Todd Hunt's drum sander

Todd Hunter writes:

I am planning to build a wooden airplane someday and, as you can imagine, I will need to make a lot of parts by laminating strips. So, I need a thickness sander. While looking at your reader projects I noticed Ron Walters' drum sander. I thought I might try to make my own.

I wanted an open-ended design. Commercial models with the capacity I needed cost over $1000. I just added up my costs and I completed mine for around $350.

I needed some capacity in thickness. Some parts will be almost 6" thick. So I made the table adjustable. I entertained your approach used on your jointer but went simpler.

First, I needed to design a way to adjust the drum if it wasn't consistent in thickness across the width.

Here is the mount for the front end bushing.




Internal structure of "C" shape.


           


The drum is made of a stack of plywood discs. I turned it round on the lathe.


Drum inside.


The drum can be removed to replace the sandpaper. I used Velcro backed paper with the sticky back hook side on the drum.


I also turned the knobs.


The motor attaches to the bottom of the C-frame.


           


Adjustment screw design adapted from Ron's sander.



See also:

Pat Hawley's thickness sander
Roger Gallant's
edge belt sander
Beri Bracun's
disk sander
Ron Walters's
drum sander
Simon Heslop's
drum sander
Pat hawley's
thickness sander


More sanding machines

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