Comments on: DEWALT DW734 15 Amp 12-1/2-Inch Benchtop Planer

By: J. Sander "Boz"

J. Sander "Boz" — Tue, 15 Jul 2014 10:16:07 +0000

Disappointing start, but a wonderful machine I purchased this machine about six months ago after being extremely impressed with my neighbor’s DeWalt DW733 planer.After just a few uses with some Pine boards, I felt that something wasn’t quite right. After calling DeWalt and explaining the problem best I could, they were stumped and suggested I take it to my local DeWalt service center, which happened to be just a few miles from my house. After a week or two, the said they had found nothing wrong with it. After testing it upon return, I could definitely tell that something had been fixed, tightened, adjusted, whatever. It worked great for a very short time after that on Pine and Cypress boards, but more problems began developing. Dull blades seemed to be the culprit, so I attempted to flip them. But guess what — one of the blades had already been flipped! I replaced all the blades with new ones and the difference in performance is incredible. It is now the wonderful machine that impressed me so much at my…

By: Joey "Joey 5362"

Joey "Joey 5362" — Tue, 15 Jul 2014 10:11:17 +0000

Great planer for small shop. I was one of the first to get the DW734 from Amazon. Other than the 3-knife head (with 2-sided disposable blades instead of resharpenable) and some styling details, the 734 planer appears to be identical to the previous model, the 733. I haven’t been able to get any detailed info on changes between the two models from any source I researched.It was set up right on the money out of the box except that the cut depth gage is off by around 1/128″ (not enough to matter). I was pleased that it came with a dust hood (4″), something not listed in any of the info I was able to get before the purchase.The cut is silky smooth–unless you look very closely in bright light on a darker wood surface (like walnut) you can’t see any blade marks at all.The machine functions very well–easy to set up, the controls operate very smoothly and precisely, and each of the features works as expected without needless fiddling. The dust hood, even though only 4″, clears chips…