I’ve owned a couple of planers in my time and have always had a real love of this particular tool.
For some reason whenever it’s time to pull out the planer I always seem to get a little more amped up than most of the other power tools and find the task of planning quite therapeutic.
When I was pulling AEG’s new 18V Brushless 82mm Planer out of the box I instantly loved the grip, balance and way it fitted so well into my hand. The rubber texture and design were great and I hadn’t even pulled the trigger yet.
The Main Areas Of Focus That AEG Has Listed As Key Features Are:
- Brushless motor, which produces maximum power, better efficiency and longer runtime.
- A unique negative chamfer adjustment, which allows adjustable and repeatable chamfers every time.
- Dual side dust ejection, meaning you won’t get covered in dust and wood fragments.
After removing a few sections of timber from some old sliding door frames into a pile of sawdust on the ground, I can happily say that overall the AEG team have done a great job on this planer.
Powerful Brushless Motor
To test out the muscle of the brushless motor I grabbed sections of Oregon and hardwood timbers that we had on hand to test. The sound of the planer in action, along with the feel is what truly indicates how easy or hard a planer is working. The depth of the blade will also test how hard the motor is working.
When planing both Oregon and hardwood we set the blade depth at various settings across the full range.
Even when set at 1.8mm on the hardwood the planer didn’t struggle or labour at any time. The planer, in short, had more than enough grunt to cope with our materials.
Micro Adjustment Depth Control
The precise micro-control knob performed very well, and a clean click on each 0.1mm adjustment made it very easy and quick to fine-tune your required depth settings. Even though in our tests we opted for the heavier usage option
I would love to use this micro-adjustment when renovating an older-style house where timber floor was out of level and skirts had to be adjusted in detail. This micro-level of adjustment would excel in these conditions.
Negative Chamfer Adjustment
Most of you will have experience using the chamfer guide on the aluminium plate of the planer, but this is the first planer I’ve seen or used that allows you to adjust the chamfer to get individual and specific results. This added flexibility will allow you to reproduce exact chamfers time and time again.
Dual Side Dust Extraction
Along with the negative chamfer adjustment, this is the first time I’ve owned a planer with dual side dust extraction, which makes it perfect for left or right-handed use.
Being a lefty myself, learning how to control any planer in the right-handed position took a while to perfect, so this feature will see a reduction in wasted timber with left-handed tradies and apprentices in particular.
More Features
Also worth mentioning feature-wise is the sturdy diecast aluminium shoe plate, which will stand up to years of usage. Well, six years actually with AEG’s awesome warranty.
There is also a lockable kickstand feature to keep your blades in pristine shape.
A safety lock-off switch will stop any accidental triggering of the tool and last but not least there is an onboard blade wrench and a spare set of blades (x2).
The Wrap-Up
This well-balanced planer comes in at an impressive skin-only weight of 1.39kg and with its max depth of 2mm and a no-load speed of 14,300/min it has all the right specs and features to mix it up with the competition and yet again, proving that AEG is continuing to lead with innovative new tools, in a very competitive trade space.
