"Larry Jaques" wrote in message
...
On Sun, 20 Oct 2019 15:36:46 -0700, Bob La Londe
wrote:

Ok... I've talked about them before, but what is the advantage of a
long
belt grinder over a short one. I imagine heat build up in the belt,
but
you would have to do a lot of grinding I think for it to matter.

What made me think of it is I was just using my little 1x30 Harbor
Freight belt grinder to clean up some steel parts. I could have
flipped
them over and decked them off on the mill, but the belt grinder did
the
trick fast enough. As I was using it I was thinking I'd like to
have a
big 2x72, but I don't necessarily want to invest the time to make
one,
or pay the going rate for one. Then I was done. The little 1x30
removed the little .025 lip that was left behind after separating
the
parts with the bandsaw and I was done.

I'm not sure I could have done them much faster on a big grinder.
The
1x30 Zirconia 60grot belt made short work of it, and then the 120
aluminum oxide belt polished them up "good enough."

Am I missing something? I feel like the big 2x72 would only really
be a
big benefit if I was standing in front of it for a while. Is that
right? Well, it would be more powerful, so it could take a wider
bit I
guess.

Mostly, the 72" length lets the belt cool down for knifemaking.
Like Jim said, the angle grinders with flap bits work pretty well
for
dressing off rust and grunge.


They do, but I also use solid flat and saucer disks to shape steel,
such as smoothing welds and rounding corners of machinery parts which
I'll be handling or could snag clothing. The advantages over a belt
are that I can see the surface and small fast-heating parts can be
clamped in the vise. The knife grinder didn't automagically do a great
job, that came from the skill and experience of the operator. I have
more experience making weld beads disappear than grinding blades.

I learned the hard way to be careful where the sparks go when grinding
a welded auto rust repair. The next day the car was freckled with tiny
brown spots that took a while to sand out. After that I used my
home-made welding blankets, canvas soaked in an alum and borax
solution, the old theatre curtain fireproofing formula.