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I currently have a Grizzly 18" open end drum sander that i have had for about 5 years. It has served me well but, as production is picking up and I am still building in my spare time I thought it would be nice to shave some time off from thicknessing material. The abrasive feed belt on it takes a lot of baby sitting and doesn't feed itself very well.
Fortunately I now have a back log of orders and some funds to purchase some equipment. Budget is up to $4000. My dilemma is that I do not have a lot of room in my basement shop. So moving anything stupid big in there is not an option. I do have a walk out which helps.

So... I am looking for input from others that may have experience with dual drum or wide belt sanders. Am I gaining much with a second drum?
I know that a wide belt is superior to a drum sander for the most part but the most reasonable one at 18" is over $5500! I have been scouring Craig's list and Ebay for several months and nothing has come up that fits the bill so I am looking to buy new.

Thanks!

Tommy

IRS auctions (Industrial Recovery Services with no affiliation with the government)

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Stupidly good deals if you are patient. Wide-belts can be challenging if you are buying used but if you have a bit of patience to go through the machine thoroughly, you will likely end up with a $10k or greater value machine for a few grand or less. If you want something new, then I recommend Grizzly's 18" wide belt. It is a very good sander for lutherie purposes. Whatever you get, research the product because many of the larger widebelts aren't really meant for short pieces (say under 1 foot in length).

Regarding widebelts vs drum sanders -- there is no comparison. The drum sander is great for smaller pieces but you will pretty much never have to worry about the abrasive loading with dust if you go the widebelt route. I do not remember fondly my days of scraping the sandpaper with a rubber cleaning stick when I had my Performax 22-44 -- and I dreaded sanding woods like Cocobolo. Night and day difference with the widebelt.

I have what would probably be one of the better duel drums, a General, and to put it simply, there is no benefit. I do at times use it with two grits for cabinets but I always use only one drum for guitar work. Most back and sides get thicknessed with 60g and tops with 80g. They burn just like any thickness sander. You could put 120 on the front drum for Spruce but you won't really gain much IMHO. Wide belt and drum sanders are two very different animals. It would be nice if a company would come out with an affordable single phase wide belt. Hope this helps you make your decision.

Pining For Wide Belt Danny

I agree with Danny - I had a 25" dual drum and have since gone with a 16" single drum sander which works just as well with a much smaller footprint.

once you go wide belt you never go back. I have a grizzly 18 in I had the larger 2 drum but there is no comparison . You can control the removal rate and changing a belt in seconds beat the drum sander. I can also sand things to .010 if I have .. I had some issues with the machine when I first got it. Bad motors and control board but after I rebuilt that it works flawlessly ever since .

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We have two Drum sanders one is a dual 37" Performax and the other is the little 10-20. I usually only put abrasive on one drum -- so with the 7 HP motor the 37" is pretty efficient and very accurate. I always take a second to scrape off the any excess glue and find that the drums stay relatively clean for a long time. I use the blue zirconia abrasive and it is far superior to the other materials. Cost $6.00 or so to change abrasive.

Now all that being said, if you have the power and air available and "really need one" -- as John has mentioned the wide belt sanders (good ones $$$$) actually perform a little better and for sure abrasive changes are more simple.

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Ken Cierp

http://www.kennethmichaelguitars.com/

Thanks for the input guys!
I pretty much knew the wide belt is the way to go but was hoping the dual drums would come close. The biggest problem with the wide belt is getting into my shop. I have air and and single phase 30 amp circuits. And although I have a walk-out basement, I cant back anything right up to the door. Lots to think about...

Thanks again!

Tommy

I'm looking at a Supermax 19-38. Seems to solve my space and accuracy problem, easy to change paper and the price
is right.

Brent

Performax/SuperMax are no longer American Made Machines Jet took over a few of the products but the rest went to places unknown --- That 19-38 looks to be the old Ryobi cantilever frame design which did not get rave reviews -- never used one, just a heads up.

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Ken Cierp

http://www.kennethmichaelguitars.com/

I did see a few years ago a Steel City Wide belt. I remember it being a little narrow like 14" or something but I think it was like 3 hp 220. Might be worth a look.

The steel city is 15", so you'd still be doing a lot of double runs.

I've been pining for the jet 22-44 oscillating sander. Even just an inch of oscillation would likely make a big difference in the skid marks.

Sure miss the Timesaver 36"...

One way to save time thicknessing is to use a portable surface planer to bring the wood down to approximate thickness, and then use the drum sander to bring it to final thickness. Wide belts are very nice for a production shop, but as an amateur luthier, I would be hard to justify the expense. Thicknessing wood is a relatively small percentage of the time I spend building.

I'm pretty sure I've had just about every common belt and drum sander in my shop over my career. I started with the 16/32 and the infeed table was machined improperly so I couldn't keep a feed belt on it for more than about a minute. From there I moved up to a general dual drum 25". As I was setting it up I couldn't get a level cut. (granted, I'm very picky and was narrowing in on .003") As it turns out, the second drum mounts were welded out of square and no matter how hard I tried, shy of retrofitting, there was no way I was every going to get a square cut. General told me to return it. I did so for that 15" steel city belt. I liked that a lot. Really loved the fact that the belt oscillation was mechanical vs air. Only problem was that it didn't work. Steel city sent a guy to look at it and he said that I got a lemon. Really? I BEGGED him to figure out a way to fix it but he said he couldn't. So I returned that to SC. Back to a 16/32 for a short while. Now have the open ended Grizzly belt. It cost a fortune but I love, love, love it. Wish I had all of the time back I spend monkeying with the other machines.
My advice: if you are even thinking of a wide belt, think no more. You'll never be sorry.

We had and sold a 15" open ended wide belt -- it was a PITA having to double run top and back plates. I see Shop Fox now has an 18" open design which would work well in a guitar making shop.

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Ken Cierp

http://www.kennethmichaelguitars.com/

General makes a 15" open ended wide belt also......

http://www.general.ca/products/1_genera ... 5-030.html

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It's easy to recommend a wide belt over a drum sander, because one is just a toy compared to the other. That said, not everyone has a need for a production machine like a wide belt sander. Drum sanders will do the same thicknessing, provided that time is not money to you. I've been through the drum sanders from my original homemade one, which I still have and use for bridge and a few small parts, to single and double drum ones. Double drums seems to be a worthless concept to me. Never used more than 1 of the drums. I'm on my second wide belt now, and if something seriously problematic and unrepairable happened to my current one, I'd be on the phone with credit card in hand. Can't live without a wide belt once you've had one. Somewhere earlier in this thread it was mentioned that only 30 amps were available for your new machine. That's worth looking closely at before going ahead. You will need to run the sander, a dust collector, and a compressor at the same time. In my case, with a 25" sander, I'm running 20 H.P. and lots of dawn amps when things start up. It's fun buying new machines. Good luck!

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