Blanking

Rex's MachineryThe Blanker

The first millwork operation is usually blanking. Almost all lumber that is milled is blanked using the blanker or roughing planer. The blanker is a heavy duty, high speed 30” roughing planer equipped with helical carbide tooling in the top and bottom heads. Foam filled tires act as the feed works. Foam tires are used so that pressure from the feed works will not cause the board to press flat as it passes through the cutter heads. This helps the board get flattened out by removing some of the cup as the top and bottom heads remove the high spots on both faces.

Thickness

When blanking, the thickness is usually set at full thickness of 1/16” less, producing a hit or miss surface. Much of the rough surface is removed from both faces, taking off any mill/kiln dust and dirt as well as making the board uniform thickness.

MachineOperation

Machine operations after the blanker can have the feed works set tighter if the lumber is uniform thickness. The hit or miss planning also allows the color and grade of the board to be seen better, allowing for better optimization and selection. Sorts can often be made at the rear of the blanker based on widths, lengths, color or grade. Sorts are limited by the space available behind the machine

Even if you prefer to do your own millwork, consider adding blanking to your rough lumber order to save the labor of several passes through your single surface planer. Blanking also cuts down on the wear and tear of your equipment and dulling of the high-speed steel of the planer. Blanked material is easier to sort in your shop for color, grade and grain, allowing you to increase your yield and decrease your overall cost.

Capacity

The capacity of the blanker is ½” to 5” thick and 2” up to 28” wide.

Stock Blanks

While we have the ability to create blanks from any species of lumber that we carry, or from clients’ lumber, we also carry Poplar stock blanks. Moulder blanks are easier to stack, save you time and money at planer and rip saws, and produce less waste.

Additional Services

Once your lumber has been run through the blanker, it is prepped and ready for additional services. These could include:

Cabinet Planing – Double-sided cabinet planers provide a smooth finish and greater customization.
Ripping – Rip one or both edges on rough lumber. Improve your yield and reduce waste with our straight line rip and gang rip services.
Resawing – We can resaw center, apply a resawn face to a moulder blank or finished moulding, or make skins using our multi-pass resaw.
Computerized Cut to Length – Our computerized, cut to length saw cuts lumber or mouldings and defects material. We make, optimize and defect cabinet, door, and stair parts, and create trim packs.
Moulding & Custom Mouldings – We make new moulding profiles, match profiles, and can re-run to similar profile to make them saleable.
Sanding – We provide flat wide belt sanding, profile sanding, and sand flat boards and panels. Our profile sander sands almost any moulding.
Priming – We offer interior/exterior water-based priming, interior/exterior alkyd (oil based) priming, and other custom finishing options.
Buffing – Our priming and buffing services smooth out primed surfaces and knocks down raised fibers.
Custom Finishing – Custom finishing options include sealers, stains and dyes, lacquer and other topcoats, bleaching oil, deck finish, and FRT coatings.
Kiln drying – We have 500,000 BF of kiln capacity with dry kilns located in our Englishtown, New Jersey and Acton, Massachusetts locations, and experienced kiln operators to dry lumber to your specifications.
End-matching – Our end-matching equipment can apply T&G profiles to the ends of flooring and paneling.
Glue Up – Our glue-up capabilities allow face gluing up to 6” thick, edge gluing up to 28” wide.