[How do I?] How to make a serrated roller?

[7milesup]

Hello, guys and gals:

I need a new infeed roller for my wood planer. The existing one is rubber and worn out. I have the new one machined, but it needs serrations or knurling for gripping the wood. I discovered that my knurler is not up to the task, so that is pretty much out for now. I thought about using my mill to cut serrations into the roller, but my first two attempts left a lot to be desired.
So, how would I go about making serrations using my mill (or lathe?) As you can see in my photos, there is too much material before the serration for it to grip. This was attempted using a straight 0.1875" milling cutter.

 

[Ulma Doctor]

Maybe a ball endmill in the .125” to .250” range .060” DOC , 20 degree indexing

 

[ddillman]

not sure if serrations will work without a lot of down pressure. I use to have a makita planer that had rubber rollers and there was a company that would rebuild the rollers. I don't remember the name though.

 

[7milesup]

Maybe a ball endmill in the .125” to .250” range .060” DOC , 20 degree indexing

That makes sense. I was planning on having 24 serrations around the circumference of the roller. I will have to look into how the ball mill will look.

 

[C-Bag]

I don’t claim to understand the whole idea of feeding planers but I think the use of metal as a feed roller unless you made it into spikes would never have the same grab as rubber. In my pea brain the grippiest would be a rubber roller that had cuts made with a slitting saw down the length like Doc said at 20deg increments. If that was too stiff and didn’t present enough bite under pressure then try a few radial cuts to give more tooth.

 

[7milesup]

not sure if serrations will work without a lot of down pressure. I use to have a makita planer that had rubber rollers and there was a company that would rebuild the rollers. I don't remember the name though.

Here is a thread about a knurled infeed roller. His planer is exactly the same as mine. I could buy a serrated roller directly from Woodmaster, but what fun is that when I have the tools (I think.) I mean I love struggling with a new project when days of frustration could have been alleviated by purchasing it in the first place

 

[7milesup]

Here are a couple of links @C-Bag for two options from the manufacturer. One is the serrated roller and the other is the rubber roller. I currently have a rubber roller but they wear out quickly in my opinion. They are also offering a urethane roller for a cool $200-ish.

Serrated steel infeed roller.

Rubber infeed roller.

For size reference, this infeed roller is 26" in total length with an 18.5" "working area" in the center-ish.

 

[C-Bag]

Wow, they really don’t want us metal heads to see the serrated roller up close do they! I couldn’t blow it up like I normally would with my iPad. Does it look like it’s almost more like how a reamer is ground? It looks like it would be too coarse and skip.

in the packing house we used this special coarse belt cut into strips and wrapped it on the bias on the drive drum on steep conveyors. We used contact cement with solid rivets on the ends. That stuff was tough and lasted forever. Only once do I remember having to replace it and it was decades old.

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[mksj]

You would need closer spacing of the serrations, too deep or wide may vary the feed rate and may show up as ripples when planing. Have you given some thought to using something like a 60 or 90 degree Chamfer Mill for close serations, another possibility if you mill is large enough would be a slitting saw and an indexer for the bar. What is the diameter of the rod, might look onto an inexpensive bump type knurler to handle a larger diameter or make one.

https://www.amazon.com/Brand-Knurls-Rotating-Knurling-Holder/dp/B07BVQNTDS/ref=sr_1_29

Unlikely to be cost effective, but there are sites that will re-manufacturer/recover the rollers.

New & Recovered Rubber Rollers - Los Angeles, California

Ames Industrial can manufacture and re-condition a wide variety of rubber and urethane coated rollers from a variety of moldable materials.

www.amesrubberonline.com

 

[cathead]

One thing you can likely do would be to get what I call a straight knurl. Then machine grooves
on your roller using a 60 degree thread cutting tool cutting 60 thousandths deep and spacing
each groove 60 thousandths apart all along the roller. Then run the straight knurl all along it
just using a single knurl. After making the grooving on the roller, the knurling doesn't take much
pressure to make a shape that is very aggressive. You could experiment with a more pointed groove
tool and alter the spacing if you want something with more bite.


The knurl tool looks like this:

I bought a pair of straight knurls on E-bay for just a few dollars. I use this combination of machining
and knurling a lot if you really want some grab.





Your roller would have teeth like this.