Angle grinders, questions & aldi review

Sep 29, 2018 5 Replies

Some questions.



I was happily grinding my angles when the bearings began to go. The gearbox was hot though the motor was cool, and it felt like an engine that kept mi ssing. It made unwelcome bearing noises as it spun down. Also the metal was bouncing about a bit on the disc surface, which the new machine doesn't do . So the bearings somewhere in there are almost toast. Is it worth unscrewi ng the gearbox & lubing or anything? It's a cheap Ferm I got 15 years ago f or £15 or 16, I certainly can't complain.



Got a new grinder from Aldi. Was going to get a Mak but Aldi had them in st ock, Screwfix didn't so changed my mind, needed to get on with it. It runs smoothly. It has a huge long tail, perhaps for better stability I don't kno w. Holding the trigger on is a bit of a pain, the old Ferm just locked on. It has a more effective guard - 2 in fact. But I think it's faulty as the d isc spins up much slower than the motor does. Just wanted a quick sanity ch eck that this isn't some weird sort of mechanical soft start mechanism. It did the job no problem though. It has variable speed too, not often useful but will be for paint stripping.



Aldi also have 4 diamond discs for 3.99, & 10 cutting discs + 1 grind disc for 3.99.


NT


Well maybe it does have some form of soft start to not load the motor too much at start which is when it will draw most current. No idea how they might do this unless its some kind of centrifugal clutch. Brian

My angle grinder has a soft start more than likely due to a centrifugal clutch as the motor turns at full speed whilst the disk slowly gets up to speed. A clutch seems a good safety feature considering the potential for the cutting disk to jam.

Richard

I've never seen a mechanical one, even though this sounds like. Never come across a soft start "4 inch" one, but my big "10 inch" one is (they have quite a kick without).

I can't imagine why they'd include one on a low price machine. I'm just crossing my fingers it's not faulty.

NT

Quite. My large Lidl one bought some years ago has a soft start. I've got three small ones, none of which do. Including a posh name one.

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