Felder Silent vs. SCM/Minimax Xylent vs. Byrd Cutterblocks/Heads

[Marlow]

Wondering if anyone has had any experience using the SCM/Minimax Xylent spiral cutter block on a jointer/planer?  Not much info available on the web. Ideally, I'd like to see direct comparison of this head to the Felder and/or Byrd.

 

[Timtool]

I have the Felder and when I look at the SCM I have the impression that it's a "fake" spiral block. The individual knives appear to be practically parallel to the block, instead of following the spiral curve like the Felder does. So you wouldn't have the "shearing" effect that makes spiral blocks interesting.

Perhaps this can be confirmed by the fact that it uses (or not) special curved cutters like the Felder, and not standard square cutters.

You would still have the advantage of spreading out the cuts, but it would still hack the wood and not shear it. But then it has 3 rows and a more aggressive spiral shape, so perhaps that makes up for it.
It's all assumptions based on the pics though!

 

[Marlow]

Interesting observations, but of course the proof of performance will be in the pudding, i.e., the quality of cut judged by those that have actually used these.  The SCM xylent head has been available in Europe, but I get the impression that its not in wide use (yet) here in the US.

 

[bertv]

Some solid information on after market helical cutterheads:
https://www.canadianwoodworking.com/tools/introduction-helical-cutter-heads

(May be dated…)

 

[Marlow]

Good article: too bad they left out the Felder head (and the article does pre-date the availability of the SCM Xylent head). 

 

[J0hn]

I have the Felder and when I look at the SCM I have the impression that it's a "fake" spiral block. The individual knives appear to be practically parallel to the block, instead of following the spiral curve like the Felder does. So you wouldn't have the "shearing" effect that makes spiral blocks interesting.

Not sure what you mean by 'fake spiral block'?  They look almost identical to me, what am I missing?

Felder
[attachimg=1]

SCM
[attachimg=2]

 

[rljatl]

[member=19713]J0hn[/member]

For one thing, judging by the pictures you posted, the SCM cutters look like they are square to the board while the Felder cutters are set at an angle, giving a shearing cut.  The shearing cut gives less tear out, little to no scalloping and a smoother finish, almost like a card scraper.

 

[bertv]

I tried to find some info regarding patents and my impression is that cutterheads with an axial placement are covered in this patent:http://www.google.ac/patents/US5083887
… and manufacturers either have to license it or work around it by placing the cutters parallel to the 'face'.

I may be completely wrong (probably am).

 

[Timtool]

Not sure what you mean by 'fake spiral block'?  They look almost identical to me, what am I missing?

As Rob mentioned, on the Felder you can clearly see that the cutters are placed at an angle, while on the SCM they look almost parallel to the block.
They don't look perfectly parallel but the angle is clearly lesser than the Felder, the close up also shows that the cutters appear rounded like on the Felder. Those cutters are expensive, I would certainly try to find out how much there are on the block and how much they cost.

 

[J0hn]

OK - I see what you guys are saying now, thanks for 'schooling' me 

 

[TheSergeant]

Also note the carbide inserts on the Bryd heads are curved slightly, almost like how you camber the edges on a hand plane blade.  My suspicion is that this reduces 'track marks' left on the surface.  I have a Shelix head on for my Dewalt 735 but haven't installed it yet.  I just picked up a new old stock 1991 Delta DC-33 13" planer and want to run that through it's paces before I commit to the 735.  I'm kind of hoping I prefer the 735 just because a Shelix head on the Delta is more than 2x the cost of the 735 at ~$900. 

If it were me I'd take a closer look at the Bryd heads. 

 

[Michael Kellough]

I'd like to see/hear a comparison of the Silent and Xilent cutter heads, and the Byrd Shelix.

 

[Marlow]

Michael: So would I, which is why I posted this inquiry.  It would appear that there are not many users of the Xylent (or I've also seen it as Xilent) cutter head yet in the US.  It would be nice to see some positive press on this: all that I've been able to find are reports of how quiet it is: that is nice, but it has to plane beautifully as well.  Marlow

 

[Michael Kellough]

Michael: So would I, which is why I posted this inquiry.  It would appear that there are not many users of the Xylent (or I've also seen it as Xilent) cutter head yet in the US.  It would be nice to see some positive press on this: all that I've been able to find are reports of how quiet it is: that is nice, but it has to plane beautifully as well.  Marlow

Literally, as in the photo above.

 

[Marlow]

Exactly.  Xilent/Xylent.  Maybe its a translation thing, but I've seen it in SCM documentation both ways???

 

[Steven Owen]

The helical blade look promising.  The Dewalt 735 sells for $699 in Canada including the shelves.  The Byrd cost $500 per a cutting head.  You need two of them.  The irony is you’ll spend more on the helical cutters than you ever did in the machine.

It’s kind of like buying an ink jet printer.  The parts cost more than the machine.

The biggest mistake people make is not buying the OEM Byrd cutting heads.  The non OEM sized throws the DW 735 depth out by 1/16 making the machine work harder with more passes which results in a small amount of snipe. 

The OEM blades give a much cleaner cut on the DW 735.

 

[AtlantaWood]

I believe both cutterheads are very similar and perform well. Regardless, the advantages of the helical cutterhead are noise reduction, carbide material, possibility to replace individual damaged knives, and greatly reduced tear-outs with a much smoother finish on difficult wood. The true comparison to be made would be to plane similar boards in both machines and identify the small differences in finishing and chips if any.

The SCM Xylent cutterhead knives are set at an angle and not parallel with the blade. Without a direct picture of the cutterhead it is hard to judge which cutterhead has more or less of an angle. I would imagine the optimal knife degree/angle would be dependent on the curvature of the spiral around the cutterhead and number of knives. The SCM Xylent cutterhead appears to spiral around the cutterhead more and have less knive overlap.

The 410mm (16") Xylent cutterhead has 66 knives total.
The 520mm (20") Xylent cutterhead has 84 knives total.
The 630mm (24") Xylent cutterhead has 105 knives total.

Videos of these cutterheads
SCM Xylent Cutterhead Video where several knives are removed.=339

Below are the noise comparisons between the Machines
SCM Xylent Cutterhead DB Noise Comparison (88db standard to 75db with Xylent Cutterhead)=55

Felder Noise Comparison (90db Standard to 80db with Silent cutterhead)=109

 

[Marlow]

Since this old post has re-surfaced, I will take the opportunity to sing the praises of the SCM Minimax Xylent Cutterblock. I've been using if for a few weeks now and it provides superb results: as good or better than the Byrd head, which I thought was fantastic. 

 

[Kwai]

Since this old post has re-surfaced, I will take the opportunity to sing the praises of the SCM Minimax Xylent Cutterblock. I've been using if for a few weeks now and it provides superb results: as good or better than the Byrd head, which I thought was fantastic.

Hi Marlow,

First post on the FOG!

I've got a SCM FS41 Elite with a standard cutterblock and was thinking of upgrading to a spiral block. I have a choice of either retrofitting the SCM Xylent cutterblock (kit available from SCM $$$!) or the Byrd Shelix cutterblock.
My main reason for wanting to swap is NOISE. Of course I'll appreciate the other benefits as well
From your experience, which cutterblock would give the best noise reduction?

Any other observed performance differences between the two cutterblocks would be appreciated as well.

Thanks!
Kwai

 

[Cheese]

FWIW...I put a Byrd Shelix on a Dewalt 735 and it reduced the noise level by 10-12 dB.  [cool]