Wide Belt Sander - Powermatic or Safety Speed Or Other Options

[John Sincerbeaux]

I have currently a 37", 20hp Cantek with a single belt, two rollers and a platen. I love it. Digital setting accurate to one thousandth. Optical tracking and very good dust collection. Been running it going on 7 years, daily. I'd have a look at these machines as they are well built and economical.

Not sure why I keep reading this, but I put a LOT of veneers (both particle core, MDF core and veneer core) through our sander, as did I also when I had our Sicar 2 head 37" sander from 89' to 2010.

You don't need a fancy sander to sand veneers. Just a good, well set up machine with decent papers and of course good quality plywood that is consistently thick. I only buy plywood that is made here in Canada, but its consitant. Again, I sand a lot of veneer through the wide belt and it just fine.

Are you talking about commercial veneer glued to plywood panels? Yikes!
And if so, why?

just curious��

[Dave Cav]

I have had a SSC for several years. Very happy with it. It replaced a Woodmaster I didn't like very much. Generally sand to 180 with the platen then lightly sand with ROS.

[Andrew J. Coholic]

Mostly to flush sand applied solid edging. A light pass both faces.

I also lay up my own veneers periodically.

And sometimes, like the op, after parts cone off the CNC I like to lightly sand both faces to get rid of any fuzziness. Especially on the bottom side since I mainly use downcut bits.

[Alan Lightstone]

Don't want to hijack the thread, but could someone explain to me what the platen is, and how it is used?

[Martin Wasner]

Don't want to hijack the thread, but could someone explain to me what the platen is, and how it is used?

It's typically a felt pad with graphite paper that sits just below the height of the drum. The drum contacts the material, then the platen. The platen has a larger contact area, and less pressure on the material so a finer finished scratch is achieved.

Some platens are an air bladder, some use little fingers and distort the belt for things like veneer so it doesn't burn through to the substrate. Most are the felt pad though.

When doing anything but a final pass, the platen should either be pulled out, or raised up. Depends on the machine as to which is easier. I can do both with mine, but prefer to just pull it out since it's dummy proof that way

[Todd Leback]

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I&#39;m also in the market for a wide belt sander. Not a huge one, mostly just something to clean up face frame stock prior to assembly. I see Grizzly has got an 18&quot; wide model (the G0527), but it looks like it doesn&#39;t have a platen. Is this going to make a huge difference, or should I be looking at something the next size up? I&#39;ve got a small custom shop with six guys, for reference.</p>
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EDIT: I&#39;ve got no idea what is going on with the text!</p>