Are you planning to replace the worn out knife for your saw machine but are confused whether to go for HSS or TCT Planner Knife? Don’t worry! You are at the right place. Here, we’ll try to explain the basic difference between a HSS and TCT Planner Knife, thereby making it easier for you to decide which Knife is best suited as per your requirements.

HSS [HIGH SPEED STEEL] planer knives:

Plane Knives

  • High speed planer knives are also known as HSS. The high-speed steel type was patented in the year 1983.
  • High speed steels are basically alloys that possess their properties from various alloying metals that are added to carbon steel. It generally includes tungsten and molybdenum, or a combination of these two, often with other alloys as well.
  • All types of HSS belong to the Fe–C–X multi-component alloy system where X represents chromium (Cr), tungsten (W), molybdenum (Mo), vanadium (V) or cobalt (Co). Generally, the X component is present more than 7%, along with more than 0.60% carbon.
  • The addition of about 10% of tungsten and molybdenum in total maximize the hardness and toughness of HSS and maintains those properties at the high temperatures that are produced while cutting metals.
  • As the hardness of the material increases, you can use high speed steel with higher cobalt content (5% or more). So, if the material that you need to cut is hard, you can opt for a blade with high cobalt content.
  • High Speed Steel (HSS) planer blades are sharper than TCT blades, which delivers the smoothest planing result.
  • These blades cuts quickly and are cheaper than TCT blades.
  • These blades dull out faster than TCT so require to be replaced or re -sharpened frequently. These knives are less brittle therefore can be sharpened easily.
  • It is often used in power-saw blades and drill bits.
  • HSS knives were generally designed to be used with solid wood like cutting logs for firewood, slicing, re sawing, veneering, re shaping of both hard wood and softwood.

 

We, at Woodford Tooling, sell high quality HSS planer blades and ship these all over the world. You can browse and select best HSS blade from our exciting offers. You can buy HSS planer blades from here.

TCT [TUNGSTUN CARBIDE TIPPED] planer knives:

Planer blades TCT

  • TCT (Tungsten Carbide Tipped) planer knives are also called HM (Hard Metal) Knives, are either solid carbide planer knife or coated with Tungsten Carbide (TCT). Tungsten carbide gives features of toughness, hardness, wear resistance and shock resistance. Tungsten Carbide Tipped blades were patented in the year 1985.
  • TCT coated knives are less sharp than HSS ones. They give less smooth result than HSS blades, but the result is still agreeable.
  • The tungsten carbide tips are capable of operating at much higher temperatures than solid HSS, therefore, TCT saw blades are usually run at much higher surface speeds. This allows carbide-tipped blades to cut at faster rates and still maintain an acceptable chip load per tooth.
  • The biggest advantage of these knifes is that these stays sharp, usually about 5 times longer than HSS knifes.
  • These blades are more expensive than HSS blades but prove to be more cost effective in long run.
  • TCT saw blades are specifically designed for cutting metal tubing, pipes, rails, nickel, zirconium, cobalt and titanium-based metal.

 

It’s really hard to beat our prices with the quality of blades that we offer. If you already know the size of your TCT planer Knife or name and model of your machine, hurry up to buy best planer knives at our special discounted prices!

 

How to decide?

If your task involves wood cutting than doesn’t requires much accuracy and smoothness, HSS planer blades would work just fine for you. These blades will finish up your work faster as these cut quickly and will also save time, energy and overheads like power consumption etc.    

If your work to be done demands high quality accurate results and overweighs all other parameters, then TCT knives would perform well. These works best for metal cutting work.

If you’re looking at long jointer blades, HSS is a proven material, and in case your blade gets shattered down by running nails accidently through your machine, these blades aren’t very expensive to replace.

If you’re looking at a cutter head with segmented knives or inserts or hand held saws, carbide or TCT planer knife is a good choice.

Woodford Tooling is proud to be the largest stockiest of all type of planer blades in UK. If you need further assistance or looking for a specific size? We can further cut these blades to any custom length in order to meet up your requirements. Please feel free to contact us or call us at +44 (0)161 439 5683 and one of our technical advisers will assist you with any query which you might have.