Grinder For Finishing Edges

[Luke Hatley]

I did what RBD mentioned in his post. I laid a small drill press on its side. I used a small sanding drum for holster welts and then I made a burnishing wheel from 1 1/2" stacked felt circles on a long threaded bolt for burnishing. I used this method for a couple of years. A few months ago I bought another small drill press for $49 from Harbor Freight. I didn't fully assemble it. I just stuck the head in a cardboard box. Not having the steel pipe in the way gave me a lot more room when sanding and burnishing. One of these days I'm going to get it out of the box and build a decent stand for it, but it sure works very well. I found the felt disks on Amazon and just stuck a bolt through them.

Thinking in the Box................

[electrathon]

Penden,

You have two issues that are stopping your set-up from working.

You need a hard wheel. The buffing wheel you are using is just not going to cut it. You need it to be out of hard wood, hard felt (soaked with wax to make it harder) or something along those lines.

Even more of an issue though is that your grinder is turning way to fast. The grinder listed is going at 2000 rpm at the slowest. With a 6" wheel on it you are turning it more than 3 times as fast (the distance traveled on the surface) as a more common 2" wheel like is in one of the pictures above. If you had a very small wheel on your grinder you likely could use it, but it is just not the proper motor for what you are trying to do. The drill press idea is likely the simplest and is a cheap way to go.

[beans]

I did what RBD mentioned in his post. I laid a small drill press on its side. I used a small sanding drum for holster welts and then I made a burnishing wheel from 1 1/2" stacked felt circles on a long threaded bolt for burnishing. I used this method for a couple of years. A few months ago I bought another small drill press for $49 from Harbor Freight. I didn't fully assemble it. I just stuck the head in a cardboard box. Not having the steel pipe in the way gave me a lot more room when sanding and burnishing. One of these days I'm going to get it out of the box and build a decent stand for it, but it sure works very well. I found the felt disks on Amazon and just stuck a bolt through them.

Good job on your holster edges. Edited July 9, 2011 by beans

[carver]

I bought a used 1750 rpm 1 horse motor off Craig list years ago mounted it on a board with a on off switch . . I make discs out of hard 100% wool saddle pads. Weavers leather sell padding I believe .the synthetic pads will melt I am told . center punch the disc then turn it on true it up with a rasp to get it truley round because never seem to hit dead center for the arbor to go thru . it works pretty good for stuff I dont need a hard glass finish on but doesnt compete with a hand rubbed edge in my opinion

[Trox]

With the new Giardini leather edge paint, all you need is a sander http://www.leatheredgepaint.com/

But perhaps yours a bit of a overkill

Buy the way, that Giardini edge paint was very good, a true time saver with a great result.

Check it out.

Tor