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For those thinking about making your own drum sander, here's a place in Canada which sells drum/bearing/pulley kits for homemade drum sanders

www.stockroomsupply.com

Look for the "V" drum sander under products.

Thanks, that is very helpful. I think I am going to build one.

Well, that looks interesting. Although since I've got a shaft, bearings, pulley and all that (just need to find a metal shop to mill the slot for the pulley 'pin'), I think I'll just stick with 'darn it, could've saved myself some effort!'

How does using a drum sander compare to using a planer? I was looking at a Dewalt 2 speed planer that I thought would be good for thicknessing. Looks like it would be a lot less expensive to build a sander. Is one better than the other? Thanks. Joe

I wouldn't want to touch thin plates of wood with two or three blades mounted in a spinning drum. Thickness sanders are abrasive planing tools, basically, and can more gently, carefully remove small amounts of wood. A planer, especially one that's not optimally sharp, especially on wood with any runout (ie, figured stuff) might very easily turn your work in a nice shattered pile of scraps.

I am making a 24 inch drum sander at this time. I have one that
is smaller that works OK, but the width just doesn't work so well.
On both sanders, I am using 7 inch discs cut out of Finnish
Plywood. This stuff, to me, is kind of a must if you are using
wood for your drum because it is made so well and has no
voids.

I cut the discs on my bandsaw and than drill a one inch hole in
the middle. I glue the discs together and on the shaft. The last
two discs are slotted to take a steel dowell pin which I have
inserted into the one inch shaft. This assures that the wood
sandwich will not become detached from the shaft.

After you have your machine bed set up and square, you need
to place sandpaper on the bed, bring the drum in contact with
the bed and true its circumfrence. It works great!!

I know Finnish Plywood is expensive, but you may go looking
for it at diemakers. I get scraps from a large printing/diecutting
operation near where I live for free. They are glad to get rid of
the small pieces or old dies that they no longer use. Takes a
little bit more time to cut up the pieces, but free is free!!

My sander is modeled after a Kuster model. These were kits in
the late 60's and 70's. I can't find where the company is still in
business. I have PDF files of the entire construction manual if
people are interested. A truly nice piece of equipment. Reply
with your e-mail address and I will send you the plans.

Here's a link to a site that has plans for a drum sander.

http://www.rockslide.org/drum%20sander.html

It doesn't look like it would be too difficult to build. Is this similar to what those of you who have built are using?

Joe

See Don, another Spiderman, see what you started...