pneumatic drum head for thickness sander?

[Mike MacGregor]

I want to do brushed aluminum sheets in a small production environment. We are unable to get the stock pre-brushed, so we are looking at alternatives. We tried running our work through a thickness sander, but since the material is not perfectly flat, the brushing is not uniform.

One option is to see if we can use a thickness sander (even the small Jet 16-32 will work), but with a pneumatic head. Does anything like this exist?

thanks

[Dale Lesak]

How about a bunch of the brush sanders on a shaft. ?

[Rick Davidson]

A stroke sander works good. Also if you use a belt sander use a scotch brite pad. I did sheet metal fab for years and this is what we would do.

[Mike MacGregor]

Thanks guys - good ideas.

Rick, I am a bit confused about how you would use scotchbrite with the belt sander? As a manual process after you sand the aluminum?

[Brian Backner]

How about a scotch brite pad used under a random orbital hand sander?

Brian
Taxachusetts

[Rick Lizek]

Why reinvent the wheel???? You should be looking a metalworking sites, not woodworking!
The drum sander with the pneumatic head is a bad idea in my opinion. I have done a lot of brush sanding of metals with various sanders.
http://www.csunitec.com/sanding_polishing_grinding_finishing/
This tool is one of the standard machines for brush finishing metals.
They do have floating bed widebelt sanders.
Stroke sanders are great and affordable machines for doing this process. We have done lots of stainless, steel, brass and aluminum on this machine. There is a special roller platen we made to better copy the short stroke brushed finish on stainless steel.
The nylox bristles do a nice job on wood and many other materials. This is a viable option http://www.supermaxtools.com/products-superbrush-bush-sanders-24-36-49.php