Im buying a new 25" planer looking at Martin format4 and SCM

What im going back and forth on are the infeed and outfeed rollers.

Segmented steel , single spiral-toothed steel or rubber for the infeed.

And Sandblasted steel or rubber for the dual outfeed?

Would love some input on the decision.

My concerns are feeding 100 stiles and rails through the machine quickly , yet not maring the surface. ill also be dimensioning rough lumber for table top glue ups amongst everything else in between.

I know it wasn't your question but have you considered running your stiles&rails on a molder?

I have but first i would like a better planer for other shop duties as well

In my experience the steel outfeed rollers leave more road rash than rubber, especially when only removing a small amount.

I would get segmented steel infeed rollers, rubber out feed.

I would also get a carbide insert spiral head. They last forever and don't tear out figured wood.

Bill thats what im leaning toward and have on my current spec sheet. segmented steel infeed rollers, dual rubber out feed.

Kinda boils down to how good of a thickness sander you have. If you go with steel, you'll likely have to do some adjustment on spring pressure if you will do a light skim cut. But if you do that light work on a thickness sander, then steel works fine on the planer since very light cuts will seldomly be made.

The format is a wonderful $12k planer. It's too bad they cost $18k.

I have one, I was looking for a used Kolle, considering a L'invincibile, but ended up with the felder. It isn't the same class as the Martin or upper end SCM

As for infeed rollers, I'm surprised they offer solid. Assuming you're in the USA I thought that OSHA required segmented (kickback safety). And if you are doing multiples you really WANT segmented, otherwise you will invariably get at least one piece sticking because it doesn't have the same pressure.

For the outfeed I would be afraid of chips sticking to a rubber roller and making dents in the finished product. Smooth steel is all I've ever used - SCMI, Powermatic, Northtech 2-sider and Ironwood 2-sider.

Based on a previous poster's comment that one of those machines is $18k, have you considered a 2-sider? We have a Stiles/Ironwood 25" 2-sider and it does an awesome job. My recollection is that it was around $25k, although that was probably 6-8 years ago. It does have insert knives on a spiral head, but they are double edged, about 30mm long, and are held in place more like a traditional planer knife as opposed to the typical spiral head 14-15mm square ones that have a hole in the middle. They are much better at indexing and give a really nice finish. Also, they last a long time. We use ours mostly for roughing so it's not as critical, but we flip/change them once a year and we typically run 150-200 MBF per year.