Skiving With A Drum Sander

[glennaycock]

Just curious if anyone else has tried skiving with a drum sander. I have been wanting to skive the ends of my belts where they fold over. I don't have a skiving machine or even a knife, but I do have a drum sander. So I tried a simple experiment to reduce the thickness by half. It worked quite well. I raised the drum up and inserted the belt about six inches from back to front, lowered the drum until it grabbed the belt + 1/2 turn. Then I turned on drum and let the conveyor belt slowly carry the belt through. It worked beautifully. The only issue is that the grain sided needs to be protected from the abrasive conveyor belt.

[katsass]

Just curious if anyone else has tried skiving with a drum sander. I have been wanting to skive the ends of my belts where they fold over. I don't have a skiving machine or even a knife, but I do have a drum sander. So I tried a simple experiment to reduce the thickness by half. It worked quite well. I raised the drum up and inserted the belt about six inches from back to front, lowered the drum until it grabbed the belt + 1/2 turn. Then I turned on drum and let the conveyor belt slowly carry the belt through. It worked beautifully. The only issue is that the grain sided needs to be protected from the abrasive conveyor belt.

FWIW from the grump; I have used a simple drum, mounted in a 3/8 vari-speed drill to reduce the thickness at the fold for buckles (I mount the drill in a bench vice). Works quite well. Also works well for sanding edges on curved areas of holsters. I have also used a table mounted belt sander to clean up some nasty, 'harry' flesh sides on veg tanned lesser quality leather, works well also, if you back the leather with a piece of wood to keep even pressure on your work, although you usually need to trim the resulting furry edges. Mike.

Edited December 24, 2011 by katsass