I have been on the lookout for a used 8″ jointer for the past 6 months or longer. All of a sudden I had one fall into my lap. (Figuratively, so I was fine). The jointer was in great shape and only needed some light surface rust removed and just a general cleaning. I had three items to update on the jointer: Replace knives with a spiral (helical) cutter head, longer power cord, and 6″ dust collection.

So here is the jointer, it is a JET JJ-8CS. I started by removing the fence, motor cover, belt guard, and the cutter head.

The first item to replace was the cutter head. It is really quite easy, but a few things to know before jumping into it. First, You will need a 3 jaw puller (gear puller, etc) to remove the pulley and bearing supports from the existing cutter assembly. Second, when assembling the new cutter head, place the belts around the pulley first before setting into place. Third, plan on shimming the cutter head. On the straight knife head, you can adjust each knife to be parallel with the outfeed table. With a segmented head, you cannot do that. I suppose if you had a parallelogram style jointer you could make it work, but this one is a dovetail slide style. I had to shim the side opposite of the belt a small amount. It probably isn’t the best material, but I used hvac tape doubled over onto itself. I should have planned ahead and had actual shim stock on hand.

YOU TUBE VIDEO

At this time I also ensured the beds were co-planar and installed the head. I should have checked for alignment of head to table at this time, but I started assembling everything back together (due to excitement), which I later had to dismantle to shim the head

Power Cord

I was a little worried about replacing the cord, since I didn’t do that on my previous jointer. The head and dust collection was completed on my last one too, so I had confidence there. It wasn’t bad at all, just a little tedious. First I removed the switch cover and figured out where the wires were going and how they routed. The blue lines represent the field power wire locations (Left to right: Hot, Hot, Ground)

It was simply just removing the old wiring and pulling it down through the switch. Slide the new power cord through, cut to length, strip. Then attach crimp-on terminals and put them back in place. After I was done at the jointer I added a 220V plug on the other end. I should have mentioned that I bought a 25 foot 12 gauge 110v extension cord and just cut the ends off.

Dust Collection

I modified my last jointer to have a 6″ dust collection port and so my shop and dust collection is aligned with that. So, I used a 6″ HVAC take-off, and elbow, and some plywood to create a dust shroud. I drilled corresponding holes in the plywood that matched the existing pattern on the jointer and mounted. Then taped the hell out of it and attached my hose. You can kind of see it on the bottom left of this picture:

The jointer is working great and I can’t wait to run thousands of board feet across it