Thread: low budget grinder V2.0

There is a str8 razor marked Bowdins Wedge. It was made in Minneapolis Minnesota. I recently went to visit the grandson, Jerry Bowdin, age 67. He had his grandfathers old buffing/grinding wheels and still uses them. Some are made of wood. Work just fine.

HELLGAP my small wood lathe runs from 500 up to 3975 RPM that gives you 10405.7591 SFM = Surface Feet per Minute at 10" According to american machinists speed calculator. And the bigger lathes go faster and of corse can handle larger diameters .
Also think about Wooden airplane props they are under tremendous stress and are fine.
Charlie is using Quality multi layer wood and that is stronger than a solid block because the grain pattern is switched in the layers for strength.
Also wood has been used in applications such as propeller shaft bushings on large ships for years and takes the heat from friction Quite well.

Charlie Thank you for posting these most useful and inspirational pictures.

Have you considered granulated cork rolls some of it comes with an adhesive back and some types of wax can be applied to make it more durable. also there are some types of cork and rubber mixes in flexible rolls that should be quite durable.
I know there are cork and rubber bicycle grip raps and tennis racquet wraps that could work if they are wide enough but most have tapered edges.

Thank you for your input, those are good ideas. I have retired my little wooden grinder. It was a good little tool. I learned a lot using it. The serpentine belt covering worked pretty good. If I were to make another one I would half the size of the two drive pulleys.

Charlie

Originally Posted by gandrw

Have you considered granulated cork rolls some of it comes with an adhesive back and some types of wax can be applied to make it more durable. also there are some types of cork and rubber mixes in flexible rolls that should be quite durable.
I know there are cork and rubber bicycle grip raps and tennis racquet wraps that could work if they are wide enough but most have tapered edges.

Just to reinforce the point about wooden wheels. On Monday I visited Kelham Island museum in Sheffield and guess what there as well as in the S. Shaws workshop were glazing/grinding wheels 10"+ made out of wood. For those glazing wheels Mr. Shaw covers them with thick leather and then with emery powder mixed with hot glue. He just pours the mixture onto newspaper and rols the wheel in it untill it is properly covered. Then he leaves it to cool down and it is ready for use.

Originally Posted by spazola

I made the tutorials and put them on my website. I have been happy with the way the grinder works.

Razor Grinder

Charlie

Can someone give me a working link to this tutorial? I know that this thread is old, but I hope that the article isn't lost.

Originally Posted by jeness

Can someone give me a working link to this tutorial? I know that this thread is old, but I hope that the article isn't lost.

I took the tutorials down when I revamped my web site.

This grinder is pretty simple just a rotating post to hold the contact wheel and a motor with two drive pulleys. The thing that I found most important was that the contact wheels have to be concentric and run true.



Charlie

Here is the information on how I made contact wheels that was on the website, Now days I have been buying my bigger contact wheels form Sunray.

I used two different methods to make the contact wheels, one for large wheels 6” + and one for smaller wheels.

For smaller wheels I would make sure my drill press was square, then use a circle cutter to to cut the outside diameter and drill a pilot hole for the bushing at the same time. I would then drill out the center hole a little smaller than the bronze bushing then press the bushing into the wood. (CIRCLE CUTTERS SCARE ME, DOUBLE CHECK YOUR SET UP BEFORE TURNING ON DRILL PRESS)

For larger wheels I would use bearings. I would attach the wood to a lathe face plate then turn the outside diameter and bore the hole for the bearings at the same time so they would come out concentric. I would then glue on the rubber belting along the outside diameter and true it up while using the same face plate set up so that every thing stayed concentric.


Charlie

Thanks very much for the information! Do I see right that the motors weight does the tensioning of the belt? What size is the belt on the pics?

Yes the weight of the motor did the tensioning. I used 1X42 belts, The design could be adapted to any size belt.

Now days I have the motor mounted on top of a X-Y cross vise. I move the motor around to adjust for belt tension and tracking.

Charlie