Running Steel through Thickness Sander

I remember seeing where Timesaver reversed the direction of the abrasive belts on their wide belts for sanding metals, i.e., the typical wood sander abrades towards the infeed side/throwing dust up onto the unsanded part of the board whereas the metal sanders throw onto the freshly abraded surface, i.e., and forevermore, bass akwards to what we are used to. I suspect they (the metal sanders) have to have one hellava holding system to keep the metal from shooting through the sander.

There also may be an issue with feet-per-minute speeds of wood sanders especially if you are wanting to sand something that you want to hold and edge later on, i.e., don't want to screw up tool steel with heat generated.

Just a thought.

UA100

SO did you try already? BTW: "carbide" is not steel, but at least with carbide you have no problem with heat softening. Maybe you need a different sanding belt, and also you have to theink on how you mount the new blades so you don#t change tha cutting angles.

I'm pretty sure he was talking about sanding the hold-down bars so that the slightly thicker carbide knives would fit...

BTW, my grizzly widebelt's drums sp> Glen Duff writes:

Are you sure the 1/8" blades won't work? I too had an old Delta jointer and bought 1/8" replacement blades. They barely fit, but they did go in. And as I was told by my supplier and found out by myself. Even if the new blades are thicker than was called far, as long as they fit and can be tightened down, they will work fine.

Preston

Considering how little I sanded down on the hold down bars I'm not surprised you could fit in a 1/8" blade. The 1/8" thick sample hardwood I made did not quite fit in but it may have been as much the gum and superficial rust. However, a little sanding will make them easier to fit in and the ends of the holding screws will still be well away from the blades.

Anyway, it seemed to work well for me.

Glen Duff

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Prest> Are you sure the 1/8" blades won't work? I too had an old Delta jointer and

I suggest you clean up all the sawdust in the shop and keep a fire extinguisher handy. You may get lots of sparks.

I once lit my pants on fire using a bench grinder.

Many have done the same thing rough grinding a chisel bevel on a belt sander.

Barry

By 16 Feb 2004 08:48:33 -0800, snipped-for-privacy@spamcop.net (Fred the Red Shirt) decided to post "Re: Running Steel through Thickness Sander" to rec.woodworking:

/ts