20" Disc Sander or a 6" Edge Sander?

[Kevin Jenness]

I have a 10" disc and shopmade tilting table that I can mount on my lathe. They rarely get used but did come in handy for fine tuning the fit of a batch of miterfold joints in slightly cupped engineered stair tread material, working off the corner of the disc to make slightly concave curves. Now that I think about it I could have used my tilting table spindle sander. I don't have tilting tables on my edge sander. In any case, if I had to pick one stationary sander it would be the edge sander for versatility. Those Kundigs are great machines but my basic Progress unit does a good job. I really like having the vfd for speed control.

[Alex Zeller]

For years I kept thinking about making a 20" disc for my lathe before I finally did. I find I use it a lot more than I ever thought I would. For the table I got a cast iron table form an old Craftsman table saw I picked up at a garage sale for $20. One advantage a disc sander has over a edge sander is if you make things like boxes you can sand all the legs at the same time so it'll sit perfectly flat. Having variable speed is really nice.

I found a 30" Max disc and oscillating spindle sander for a really good price but hesitated due to it's weight and being 3 phase that I regret not buying. It was a beast but if I knew then what I now know the 3 phase would have been ideal. While a 5hp VFD isn't cheap it would have been worth it. For making chairs 30" diameter would be ideal. If I was to get into making chairs I would make a 30" disc for my lathe. That being said I often think about getting an edge sander (or even a stroke sander).

[John C Bush]

I have the Griz 1140 6"x 80" edge sander and use it all the time.(Hobby shop) I had a PM model and the table position adjustments were more of a hassle to change but otherwise it worked well. Had a Craftsman disc/belt sander and never used the disc. I plan to upgrade to an oscillating model with a longer platen. Rarely need more width but more length would come in handy. Not sure how much effect a 1/4" -3/4" oscillation would help but getting more use from the belts would be a good thing. The Griz has a table height adustment wheel that makes it easy to move to fresh paper. I have a Griz 1071 ossc. spindle sander as well and I use the idler end on the edge sander for inside curves more often. Much faster. Try to find good "seanless" paper too. The cheaper stuff I have has a "bump" at the seam-works OK but gets annoyng. Good luck shopping.

[Bill Dufour]

At an estate sale I saw a interesting belt sander. It was factory made of weldements. Maybe 6" wide by 48" working length. Thing was it was vertical with a small table at the bottom. Not sure if it was for wood, metal or stone.
Bill D

[Wes Grass]

Sounds kinda like a glass 'sander' a friend of mine had. Any bucket for water under the bottom roller? 'Litton' pops into my head. No idea if it was a company property tag on it, or the mfg'r. I know they made glass lathes. Shop next door to us did a lot of glass-metal seals. We made a fair number of parts for them, and other big companies out of Kovar and Alloy 42. Dad took me over there for a tour. I remember watching with my mouth agape seeing them bonding glass and metal together. All I remember was oxidizing the metal so the glass would bond with it. And then there was another company bonding gold plated heatsinks we made to silicon. Heat and ultrasonic.

Sorry ... ;-)

Re disc sanders, I was looking for one for awhile, and considering the variation in surface speed and width on the disc I considered 'useful', I was figuring I'd want a 24". I think I've since changed my mind and the HS-950 is on my future list of toys.

The big combo disc/spindle machines are interesting, but 'massively' out of the question. One of the State tilting spindles would be nice, but for the little I'd ever use it a sleeve on my shaper spindle should hold me for the rest of my life.

[David Walser]

Keegan -- I have an edge sander in my shop, which I use regularly. I don't have a dedicated disc sander, but I do have a lathe. My lathe has a 24" swing, so turning it into a 20" disc sander is child's play. Simply mount a 20.5" mdf disk onto a faceplate and true it up on the lathe. Mine is made from a double layer of 3/4" mdf so that the screws holding the mdf to the faceplate don't telegraph through to the face of the sanding disc. It's not quite as convenient as a dedicated sander, but it takes up a lot less room.

[Mike Hollingsworth]

If I gave up woodworking I would keep my edge sander. Crazy Useful.
Mine has oscillation but I don't think it's necessary.

[Warren Lake]

I do my finger nails on it, saves a lot of time

[Aaron Inami]

One of the things that I believe make the Hammer HS-950 such an accurate and stable machine is the design of the platen assembly. The platen itself is a 12mm thick piece of machined steel (that is 0.47" - almost half an inch - i.e. NOT sheet metal). The frame has 5 vertical cross members that are welded to the top and bottom. Each cross member is mounted to the 12mm plate using two bolt points. There is no flex or bend on the platen of this design.

In comparison, the Jet edge sander has a similar design, but only 3 vertical cross members. The platen looks like a thick machined steel, but it looks like the platen is mounted to the top and bottom of the case instead of bolted to the vertical cross members.

Like I said before, all the Grizzly edge sanders (except for the big 9x138 Powermatic clones) all use sheet metal for the platen that is mounted to some square tubular steel frame with one mount on one side of the machine.

HS-950 pics:
HS950_Platen.jpgHS950_Platen_2.jpg

[Robert Hayward]

The head on that 950 sure has a lot of similarities to my China import edge sander. I could have posted a better picture but did not want to remove the belt this late in the day. If you would like to see more I will take the belt off.

[Matt Day]

Edge sander, but my 20” disc gets a lot of random sanding duties including metal. Not sneaking up on a miter with 80grit - wrong tool.the end he sander will be very helpful when you need to sand flush a bunch of doors for instance.

[Aaron Inami]

The head on that 950 sure has a lot of similarities to my China import edge sander. I could have posted a better picture but did not want to remove the belt this late in the day. If you would like to see more I will take the belt off.

Is that the Baleigh ES-6100? I looked it up and it appears this is one of the better designs. The platen definitely looks like my HS-950.

[Wes Grass]

Nothing beats a disc sander for dressing the ends of steel tubing. But it ain't wood ...

[Robert Hayward]

Is that the Baleigh ES-6100? I looked it up and it appears this is one of the better designs. The platen definitely looks like my HS-950.

Yes, that is the ES-6100. The entire head looks to be a lot like the 950.

[Mike Stelts]

I gave my 1950s belt/disc combo to my daughter and bought the Felder HS950, which I now wish I had it 10 years ago. However, sometimes I miss the disc sander for little touch ups. Thanks, David, for reminding me I own a lathe!