Stroke belt sander/grinders in Europe

Hello, fellow machinists and fabricators, long time lurker here and finally posting. I am looking to buy a manual stroke sander/grinder with a standard belt which we'll use for polishing stainless surfaces on welded boxes and cabinets and I am confused what to look about for. Found a machine which could get the job done, unfortunately it's made in Canada and we are based in Europe which makes the whole shipping deal more complicated. Any tips on hp/kw rating, belt speed in m/s and recommendations for makes/models are welcome.

The stroke sanders I'm familiar with are not that complicated.

Why not post a link to the one you want (but can't afford to ship).

These are commonly used in auto body shops and are usually pneumatic and are readily available in Europe in most auto body supply houses. However, reciprocating sanders do not work near as well in your application as belt sanders. Electric belt sanders with a zirconium grit belt work best on SS.

^ Strongly disagree, belt sanders are ok, but the finish from properly applied stroke sanding beats it every day of the week. Finish is just so much more even and no gouges.

adama said:

^ Strongly disagree, belt sanders are ok, but the finish from properly applied stroke sanding beats it every day of the week. Finish is just so much more even and no gouges.

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That's exactly why we want one. Wrote an inquiry in Friday to a company based in the uk, named rjh i think, no answer still. My main concern is the power, it would s**k to buy, say a 3kW one and conclude after installation that it doesn't have the power to grind metal, it would s**k even more to buy a 7.5 kW that scraps a part in two seconds and a harder push.

digger doug said:

The stroke sanders I'm familiar with are not that complicated.

Why not post a link to the one you want (but can't afford to ship).

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I was looking at a Doucet PMC-HD heavy duty sander. AFAIK they are a Canada based manufacturer of said equipment but importing that to Europe is going to be complicated, think renting containers, getting them through customs, further arranging picking up the container and shipping it on trucks, etc...probably if they had a representative in Europe it would be a whole lot easier, however I don't think that's the case.

I don't think your fears of excess power are justified, abrasives only cut so fast based on grit, pressure and belt speed. weather its a 3hp or 500hp motor driving it makes little difference. IME your going to need to play with belt brands - grits to find what works best for you. I very much like the adjustable speed option on my belt grinder, lets you drop the speed down and gain more control and also alters how belts cut, if you want finer finishes, i would seriously look at vari speed options its only a few hundred quid for a suitable VFD these days.

Belt grinders there’s the age old rule of thumb of 1hp per 1" of belt width. With the large contact areas your dealing with you want plenty of hp. IME 3hp is really a minimum, your going to be able to stall that you probably really want more like 5-7hp if you want rapid progress - to run coarser grits. If your just after final light graining 3hp may get you by but IME would be pretty easy to stall.

Transport wise you need to contact them - use a freight forwarder. See if they will send flat pack? Failing that there not exactly a complicated thing to make if your already set-up to do sheet metal.

adama said:

^ Strongly disagree, belt sanders are ok, but the finish from properly applied stroke sanding beats it every day of the week. Finish is just so much more even and no gouges.

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To each his own of course, but when I was a teenager and working in a machine shop, we used to make Inconel vacuum muffles for Pratt & Whitney used in heat treating furnaces. These were fabricated with a flange on one end that had to be dead flat to seal against an end plate held in place only by the internal vacuum pulled down before placement in the oven. This was a metal to metal seal without bolts or gasket. If an oscillating sander were used, you would be there for hours getting the flange flat enough to seal. We used a belt sander because it would cut more metal much faster. In our case it was the seal we were after, not a polish. Even with the belt sander it was slow going.

steve-l said:

To each his own of course, but when I was a teenager and working in a machine shop, we used to make Inconel vacuum muffles for Pratt & Whitney used in heat treating furnaces. These were fabricated with a flange on one end that had to be dead flat to seal against an end plate held in place only by the internal vacuum pulled down before placement in the oven. This was a metal to metal seal without bolts or gasket. If an oscillating sander were used, you would be there for hours getting the flange flat enough to seal. We used a belt sander because it would cut more metal much faster. In our case it was the seal we were after, not a polish. Even with the belt sander it was slow going.

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Manual belt sanders are fine, we simply need something heavy duty given that it's probably going to end up being used two shifts per day. Even finish is a must and i think with a stroke sander it will be far easier to achieve. I feel lucky not working on super alloys.

Some people may be confused about what a "stroke sander" is. So here is a picture. At least in the USA, a Stroke sander is a rather large (sometimes huge) stationary belt sander. The work goes on a table that can be raised or lowered, and the operator uses flats or forms inside the back of the lower run of the belt, to sand the work below. The flats or forms are faced with replaceable graphite cloth for slickness and to prevent heat build up. I have even seen graphite faced mittens used.

The operator "strokes" the table back and forth under the belt while manipulating the flat to sand flat surfaces.
With a form block, the table is held in place and the work aligned with the belt, then the operator strokes the form block along the surface to sand it to contour.

Some of these machines have auto stroking over a chevron graphite inner belt. Or have pads that are machine mounted and can be made to cycle automatically. Mine, in the picutres, was a Mattison originally set up auto when built in the 1920's. It may well have been used originally in metal fab. All the auto mechanism was long gone by the time I acquired it.

In the US, you can barely give one away. I tried to sell mine (pictured) a few years ago and no takers except one scam artist from offshore, lol. I'm glad no one took it, started to do work again for which it is invaluable & I would be vexed to not have one. Some of the work i do on it is large radius wood or metal parts.

I agree with Adama. Any machine that uses an abrasive belt is essentially abrasive limited, not HP limited. That said, 1HP/inch of belt width is indeed a good starting point. 5HP wworks quite well on my 6" x 300" (25' belt) machine. If setting up strictly for metal, I think 7.5 would be plenty, and that you would rarely if ever absorb 10HP.

I have used or been around others - I like the "Unusually" large diameter wheels on mine - good grip without rubber facing, and lots of room to work your forms, or to go up and over lengthwise curves. (though lengthwise curve is limited by how slack you can decide to run the belt. But again, large wheels help).



I've seen them as long as 15' between columns (*Euro-built machines.) Of course since the wheels are cantilevered, any length of narrow work up to about a 1' wide can be accommodated. Sometimes the Euro machines have the framework cantilevered as well, and even wide work longer than the machine can be accommodated.

The most difficult task about building one is the table raise-lower mechanism. A much older, now late, acquaintance of mine built a few back in the 60's /70's when such machines were still very expensive. He did beautiful fully functional work, too. German derivation name, of course.

smt

*It finally came to me after posting, I think the larger machines I've seen, especially the auto-stroker/chevron belt were made by Panhans. There are (or were) a lot made in Europe, and the Germans (Including Felder) and maybe especially Itallians (SCM/SCMI)exported a lot of the very small, and very large, machines to USA for opposite ends of the furniture market. panhans stroke sander - Google Search Doucet (French?) also was popular, they made an unusualy 3-wheel/pyramidal machine with even more space at the center of the operator position. Doucet stroke sander - Google Search Wadkin (England) was less common in the US, but built heck for stout. Really rugged machines.

We wanted to fabricate one ourselves too and decided on using a welding table with a broken motor. That was months ago and we've decided against it due to everyone being too busy to work on it.

This machine looks really nice. ZBS in aktion

stephen thomas said:

Some people may be confused about what a "stroke sander" is. So here is a picture. At least in the USA, a Stroke sander is a rather large (sometimes huge) stationary belt sander. The work goes on a table that can be raised or lowered, and the operator uses flats or forms inside the back of the lower run of the belt, to sand the work below. The flats or forms are faced with replaceable graphite cloth for slickness and to prevent heat build up. I have even seen graphite faced mittens used.

The operator "strokes" the table back and forth under the belt while manipulating the flat to sand flat surfaces.
With a form block, the table is held in place and the work aligned with the belt, then the operator strokes the form block along the surface to sand it to contour.

Some of these machines have auto stroking over a chevron graphite inner belt. Or have pads that are machine mounted and can be made to cycle automatically. Mine, in the picutres, was a Mattison originally set up auto when built in the 1920's. It may well have been used originally in metal fab. All the auto mechanism was long gone by the time I acquired it.

In the US, you can barely give one away. I tried to sell mine (pictured) a few years ago and no takers except one scam artist from offshore, lol. I'm glad no one took it, started to do work again for which it is invaluable & I would be vexed to not have one. Some of the work i do on it is large radius wood or metal parts.

I agree with Adama. Any machine that uses an abrasive belt is essentially abrasive limited, not HP limited. That said, 1HP/inch of belt width is indeed a good starting point. 5HP wworks quite well on my 6" x 300" (25' belt) machine. If setting up strictly for metal, I think 7.5 would be plenty, and that you would rarely if ever absorb 10HP.

I have used or been around others - I like the "Unusually" large diameter wheels on mine - good grip without rubber facing, and lots of room to work your forms, or to go up and over lengthwise curves. (though lengthwise curve is limited by how slack you can decide to run the belt. But again, large wheels help).

I've seen them as long as 15' between columns (*Euro-built machines.) Of course since the wheels are cantilevered, any length of narrow work up to about a 1' wide can be accommodated. Sometimes the Euro machines have the framework cantilevered as well, and even wide work longer than the machine can be accommodated.

The most difficult task about building one is the table raise-lower mechanism. A much older, now late, acquaintance of mine built a few back in the 60's /70's when such machines were still very expensive. He did beautiful fully functional work, too. German derivation name, of course.

smt

*It finally came to me after posting, I think the larger machines I've seen, especially the auto-stroker/chevron belt were made by Panhans. There are (or were) a lot made in Europe, and the Germans (Including Felder) and maybe especially Itallians (SCM/SCMI)exported a lot of the very small, and very large, machines to USA for opposite ends of the furniture market. panhans stroke sander - Google Search Doucet (French?) also was popular, they made an unusualy 3-wheel/pyramidal machine with even more space at the center of the operator position. Doucet stroke sander - Google Search Wadkin (England) was less common in the US, but built heck for stout. Really rugged machines.

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Thank you for posting that. I have never seen one of these. Very educational. I feel stupid for my last post........ I wish I had one of those when I was doing the muffles. Very slick.

anht said:

Hello, fellow machinists and fabricators, long time lurker here and finally posting. I am looking to buy a manual stroke sander/grinder with a standard belt which we'll use for polishing stainless surfaces on welded boxes and cabinets and I am confused what to look about for. Found a machine which could get the job done, unfortunately it's made in Canada and we are based in Europe which makes the whole shipping deal more complicated. Any tips on hp/kw rating, belt speed in m/s and recommendations for makes/models are welcome.

Click to expand...

Have a look at this company, they appear in a lot of the trade publications here.


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brianweldor said:

This machine looks really nice. ZBS in aktion

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Would you believe if I tell you that one of the manufacturer's products is listed with a photo and a youtube video of grinding the exact same customer part we want to buy it for? One in a billion. Million thanks wouldn't be enough for bringing this to my attention. Thanks to everyone that participated in this thread and particularly to Stephen Thomas for the educational reply.

anht said:

Would you believe if I tell you that one of the manufacturer's products is listed with a photo and a youtube video of grinding the exact same customer part we want to buy it for? One in a billion. Million thanks wouldn't be enough for bringing this to my attention. Thanks to everyone that participated in this thread and particularly to Stephen Thomas for the educational reply.

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Bitte schön!