Hammer

[Sedgar2156]

Hello fellow green Kool-Aid slurpers,

  I am new here. A few weeks back, on another board, I asked about recommendations for a replacement Shop-Vac. I was instructed to look into the Festool dust collectors. I had always steered clear of the Festool displays in woodworking stores, because once I had looked at a price tag for their tools. Talk about sticker shock! Anyway I came home with the latest and greatest offering from Lowes. It was packed in the box and broken before it ever left the box. Looking at the thin plastic, it was no wonder it broke. This was touted as a top of the line unit. BAck to Lowes we go and got a refund. I held my breath when I hit 'complete order' on Amazon. I was impressed with the quality of the materials and the features on the CT 36. The outlet for the tool to engage the motor and the variable suction were a welcome addition. Not to mention the suction, my Rockler dust separator threatens to implode. A Dominoo 500 and systainer full of Dominos followed. Festool is really a breath (expensive) of fresh air from the offshore built offerings in the woodworking tool category.
  Sorry for the Gettysburg Address, but I wanted to provide a little background to how I arrived here.
  I am now looking at Hammer/Felder for a combination jointer/planer. I saw a few members had posted that they had or were waiting on delivery of their new Austrian built machine. How do you like them and would anyone mind answering some detailed questions before I order mine?
  Thanks for reading this far, Regards, Steve

 

[Picktool]

Hey Steve, due to space limits I bought the Hammer A3-26 back in December
and took delivery end of March. Yes you will be waiting.
If you go the A3 route, make sure to get the Silent Power head.
It's either/or. Cannot add on down the road.
Im still finishing off my dust collection but I did run a few small
boards thru and the cut was incredible let alone quiet.

[member=11290]TomGadwa1[/member] made a mobile setup w/ a car jack. Pretty Cool.

I dont think a CT-36 is going to work for the J/P.

Other than that others will chime in and give better experience
because I havent had much time to work with mine. Im just
a weekend warrior with limited time & space.

Enjoy it if/when you get it.

Ronnie

 

[nako]

Hi Steve, I have the Hammer A3-31 with the quieter helix cutter head for a few years and have been very happy with it. I have a cyclone style dust collector for chip collection.  You might be able to run your machine without dust collection, but the cut quality will be diminished by chips falling back onto the board as it goes under the cutter head and this will cause small depressions or divots on the finish surface.  The volume of chip material will be overwhelming for a dust extractor unless you use some type of diversion canister.  You should begin thinking about getting a dust collection system that can provide at least 600 cfm at the dust shroud on your JP.  That means you should be looking at a dust collector with about a 2-3 hp motor minimum.  Lots choices and new learning for you there and hope you have fun!

 

[rvieceli]

there is a Felder/Hammer owners forum on ye olde interwebs athttp://www.hammerfelderowners.com/

Also if you do a search here on FOG for Hammer you should pick up a bunch of threads

 

[Picktool]

You also have the FOG group on Yahoo
https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/felder-woodworking/info

Restricted but send in a request and you should be granted access.
Alot of info on there but pretty much higher end Felders & Format4s
and some ultra precision topics. Neat stuff.

Ronnie