometimes pop out and rest on his cheeks. The prisoner often defecates, urinates, and vomits blood and drool. The body turns bright red as its temperature rises, and the prisoner’s flesh swells and his skin stretches to the point of breaking. Sometimes the prisoner catches fire…Witnesses hear a loud and sustained sound like bacon frying.”
If you own one of the Skil Planer variations, Pete’s Sharpening Jig is a MUST OWN. I certainly agree, with the above quote. The first thing I did with my jig, was to salvage a severely worn set of used SS blades that I had purchased. A pretty impressive tool.
Made a living off that Swap Meet for a year or two. A few Surfboards, Arichokes and Califlower from Castroville. Fun times.
A site to behold obviously. The eyeball thing sounds like that Twighlight Zone episode with Gary Mumy??.
…hello Diamond, regarding the wall racks: if may I, is better to rest those blanks or shapes in “three points” or “two points”; in a plane or line but not that way, to prevent warp, bend etc; even worst with longboards and near the roof.