Hi Paul,

With that much wood, buy the planer, it should get the job done much faster and probably better.

Some of those 12'ers are less than $300, low enough to have paid for it's self in the lumber you process.

Dan

> Since I am planning to make a lot of strips I am thinking of buying a
> surface planer. A shame there is no place around me where I can rent one,
> as I'll use it for only a few days and store it until another project
> rolls around. I'm considering other options, like using a router or making
> a jig to convert a handheld electric planer into a surface planer. I may
> even forget about planing and use a drum sander to get the strips to an
> even thickness. You'll hear more on this process in late spring I hope.