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Posted

Damn, I realize now that buying the granite slab offer by Tandy was not a good idea but eah, it was a year ago and I was beginning in the hobby !

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Posted

The cut and polish changes everything. Cut to size and polished changes it from scrap to a table top. You were treated fairly.

Yeah, I wish mine was polished and rounded edges. The guy at our shop took me to a pallet and said "like these?". I said "sure" and grabbed the top one and went on my way. They actually pay to have them hauled away. But, it's all rough edges. I just taped some folded up paper towels over the edge to give a nice surface in case I accidentally drag my leather that direction..

Posted

Yeah, I wish mine was polished and rounded edges. The guy at our shop took me to a pallet and said "like these?". I said "sure" and grabbed the top one and went on my way. They actually pay to have them hauled away. But, it's all rough edges. I just taped some folded up paper towels over the edge to give a nice surface in case I accidentally drag my leather that direction..

Put a stone on your angle grinder and you can soften/roll the edges pretty easy. Keep moving side to side, do not stay in one spot. Pretty easy to do the basic shaping of the edge profile. If you want it polished you will need some diamond pads.

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Yeah, I figure if I'm going to go through the work to round it I'll want it polished too. Maybe if I had an angle grinder to start with, but I don't feel like buying one just for that. Once I have a project I need one for though. For now I know it's not going to scratch up my work.

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I got my 20" X20" slab when my wife bought new countertops, asked for the remnant and they cut rounded and polished it. I still paid for it but to me it was free!

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FWIW you can get a 9"x12"x3" granite surface plate for $40 delivered from http://www.grizzly.com/search/search?q=granite%20surface%20plate&cachebuster=417378007726428.3 Larger ones are available. Surface plates are used by machinists as a reference flat surface for their near absolute flatness. I have two, one on my leather workbench and the other for my wood shop in the garage. Their thickness (and hence mass), their (relative) portability and their guaranteed flatness all work for me. Tooling occupies only part of my time. I have smallish leather workbench and like to be able to move my pounding surface out of the way. I found some cabinet liner material that is slippery on one side and kind of tacky on the other. I cut a 9"x12" piece and put it upside down on the underside of the surface plate. This allows me to easily "slide" my 40lb. slab of granite into and out of my immediate work area as needed. When the block is stowed toward the back of the bench it is still within easy reach to set a snap or cut a belt end with a quick blow or two from my maul. I also use the surface plate's guaranteed flatness when I lap my splitter/skiver blade to a high polish using 3M's abrasive polishing papers. In terms of bang for the buck, my granite surface plate is one of the most cost-effective and useful tools I have. The only thing is that it bothers me from an ecological point of view. I can't reconcile in my mind how a precision block of solid granite can be cut and highly polished in China, shipped to Grizzly stateside, and then finally delivered to my home workshop for $40. I don't even want to think about the carbon footprint involved...

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Posted

ha, I just have an old headstone that the engraver messed up. Its nice because it is slightly angled so my neck isn't entirely shot after a lot of tooling. Also use a chunk about 24x12 and 4-5" think. Luckily I don't have to mover it very often. Free from the headstone guy and big one was given to me by an older leather worker not using it.

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My dad and I got ours from a Monument cutting place near us. The tombstones that have stuff cut into the front starts with a square slab and when they start cutting out for the design they usually have to leave a lip around the edge for errosion. It is already rounded and smooth edged where they hollow it out. They also have a hole drilled in the corner where they start which makes it easier to pick up and move around. We each got a huge piece of black granite. Free. Consider this as an option.

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Their is a shop out here that lets me pick through the scrap bin and take what I want for free. I've made 4 stops and have taken about 5-6 each time.

Rough edges and some over cuts but I put layers of tape to protect my work and they are perfect.

  • 3 weeks later...
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Posted

I need to check out a local countertop provider, maybe get a 2 x 2 piece

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