My long beltsander

[Charl]

I've been dreaming about a slack sander for quite some time, eventually got one and thought I'll post some pics.
A fitter and turner friend of mine made it for me. Unfortunately he is the type of guy who listens to what you want and then goes ahead and makes what he would want! So I ended up with an all-in-one that could only take very short belts. After cutting the whole thing in half and throwing in an antique motor, this is what I came up with:

[Growley]

Charl,

Looks like you made lemons into lemonade. Have you shown your fitter friend how you sawed his masterpiece into two yet? I've been wanting to use one of those to see how it would work. Maybe some day... Glad you got yours to work. Looks like a winner.

Brian.

[jogilli]

Carl

Thats pretty nice.. i like the cut it in half option... i made mine from a standard belt sander from the hardware store.. but will eventually turn it into something like yours...someday..

with the belt sander you'll find a small learning curve (I did) and a significant decrease in the amount of time required for almost final shaping

james

[Charl]

Yip, indeed! Works like a dream. Can't understand why I haven't gotten one long ago!

[billiard]

That's really cool, I could see how something like that would be extremely useful. Thanks very much for sharing it.

[caskwith]

One day I will get around to building one.

[smokindawg]

The only problem I see with a setup like that is the dust that will be flying all over the place when your using it. I know this first hand from using a small 1" wide belt sander before I got my dust collector hooked up and ran a hose to the sander.

I'm now building a 1" sander using long belts like that and will have to work on some sort of pickup for the dust collector to hook to it. I find the 1" belt sander useful when I want to work on the shanks of pipes, but can see the usefullness of that wider belt as well. I will have to take my regular belt sander apart and see if I can make something such as yours.

It's amazing what we can see from others shops and adapt to our own uses.

Thanks for sharing your ideas as well.

[Charl]

Dust a problem?! Never!
Yip, still need to get something sorted for dust extraction. Just a matter of time..
I noticed that some other guys have 25mm belts, but for me the 50mm works just fine. These I could get off the shelf, instead of having to order to size and pay ridiculous prices. At the time of buying I was thinking that I'll just split it into 25mm if need be.

[smokindawg]

Charl, in taking another look I realized that it wasn't as wide a belt as I was originally thinking. I like it....... Just so happens though that I ended up with a whole box of new sanding belts in the 1" width for free. So that's why I'm going with one that will use belts that width. Also, I already have the parts to build one in that width as well.

It's my next project and I'll start a post when I get started.

I like what you came up with, too bad though it cost you to have made, what you didn't really want made to begin with. Give us a look when you come up with a dust collection idea. I'm interested in seeing what you come up with.

[PipesByDesign]

That is really nice. I'm reworking my shop at the moment and now have the urge to include one of these in my setup.

One question: how do you track the belt?

[Charl]

If you look at a pic of the top arm, you'll see a bolt by the arm. The arm can swing and is being kept on track with a bolt to the left and one to the right.

[PipesByDesign]

Very nice idea! Where did you get the wheels? Seems most places online that offer that kind of stuff want an arm and a leg for them... am I just going to have to bite the bullet on that?

[Alan L]

Back idler wheel with tracking adjustment: http://www.knifemaking.com/product-p/id580.htm

Drive wheels and contact wheels: http://www.sunray-inc.com/

You're on your own for step pulleys to drive it, or you can go all-out king-hell and get a VFD infinitely variable speed unit: http://www.waynecoeartistblacksmith.com ... _VFDs.html

You're welcome.

[jogilli]

I got mine from there guys.. http://www.beaumontmetalworks.com/ and they work great for the belt sander I created... just used and idler wheel attached to a llllloooooonnnnnnggggg piece of iron



james