Thread: What hand belt sander

Norri

Were you pressing down on the sander because if you were this would slow the revs down and overheat the tool hence it cutting out.
Just let the machine do the work the weight of the tool should be enough pressure onto the work piece.

the other thing is you get what you pay for.

regards

Gino

I bought the 1,000 watt GMC belt sander for about $125 and it seems plenty powerful. It almost ran away from me the first time I turned it on. Good power, low price, but then I don't use it for long periods. Gino's point about not pressing down on the unit makes good sense,as it would then be working against itself.

You could probably save yourself a lot of trouble by hooking up some dust exteraction.
it woudl greatly extend the life of both you and your sander.

I have a variety of sanders and a selection of as new dust bags.

you wont get all the duts collected from a belt sander but you will end up with the vast majority in the bag.

Ie had a hitachi for some years & its worked hard.

the other big improvement is to make sure the machine has graphite cloth on the platten.

you may find the gelcoat dust is getting between the belt & the platten & heating up into a glue.
the graphite cloth should help and reduce the tempriture of the belt which reduces abrasive cloging.

Thanks Guys for the advice, I dont think I was pushing too hard because I was working upside down and had a bugger of a time trying to stop it taking off after a while when the arms had had enough. The platten got the hottest by touch so possibly some problems there with gumming up, the dust bag worked really well though. I took it back and bought a GMC 650watt one. It works ok but is a lot slower and the dust catching ability is crap, after useing this one for a couple of minutes it seems as if I just got unlucky with the Ryobi I bought (last one in stock) and the place is not stocking them anymore so I have ordered a 1000watt GMC like kenmils as the 650 is just too slow for the job I am doing. The Hitachi I think is too expensive for my long red haired accountant (wife).
Always carefull with dust I look like a SARs team with all the stuff I wear, works well to scare the door to door salesman away, this person with bright yellow dust from head to foot trying to talk through breathing aparatus, goggles and earmuffs about switching phone companies . Anyway thanks all again for the advice and I will get back to the site with what i think of the GMC1000 as seen through an unskilled belt sanders hands. Norri.

kenmil ,if it tried to get away on you ,you might have a race winner , in america of course.Do a search for racing belt sanders and you will see what I mean.

Originally posted by trevorZ
kenmil ,if it tried to get away on you ,you might have a race winner , in america of course.Do a search for racing belt sanders and you will see what I mean.

The 'International Belt Sander Racing Association"???????:confused:

Only in America !