Chris:

I don't know how it will work for your specific product mix, but my choices are
as follows:
- 6x48" vertical belt sander (can also sand some curves on the top roller
without too much effort)
- Oscillating vertical drum sander (next best for dealing with curves)
- wide belt sander (24" open end, can do 48" in alternate passes)
- 6x80 edge sander (as you might guess, I don't do a lot of long, flat edges,
and can take care of the few table top edges I do work on with hand operated
power sanders).

Note that the first two take a very small amount of relative floor space. The
wide belt sander takes more, because it takes the place of a large drum sander
(for table tops, I would really rather have a multiple drum, 60" wide drum
sander, but I don't do enough tables to warrant the thousands of dollars one of
these costs). Given the cost of sanding belts these days, you could easily
substitute an equivalent width drum sander (24" to 30" open end drum sander) and
still be able to sand a 48" wide tabletop. No matter what any salesman will try
to tell you, there will be some manual sanding necessary with any double pass
sander like this, but it's still better than doing it all "by hand" or with a
hand operated belt sander...

I use the 6x48 vertical belt sander for typical sanding tasks, plus sharpening
lathe tools, and even use the top roller for curved items (less now, given the
oscillating drum sander), still, a really coarse belt on the 6x48 allows one to
hog off a lot of unwanted wood before going to the oscillating drum... (of
course, a decently close cut with the bandsaw would help just as much, but
depending on whether you already have one, it might make a difference in your
thought processes). THe oscillating drum sander typically runs a 2" drum, so
you can't hog off a lot of wood, but it's good for medium cuts and pre-finishing
processes.

Of course, wide belt sanders and wide drum sanders are typically used for tables
and such, and have limited utility beyond that, unless you use them for
surfacing boards for other projects (a decent planer can get things close enough
that a wide drum or belt of 150 or finer can be used), but if you don't have a
planer, coarse belts/drums can be used in place of a planer if you don't have
one, and are patient. Feeding too fast is the biggest problem of most belt/drum
sanders, leading to premature loading of the "paper" and subsequent burn marks
in the project.

Thanks
--Rick

" wrote:

I'm trying to decide what to ask Santa for Christmas this year. Or really
which web page to get SWMBO to order from. The method of work that I'm most
frustrated with is using my bench top drill press as a drum sander. All my
other powered sanders are the hand held type, so I'm thinking a multipurpose
sander.

For a hobbyist wooddorker who makes mostly chairs, tables, cabinets, etc
which sander would you guys recommend?

The Grizzly G1531 6" x 80" Edge Sander
http://www.grizzly.com/catalog/2004/106.cfm
This lets me do some serious edge sanding for table legs and such. The
contour part should do most of what I want, but not everything. The radius
looks to be between 2-3".

The Grizzly G0529 Oscillating Spindle / 12" Disc Sander
http://www.grizzly.com/catalog/2004/104.cfm?
It be a better choice for contour sanding since it oscillates and would do
multiple radii. Not sure how well the disk would work for longer pieces
though.

Or I could go cheap and get the Grizzly G9922 Oscillating Spindle Sander
http://www.grizzly.com/products/item...emnumber=G9922 and get a edge
sander later on.

If you can't tell, I like Grizzly. My shop is mostly green and it's worked
out pretty well.

Thanks!
Chris Corbett