Official Luthiers Forum!

I see several drum sanders in the $900 range (Performax 16-32, Delta
X-5, Grizzly G1079, Palmgren 81318), then a slight bump up in size and
perhaps quality to the $1200 range (Performax 22-44 and Grizzly 1066),
and then a big bump in price ($3000) to a wide-belt sander (Grizzly
9983, Sunhill SDM-15).

It appears that the Performax 16-32 is the most popular with home
luthiers.

What can you folks tell me about the merits of what's on the market? I am
particularly interested in precision and uniformity. If I want a top at
2.4mm, I want it to be 2.4 everywhere. If I want to try it a bit thinner, I
want to be able to dial in, say, 2.2mm.

Can a $900 sander do that? Or do I have to go to $3000, or more?

Have I missed a gem?

Thanks in advance!

Cameron Reddy

Cameron, I use the Delta 18x36. I'm very pleased with it. You can adjust the thickness on each side to ensure it is even all thhe way across.

You have to decide what width you want to be able to sand. I have this rule of thumb on power equipment. I never use more than 3/4 of the machines capacity. So I would decide if I wanted to be able to sand a jumbos un-profiled jointed back (18"+or- wide) so 18 x 1.5= 27" minimal sanding width. Then I would look at HP and other features, and base my decision that way.

I don't have a drum sander. I use a safety planer or a hand plane at this time or I have the wood vendor sand for me at the nominal building thickness. this is typical a $20 charge per b/s set maybe $15 for a top.

Hope to afford one soon though.MichaelP38953.5113194444

Once again:

http://www.woodmastertools.com/s/drum.cfm

-C

_________________
Freeborn Guitars
and home of BeauGuard©

Cameron,
All thickness sanders will have a little variation due to the sandpaper, the
actual sanding drum imperfections, imperfections in the conveyor, and in
the conveyor belt.

For example, I think a variation of just under 0.005" ( about .1mm) is
very, very good for any kind of thickness sander. Regardless of the cost
of the tool, getting tighter than those tolerances is unrealistic.
Sometimes woodworkers expect the accuracy of metalworking machines.
Howevever, the reason you can get such accuracy with metals is because
they do not give or compress (at least, not to the extent that wood does)
and everything is always clamped and held rigid while the operation takes
place.

I had a Performax 22-44 at one time. It was a very good machine and it
was incredibly accurate. However, It was a slow going process. I have
since upgraded to a Woodmaster. In my opinion, there is absolutely no
comparison between the performance of the Woodmaster as compared to
the Performax. The Woodmaster has also been extensively reviewed by
woodworking magazines and it always is considered the best drum
sander of the test panel. The Woodmaster is no more accurate; however,
it is much more powerful and in my opinion, approaches wide-belt
performance.

Let me qualify that statment tho'. As guitar builders, we aren't going to
be hogging off a quarter of inch of wood. Some wide-belts can easily do
that in one pass. However, the Woodmaster can easily sand 1/32" of
cocobolo without any trouble at all. What this means for a luthier is that
with just a few passes (under a 1 minute of runtime) you can completely
thickness a top or back plate. In reality, I go much slower, because I vary
the thickness with each piece and take my time for the last 0.010" to get
it exactly where I want it. I think the Woodmaster obsoletes the need for
wide-belt because you really won't be saving any time.

Feel free to email me at info@fayguitars.com if you want to talk in more
detail about the Performax machines or the Woodmaster or even some
wide-belts. This was one topic I heavily researched.
SimonF38953.5683333333

I'm with Chas on this one. Woodmaster ROCKS!

-Mark

_________________
Pullman, WA

The more I know, the more I know I don't know.

trippguitars.com
OR
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I use an older Performax 22-44. Works well, very accurate, if a bit slow. Good dust collection is a must with these -- the abrasive will clog up quickly otherwise. I still prefer my scrapers for those final few thousandths.

You might be able to find an old used 22-44 at a good price.

I'd love to get a Woodmaster, but don't think I could get it up to my 2nd floor shop ...

Good luck!

_________________
James Warwick
J. Warwick Guitars, LLC
http://www.jwarwickguitars.com

[QUOTE=Cameron Reddy]....If I want a top at 2.4mm, I want it to be 2.4 everywhere. If I want to try it a bit thinner, I want to be able to dial in, say, 2.2mm.[/QUOTE]
Cameron,
When you say you want it to be 2.4 mm everywhere, that is not reasonable without talking about a tolerance.    Can you live with 2.4 ± 0.5 mm? or 2.4 ± 0.1 mm or do you really need accuracy of ± 0.05 across the entire surface? You need to decide what kind of tolerance you need/want.
With my Performax 16/32, I am able to hold ± .5mm (± 0.002") but that is probably pushing the limits of any sander and I suspect plenty accurate for guitar making.

I would expect the Woodmaster to be a lot better than my Performax 16/32. The Woodmaster is $2200 dollars and the performax is $800. If I was going to make 50 guitars a year, I would look at something other than a Performax. At 4 guitars a year my Performax will never pay for itself, but it does a great job for me.SteveS38953.6420486111

_________________
"An adventure is only an inconvenience rightly considered. An inconvenience is an adventure wrongly considered." G. K. Chesterton.

I have never tried the Woodmaster, but I am sure that it is a big step up in quality from my $900 Delta 18x36.

However, with regard to Cameron's original question, the answer is absolutely "yes," you can do what you want to do with a $900 sander. My Delta is easily within the tolerance you are talking about --- I had to adjust it to get it there, but the adjustment is not difficult.

I have to go slower than some other folks have mentioned. I could never take anything close to 1/4" in a pass --- I would be fortunate to get that in twenty passes on a difficult wood. Spending three or four times as much on a nicer machine can get you that, if it matters to you. But personally, I would rather spend $900 on a less expensive drum sander that may require just a touch more patience and spend the other couple grand on a really nice Laguna bandsaw. At least, that's the route I took. A great bandsaw and a decent drum sander, and you can resaw your own back and side sets from any material you want.

Course, if you have the money to get the Laguna and the Woodmaster, that's not a bad idea either . . . .Kelby38953.6453240741

Cameron,
I have a General International Dual 25" double tower, conveyor feed. It's not perfect, but it's a workhorse.

On the OLF Online Resources page, you'll find a machine in all respects identical to the General Int'l except it has a John Deere Paint Job. The Woodtek. Specs are the same, it's Taiwanese like the General.

Oh, and it's $500 cheaper than the General International. Petros uses one of these and had an artical in the GAL publication where he removed the rubber conveyor to upgrade to a sandpaper drive. Mine is fine with the rubber, matter of fact I like it for multiple passes without having to adjust the machine, each pass being lighter than the last.

Works swimmingly. Weighs 400 lbs or so. HEFTY. But I like it. I'd buy another if it blew today. If I were to upgrade, I'd go with the Grizly small widebelt.

Good luck in your perusals. A thickness sander will put a guy on a path to great guitars. It just felt that way when mine showed up.

I ended up going the same route as Hesh (Performax 10-20 @ $500), as I'll only be sanding sides, unglued top/back plates, and other assorted small pieces. I've been really pleased with it so far. It's not something I use a lot, so I had a tough time justifying spending a lot of money on it.

[QUOTE=SteveS] [QUOTE=Cameron Reddy]....If I want a top at 2.4mm, I
want it to be 2.4 everywhere. If I want to try it a bit thinner, I want to be
able to dial in, say, 2.2mm.[/QUOTE]
Cameron,
When you say you want it to be 2.4 mm everywhere, that is not
reasonable without talking about a tolerance.    Can you live with 2.4 ±
0.5 mm? or 2.4 ± 0.1 mm or do you really need accuracy of ± 0.05
across the entire surface? You need to decide what kind of tolerance you
need/want.[/QUOTE]

Ah... Good point. To answer, however, I needed some of the information
you guys have provided. It seems that it is realistic to expect plus or
minus 0.2mm, maybe 0.3mm. Truth is, even with my fancy and very
accurate gage, It's hard for me to hold the wood perfectly perpendicular
to the measuring points... so I'm not sure that I can even read more
accurately than 0.2mm. That said, 0.5mm is too much variance, it seems
to me.

So I guess my question now is, how much better tolerance could I get
with the woodmaster?

I'm not concerned about how long it takes... I have a thickness planer and
a scrub plane to hog off serious amounts of material. This sander is to
get a final and accurate thickness.

I also have a Monster dust collection cyclone (the Clear-Vue) and two
customized ambient wood-shop air cleaners. Less dust settles in my
basement shop than in the rest of the house! Much less, actually. I also
have a four HEPA vacuums and three IQair HEPA and VOC air cleaners
throughout the house! I'm all over the dust/fumes collection issue. I've
even got a Delta 50-760 dust collector, with a customized two stage
filter, dedicated to my chop saw in the garage!

Thanks for all the help!

Hi Cameron,
The answer might surprise you but I think the Performax is every bit as
accurate as the Woodmaster. I would wager to guess it is also every bit
as accurate as some of the nicer Wide-belts you can buy. Any of these
machines should be able to get you within 0.005" or around 0.1mm. A
proper setup is absolutely essential to achieving these results, as most
machines don't come setup to their potential.

The difference in performance comes from how fast you can send wood
thru -- how much wood you can take off in one pass -- and the surface
quality of the finished wood. The reason I love the Woodmaster is that
the sandpaper (assuming you have adequate dust collection) takes a long
time to load. And once it does, just a few swipes with a cleaning stick
and you are good to go again. With the Performax, it seemed that every 3
passes I had to clean the sanding drum. I just sanded some cocobolo b/
s, bloodwood b/s, and two port orford tops last week - I haven't yet
needed to clean the sanding drum. As far as drum sanders go - that kind
of performance is absolutely incredible. There is not doubt in my mind
that the Woodmaster design is superior to every other drum sander on
the market and it is also very reasonable due to its very simple design.
The motor is also much more powerful meaning that you could probably
take off 1/16" (or 1.6 mm) in one pass without too much difficulty.

Also, I sometimes would experience some slight "ridging" when using fine
grits on the Performax. The Woodmaster will give you a flawless surface
quality every time - absolutely comparable to the wide-belts with platens.

In short, my experience with the Performax is that it does a great job but
sanding can be a chore, especially with oily woods. In contrast, the
Woodmaster is an absolute joy to use. I truly think it is the ideal machine
for the luthier. I only see the wide-belt being an advantage in a factory
scenario. If you build less than a 50 guitars a year - I honestly don't think
you will cut your sanding time down by more than a few hours. However,
if I had loads of money, I would probably get a wide-belt -- just because
they look cool

However, if you are building just one guitar at a time - I think the
Performax is more than adequate. If you are building more than one
guitar and you are on a schedule, I do believe the Performax will
eventually test your patience.

--
Simon

SimonF38953.7524652778

I have an older Woodmaster 36"(maybe 38") sander that I picked up locally for under a grand, rolling cart and tons of paper included, feel really lucky to have found it as it works like a charm, I love it! I use a sled which works just fine.

Greg

_________________
Gwaltney Guitars

Cameron,
   I use a Timesaver that will take a 25 inch wide piece for all of my rough and dimensional sanding. It is an industrial machine that is a little more expensive than many, but it is extremely accurate and fast. It isn't in my building shop, but is kept in a more industrial building about five minutes from here with all of my heavier and bulkier machines that don't need to run on a regular basis. I think I paid about $6k for it used, but in great shape about ten years ago. I may be giving it to a friend soon as I'm looking for a newer Timseaver unit. I probably run this larger unit once every eight weeks for a day as I prep all of my wood for upcoming orders and to stock from rough lumber.

   The sander that I keep in my small machine room in my shop connected to my home is a Delta 16-32 inch open ended unit similiar to the Performax or Ryobi units. It's not heavy enough to handle all of the material removal passes that the Timesaver will, but is where I finish all backs, tops and sides to their final dimensional thicknesses. I never cut on this unit with anything heavier than 120 grit and never take more than .003" to .005" per pass.

   It runs true across a 16 inch wide plate to within .002" which is fine. You'll be hard pressed to set one up to run much more accurately than that across 16 inches since there will always be a slight deflection no matter how light of a pass you're taking.

   There are lots of sanding units that come up for sale used and in close to new condition so keep an eye out for those guys who thought they'd like woodworking more than they actually did ad are selling their gear to get the car back into the garage.

Regards,
Kevin Gallagher/Omega Guitars

Thanks again, guys, for all the advice. I just got the Woodmaster
promotional material and will study that. I'll keep an eye out for something
used, as well. Sounds like almost everyone likes the Performax and Delta for
small shop use, and that the Woodmaster is a worthwhile upgrade to the
extent your tasks may intensify or stock sizes increase... which may be the
case with me as I do some general woodworking as well, and would love to
be able to flatten tabletops, workbenches, and counters.

If anyone knows of a woodmaster going used please let me know!

Thanks!

Cameron Reddy

Cameron...I have a Woodmaster 718 which is a planer/molder/sander. I picked it up used for around $1200. It has really worked well as a planer. The sanding drum attachment is kind of a pain to install but it does work. I have not used it enought to know exactly how accurate it is but my guess is with some care it can do a decent job. The one reason I picked up the 718 is because at 18" width it is just the right size for guitar stuff....not to big and not too small.

_________________
Brad
Avon, OH

I use the General International and yes, it is a little more than some of the others but it is worth every penny. People Point out that it looks the same as the others that are cheaper and they are made in Tiawan, But if you check the specs, the generals are always heavier, That extra weight comes from somewhere. I once saw three Table saws taken apart. All looked Identical, they were a general, a woodtek and a toolex or something like that. What was inside was totally different. The motor on the General was much bigger where the others had plastic general had metal etc. I have also read many reports where it is pointed out that the general machines have much closser tolerances that they allow in the factories and when General does a run they send supervisors from Canada to oversea the factory and make sure they meet the standads. The other nice thing is you will probably be able to sell a general for what you paid for it down the road while the others will depreciate.