Question about Planers

Is there a big difference in the planers used to shape? And why? I was thinking about purchasing the Clark Foam 03 Planer from EZ Foam. Does anyone think this is a good planer? It says it can be attached to a vaccum. Any info would be great!

                                        Thanks, 

                                                   Da Cheetah

I have 3 Skil’s and 5 Hitachi’s and after 40 years of watching foam fly, I like the weight of the Hitachi. I even have a Chicago Electric, Chinese knock off of the Hitachi that I use to only knock down gluey stringers. The body would be better if they were cast from aluminum, the bearings get hot and melt the bearing seats out of round, then it is on the scrap pile, but you can buy them easily and cheaply to replace

Thanks Jim! I’m living in Japan now and I heard Japan has a couple of good planers do you think you could give me some advice on what good planer I could get my hands on here ?

Or a model # of that Hitachi you were talking about?

Hey jim how does that chicago electric work? Thanks

The Chicago is identical ti the Hitachi, it has a different front shoe, so I replaced it with the modified Clark shoe from a trashed old Hitachi, it took only a minor sanding for the center post. The stock is a threaded spiral screw that takes the typical zillion turns lock to lock. The Chicago seems to load up with chips although it looks the same, fine for grunt work