I'm Losing Sleep Over Bench Grinders (Long rant alert)

[6PTsocket]

I have seen them branded as both Delta and as Rockwell, and as both. 1x42", yes.

Not surprising. For a time Rockwell owned both Delta and Porter Cable. My band saw is a Rockwell. Then they were bought by Pentair, then Black and Decker who in turn was bought by Stanley who sold off Delta to Chang Type, a Taiwanese company that moved Delta from Tenn. to a new plant in North Carolina. More than you ever wanted to know, probably. Thanks for the info; I will look for both brands. The Rockwell period was a definite low point. They introduced home grade products that were total junk.

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[macgee]

That Delta looks beautiful.They go really fast. I think the one I missed on CL went for $40. Is there an import knock off available? I don't know why there is nothing similar.
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I don't want to hijack this thread from the OP with his grinder-apnea.

He needs help finding a solution to being able to grind something so he can sleep better.

Your welcome to PM me if you want more info but Dayton, Foley, Sears, Mead made the same ones or very similar knock-off 1" x 42" grinders. Almost all of them (99%) will need new belt wheels. That's why the one I listed above on craigs is a good deal.

Grizzly and Jet make current knock-offs but prefer the aboves with a VFD.

Actually the old Rockwell - Delta machines in general were very good consumer level machines.

Here's a good thread on replacement grinders: http://www.garagejournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=271667

 

[MikeF2316]

Hmm, it's interesting to see differing opinions here. I use bench grinders pretty often. But the grinder with the stone wheels is the least used. The grinder with the wire wheel and 3m Scotch-Brite wheel is the absolute most often used grinder for me. That said, I do a fair bit of prep or cleaning work with them.



I have 4 grinders mounted but one of them is going to find a new home, soon. I'd like to replace it with a heavier duty unit that I could polish with.

If you do fab work a grinder is handy. I could work without them but it would take me much longer.

OT: I like the little side box, I want one. Where did you get it?

I don't have a bench grinder either. I make do with an angle grinder. My dad didn't have one when I was growing up either. When we needed one, we mounted a wheel on his wood lathe. Most of the time that lathe actually had a wire wheel on it.

 

[sberry]

I was at a sale and my neighbor snagged a nice little belt sander I was looking at. This is something I wouldn't mind, wouldn't have to be heavy but a 1x30 or so as I don't have one.

 

[Coach James]

I bought a Craftsman a few years ago new that I imagine is an import, but it has worked fine for me.

I also have a Dremel 1731 I inherited from my dad that has been getting more use and the grinder less.

Coach

 

[FMC1959]

One thing for sure, get a quality, like the $300 Baldor, that won't bog down constantly. Poor quality tools makes you not want to use them. Good quality you will use more and find other jobs to use on it because it does well.

I do not know how old you are but $300 on that Baldor will last last over 40 years. A cheap under powered unit will last 5-10 years, along with frustration. The $300 Baldor will pay for itself long term, even if you use it once a week.

BTW, for the belt grinders, I am no expert, but they do come in many belt sizes. Maybe some of the advocates can name a few of the more popular sizes so having a good variety of belts and prices is available.

Kind of like having a 10" grinder, beast of a grinder, but nowhere even close to the selection of stones, wire wheels and other accessories you find on 6" & 8" grinders

 

[WWheeler]

I have to say I'm luvin my $100 8" Dewalt that I just got so far. I trued the wheels up with a dresser and it's so smooth I can barely tell it's running. I traded out a stone for a wire wheel and I can't bog it down hardly if at all and that's if I'm shoving metal into it harder than I would ever need to or probably ever should just trying to see if I can slow or stop it. This is a huuuge improvement over the 6" grinder I'd gotten by with for 10 years. Not even in the same league.

 

[MacMcMacmac]

I have to say I'm luvin my $100 8" Dewalt that I just got so far. I trued the wheels up with a dresser and it's so smooth I can barely tell it's running. I traded out a stone for a wire wheel and I can't bog it down hardly if at all and that's if I'm shoving metal into it harder than I would ever need to or probably ever should just trying to see if I can slow or stop it. This is a huuuge improvement over the 6" grinder I'd gotten by with for 10 years. Not even in the same league.

I'm glad it's working out for you. We have the same one at work and it's a gutless piece of junk. I am wondering now if there isn't a bad capacitor in ours somewhere.

 

[WWheeler]

I'm glad it's working out for you. We have the same one at work and it's a gutless piece of junk. I am wondering now if there isn't a bad capacitor in ours somewhere.

I'll admit a lot of it may well be that I'm just not used to having used anything better to compare it to except a 6" Wen I got new for $20 around ten years ago which still runs and I was always able to get done with it all I really needed to use it for. I never really bogged it down either and it never got hot or anything, but I can't really imagine anyone calling this Dewalt "a gutless piece of junk". It's a complete beast of a machine compared to that old Wen.

 

[Packard V8]

How anyone gets along without a bench grinder is a mystery to me. I have four in a row on a bench with different stones and wire wheels. Then have a 1"x42" and a 4"x72" belt sanders.

Yes, there's a time and a need for hand-helds, and I have several, but those of us who do a lot of fabricating, welding, rusty part reclamation, couldn't get along without several bench grinders.

jack vines

 

[lbhsbz]

For a bench grinder to run stones, I use an old craftsman block grinder...but it rarely gets used. My everyday go-to is a harbor freight unit that I've converted to a 1x30 belt grinder on one side and have a scotch brite wheel on the other side. It takes 3 seconds to change belts, and about 30 seconds to install/remove a platten/tool rest, so it's much more versatile.

 

[mbshop]

Got pics please ?

For a bench grinder to run stones, I use an old craftsman block grinder...but it rarely gets used. My everyday go-to is a harbor freight unit that I've converted to a 1x30 belt grinder on one side and have a scotch brite wheel on the other side. It takes 3 seconds to change belts, and about 30 seconds to install/remove a platten/tool rest, so it's much more versatile.

 

[rick carpenter]

I just today brought home a Dewalt DW758 8" Bench Grinder....

It does have a tiny bit of wobble to it but I suspect I just need to dress the wheels a bit. I'm almost sure that's all it needs, but I'm still waiting on a diamond wheel dresser I ordered to show up.

I have that same DW758. The wobble is due some to the arbor holes on the wheels not fitting tightly to the arbor, but mostly due to the stamped flange washers. I've tried indexing the wheel to the washers to the arbor, dressing the wheels, etc without real success. Keith Fenner has some good youtube vids on milling accurate nuts and flanges, I emailed him to see if he could gin some up for me but he never answered.

Now I just have wire wheels on both ends and a flap wheel outboard of the right wheel. At the print shop I retired out of in '14 we had a 6" grinder that was dead smooth. I know it was a cheap unit purchased off the state contract list, so I guess we were lucky. I can't remember what brand it was, maybe Craftsman.

 

[zkling]

Bench or pedestal grinders were really designed for sharpening tools, primarily lathe tools and drill bits. With the invention of carbine, furthermore, carbide inserts; tool sharpening has become largely a thing of the past in industry. Coated abrasive machines were always big in industry for heavy stock removal, primarily in disc form. Belted abrasives are nothing new or modern either.

A bench grinder isn't as great as a dedicated buffer or wire arbor, but rather versatile. While one can sharpen drill bits and HSS lathe tools, even milling cutters free hand if skilled with a belted abrasive, the hard stone makes it much easier to keep the edges from rounding over due to belt flex.

 

[lbhsbz]

Got pics please ?

Don't mind the mess

I built a base out of some 3/16" steel I had laying around, bent the 2" flat stock for the box on my HF bender. The top pulley is a timing belt idler from a 4cyl. Camry, on an arm tensioned by a spring from an old green HF 4x6 bandsaw. If I did it again, I'd make the lower drive pulley larger to increase belt speed...It was supposed to be larger, but I had trouble machining it (buddy had used my lathe earlier and when he switched the jaws back to the way I had them, failed to tighten the fasteners appropriately, so things kept moving...took about 5 tries before I figured it out, at which point I was running out of diameter).

 

[-Brent-]

OT: I like the little side box, I want one. Where did you get it?

Came with some other boxes that I bought. So, I don't know anything about the model number and such. Sorry!

 

[fatfillup]

I buy a bench grinder at auction at least 4 times a year. Mostly Cman blocks but have Baldor's, and Wissota's also. Bought one 3 weeks ago, don't remember the name but it was cast iron, heavy as all get out and 1/3 hp. It was quite old. Ask the auctioneer if he plugged it in, he said no, I called him chicken sh#t I know him pretty well.

Bought it for $2. plugged it in. Ran smooth. Unplugged it, carried it outside and put it in my truck. It was still spinning

Sold it the next morning for $45 and the guy loves it.

 

[btdobie]

I buy a bench grinder at auction at least 4 times a year. Mostly Cman blocks but have Baldor's, and Wissota's also. Bought one 3 weeks ago, don't remember the name but it was cast iron, heavy as all get out and 1/3 hp. It was quite old. Ask the auctioneer if he plugged it in, he said no, I called him chicken sh#t I know him pretty well.

Bought it for $2. plugged it in. Ran smooth. Unplugged it, carried it outside and put it in my truck. It was still spinning

Sold it the next morning for $45 and the guy loves it.

I need to go to auctions in your area. Unfortunately I'm surrounded by farmers here and they love to come to auctions and bid up tools. I can still get some good deals later in the day once everyone has spent all their money though.

 

[mbshop]

Very nice. Gives me some ideas. Thank you !

Don't mind the mess

I built a base out of some 3/16" steel I had laying around, bent the 2" flat stock for the box on my HF bender. The top pulley is a timing belt idler from a 4cyl. Camry, on an arm tensioned by a spring from an old green HF 4x6 bandsaw. If I did it again, I'd make the lower drive pulley larger to increase belt speed...It was supposed to be larger, but I had trouble machining it (buddy had used my lathe earlier and when he switched the jaws back to the way I had them, failed to tighten the fasteners appropriately, so things kept moving...took about 5 tries before I figured it out, at which point I was running out of diameter).

 

[exmaxima1]

Very nice. Gives me some ideas. Thank you !

If you build a belt grinder make sure you use an adequately sized drive wheel to get a realistic surface speed. For ferrous metals a 5" or 6" diameter at 3450 rpm will yield the ideal sfpm. For softer metals, plastics, wood, etc a tiny wheel like that shown above will be marginally ok, but will take a long time to get anything done.

 

[fatfillup]

I need to go to auctions in your area. Unfortunately I'm surrounded by farmers here and they love to come to auctions and bid up tools. I can still get some good deals later in the day once everyone has spent all their money though.

I do live within an hour auction central USA

An auctioneer told me that there are more auctioneers per capita in Lancaster County PA then anywhere else in the country.

Note, not all auctions are great. Its a numbers game. You go to enough auctions, you will find deals. Some items never sell cheap at auctions though.

 

[EOC_Jason]

I would check CL all the time too, also went to a lot of garage sales & estate sales. Estate Sales are good to look on CL and if you see good pics of the garage sometimes you can hit gold. Also sometimes there are Facebook Garage Sale groups for your area, you can sometimes find good stuff there.

I found a NIB 8" craftsman bench grinder locally on CL for $50 so I grabbed it since they are pretty scarce around here (bench grinders in general). Rated 3.0A / 1.4HP, it had just about no power. Okay for light grinding but when you stick a wire wheel on it you can stop the motor very easy. Ending up selling it after having it about a week for $75, literally hours after posting on CL.

Found an older model 8" Dayton on eBay that was NOS / NIB. Seller only had stock photo (of a newer model) and a picture of the box. Figured I would take the chance after looking over the specs on the Grainger website. It was $100 + $50 shipping (It was very heavy). So it shows up, new in the box as described... Motor is stamped 1987! And the seller had TWO! I was going to grab the second one but instead of BIN he did an auction and price started going up so I passed. It's a 3/4HP but rated at 10.8A! It is a beast and still scares me every time I flip it on I go running around the corner! But I can wire-wheel anything and it doesn't bog down. I use the stone for sharpening my lawn mower blades, chisels, drill bits, grinding down whatever...

Not too long after I saw on an Estate Sale what looked to be a decent shape CMan block grinder, so I went early and was able to grab it before all the other guys showed up, paid $20 for it. It was a 1/2HP / 5.2A rating... It was rough and needed a lot of cleaning, but ran smooth and was complete. It has plenty of power, but not as overbearing as the Dayton. It runs so smooth in fact I still haven't bolted it down (but I need to).

Lastly I found a little 1725 RPM 1/6HP homemade buffer that I bought for a few bucks. Need to build a little box for it and re-do electrical but it has a good strong motor and will work great for polishing small parts.

I have a couple stones, wire wheels, scotch-brite stripping wheels, unitized deburring wheels, and various polishing wheels. They all have their purpose. One thing I don't like doing is taking off the stones because it can take a while to get them balanced and I'm a perfectionist, lol.

The side-to-side wobble is usually due to the stamped steel washers on the bench grinder. Only thing I can say is do not overtighten! Here is a good link on how to tune up your wheels and remove that side-to-side wobble. It takes a little time and patience. I didn't put paper on the side of the wheel, I just used a pencil and marked on the blotter area. One tip I would recommend is to always have the wheel the same orientation when you tighten it (i.e. always put the text up) because even that can have an effect. I usually start out turning one of the washers 90 degrees at a time till I find the least runout, then use those little stickers to fine-tune it.

http://www.geigerssolutions.com/Tuning-Up-a-Bench-Grinder.html

I've also had wheels that were egg-shaped, you could watch the wheel get closer and farther from the rest as it spun. I bought one of those diamond impregnated dressers on eBay and was able to true it up back to round.

I would take the wheels off your grinder when you get it and see how it runs with nothing on it. If it's smooth then you know any vibration is caused by the wheels you put on, hence the need to shim & dress them true.

Anyhow, my point is, don't be too dissuaded. Some of the best garage sales I've found were never listed online and were actually on the way to another garage sale or I just saw them while running errands. But also Estate Sales can be good for garage stuff if you show up early before everyone else picks it over. I've seen a few good things on CL (including some Baldor's, with stands even!), but they always sold by the time I called...

 

[LarryFahn]

My dad used to have a hf bench grinder. It ran fine for the once a week type of grinding you're talking about... But you better make sure that EVERYTHING was cleared off that workbench or it would be on the floor within 2 seconds of turning it on. The wheels were true, the motor was not.

That said, I work in a metal shop and our ancient grinder finally died. We bought a Chinese grinder for $400 instead of a Baldor or Dayton. The plates that the wheels bolt to were so out of true that the plates were removed and faced. When you work with good machines, you don't want to go home to junk. You won't use it. Instead, you'll take the stuff into work. Get a good one. Spend the $300 and you'll be glad you did.

 

[carbon]

If you like the 1" Rockwell belt grinder mentioned above, try this with or without the motor (from $99 to $250):

http://www.vieltools.com/detail.php?p=NTQx
http://www.vieltools.com/detail.php?p=NTQy
http://www.vieltools.com/detail.php?p=MTU3Mg==

Or I think this guy sells them from the USA instead of Canada:
http://sharpeningmadeeasy.com/belt.htm

It's marketed as a knife sharpener but it'd grind just fine. If you have more cash search for 2x72 knife grinders. I was on that path until I lucked into a 1.5x60 burr king for $600 that spins at 8000 sfpm. Thing eats metal. Not for sharpening!

Here's the tip of the belt grinding iceberg: http://www.beaumontmetalworks.com/shop/

There's also bolt together kits (not kmg). Key is to search for 2x72 knife grinder. Good luck!

 

[carbon]

Or modify your angle grinder for very little $:

http://www.instructables.com/id/Homemade-Angle-Grinder-Holder/

 

[Macrosloth]

I looked for a while before settling on a 8" king canada model.. Its 7 amps and ball bearings.. Seems decent enough for the price.. Only think I wish is that I payed a little more and went to the 10" model. Not sure of a better grinder for the price though.. For reference the dewalt model is only 4.2 amps....

If there is a better grinder for the price I'd love to know.


https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B00KXFRWD0/?tag=atomicindus04-20

Cheers

 

[1982fxr]

Or modify your angle grinder for very little $:

http://www.instructables.com/id/Homemade-Angle-Grinder-Holder/

Those videos are truly cringe worthy.

The second one...that guy is a Darwin Award waiting to happen wtf!!!???

 

[carbon]

Those videos are truly cringe worthy.

The second one...that guy is a Darwin Award waiting to happen wtf!!!???

Lol, I wouldn't do either long term with a disc. A wire wheel, however…