tell me about flap discs

[Alaniho]

Ceramic resin fibre discs are great for grinding flat weld seams and quick smooth quiet stock removal. VSM and 3M are the best ,especially the new VSM Actirox and 3M Cubitron2 which both have grinding technology way ahead of the competition. But really these are designed for high use industrial situations with hard backing pads.

Flapdiscs are best where you would have to deal with internal corners as fibre discs dont like to be used on their edge. Loads of brands and rebrands of these available, but again look out for ceramic types for best performance.

Also if using ceramic no point in using 600w grinders , 900w minimum to get the best performance, otherwise they may just glaze over.

 

[eyeball]

This ^^^

I jumped on the flap disc a while back, and they are great, but also expensive, especially if you dont know how to dress them.

I am in the camp of those that do not know how to dress a flap disc. Please educate me...

 

[22george]

I am in the camp of those that do not know how to dress a flap disc. Please educate me...

Me too

 

[BajaScout]

Me too

Sounds interesting.

 

[dr_clyde]

Some flap discs are designed to be dressed or “trimmed” during use to extend their life. Most aren’t, and you guys aren’t missing anything.

They’re normally pretty proud of the “trimmable” feature, and advertise it prominently as well as charge 2x for a flap disc that is designed to be dressed.

 

[dusterdude]

Youtube

Sent from my LG-US601 using Tapatalk

 

[ItsNemo]

Unless you're grinding all day, every day, flap discs aren't that expensive and they're so much more forgiving than grinding wheels. I'll opt for one even just for the safety aspect of it.

 

[tarbellb]

Dressing a Flap Disc: Essentially you are removing the outside material of the disc after it has loaded up with material/worn.

If you notice your disc starting to almost polish, coat, or just skip over the material, its been compromised and needs "dressed".

All flap disc can be dressed, some just have a better backing material for it ie some sort of polymer.

How to Dress: take the disc, run it at full speed with the disc perpendicular (like you are cutting not grinding) against a sharp edge or sheet to trim back the outermost part of the disc. Once you have fresh material showing on the edge it should yield better results.

It will stink, and it will create a lot of dust when doing this.

You will gain a few extra rounds of effective grinding by doing this. If you are dropping $3-10 a disc it may be worth it.

Again, every attachment has its place, flaps are great for tight areas, certain welds, etc.... but I have personally moved over to resin disc for the consistency and price for most of my grinding needs.