Sanders Now

In any wood working shop, the edge sander is the second most often used tool, and the first one as you know is the table saw. That’s especially true in case of designs that involve a lot many curves. Though an edge sander is perfect for long straight edges, it can also be gainfully employed to sand inside and outside curves efficiently.

This sanding machine can be exploited to sand large, round table tops by a jig with a pivot pin in the center. You get machines with 6″ x 108″ sanding belts with about a three-foot platen surface. Outside curves can be sanded on the front table while the inside curves are done on the end table using the curvature of the idler drum. The edge sander wouldn’t oscillate and neither the front table nor the platen should get tilted.

The best way for working on this machine is to use a pencil for marking on the work piece the final profile to be sanded, and then cut just outside of that line by about one blade width with the band saw or a jig saw. If the job is too big to be managed on the band saw, use a jig saw for making the cut. Then, use the edge sander for getting the final dimension on the job.

An oscillating edge sander prevents the sanding belts from loading up and thus burning, as it constantly keeps moving the sanding belt up and down with respect to the work piece. You can sand bevels and even compound angles by a sander that has s tilting front table or a tilting sanding head.

Those experienced with handling edge sanders are usually able to know when the belt is going to give up, as it would make some typical rumblings followed by a loud bang. An experienced operator should be able to sense it and avoid getting hurt.

If you are unable to anticipate that the belt is nearing its death, make sure that you don’t use a belt for more than six months in any case. That’s because the adhesive that holds the lap or butt joint together tends to dry out and weaken with time. You would better keep it in mind while ordering sanding belts. That means don’t order belts more than what you are sure of using within six months! Butt jointed sanding belts deliver a smoother finish but lap joints are stronger and less likely to come apart.

Another way of avoiding such explosions of belt is to, as far as possible, avoid sanding sharp, pointed edges that could rip into the sanding belt and split it up. Machine with some coating on the platen, such as graphite, help reducing friction between the back of the belt and the platen and thus reduce heat buildup that shortens the life of sanding belts.

Another essential requirement for any edge sander is a dust collector which must be large enough to handle any amount of sanding dust that is created by the machine. If your present dust collector can’t suck up at least 600 cubic feet of air per minute, you need to add the cost of that machine to the cost of the edge sander. So, while calculating the cost of an edge sander, you must look at the total cost, including the dust collector and not just the cost of the edge sander alone.