Drum sanders

[James Mills]

Near as I can tell Jet's "smartsand", Powermatic's "feed logic" and supermax's "intellisand" all do the same function of automatically slowing the in-feed rate of speed if you are taking too deep a cut.
I could see this severely damaging a project piece while going through the sander by cutting in a big deep gouge across the board.
Is this a common problem? The solution being to take lesser cuts, but is the sensitivity of the technologies function a common problem?

[Jerry Miner]

I've used a couple of different drum sanders-- one with the "smartsand" feature and one without. If you're careful, you can operate without the smartsand, but I do find it helpful.

These machines cannot handle taking a lot of material off in one pass. "Stalling" -- and creating a gouge in the material -- is a common issue, IME. The "smartsand" feature helps to reduce stalling and therefore gouging.

HTH

[Nick Decker]

James, you've got it right, basically. I use Intellisand as a warning device. If the light starts blinking, I adjust the drum upwards a little to make it go out. But yes, if you just continue while it's on you're risking it slowing down the belt to the point you might stall it.

The times I've seen it come on have been when I was sanding something the full width of the drum, when it's under the most stress and you should be taking even lighter bites.

[David Kumm]

It is a nice safety device but you will learn to listen and read the machine so you don't need the help from the electronics. I could see and feel a slight difference in the finished board when the machine slowed down due to the device so I got used to avoiding having it trip on. You can do it manually if you add an amp meter. Dave

[Art Mann]

The conveyor feed motor on my Jet 16/32 will slow down if the drum motor begins to labor too much. You normally can't tell where it happened on the work piece unless you started out with the drum way too close to the conveyor. It doesn't cause the drum to gouge the work piece. It prevents it from doing so under normal circumstances. Not having the feature would be more likely result in damage the work piece.

[Matthew Curtis]

How many times through the sander do you put your your work piece when at its final depth? I notice significantly better results when making 2-3 passes at the same depth.

[John C Bush]

I do several "spring cuts" at the final drum setting --you will be able tell by the sound when there is little contact with the paper.

[glenn bradley]

How many times through the sander do you put your your work piece when at its final depth? I notice significantly better results when making 2-3 passes at the same depth.


I do several "spring cuts" at the final drum setting --you will be able tell by the sound when there is little contact with the paper.

I do like John describes. The Intellisand is indeed a warning system more than a safety system. The times it serves me best is on fairly irregular pieces where I may miss an area that is thicker than I perceive with my checking method. I have just plain screwed up, wandered to an area where I couldn't get back to the wheel quickly and gotten a big divot for my efforts. The stars really have to align to make this happen. You need to mis-measure, step away from the machine while operating it or some such. Fortunately if the worst should happen, it is happening to an area that is way thicker than your end dimension so it will all get sanded off.

[Mike Henderson]

I adjust mine so that the roller hits the wood, but not the sanding drum. Then, as the wood is feeding through I turn the crank to move the head down until the drum is just contacting the wood. I miss the first part of the wood but I just run it through a second time to get that part.

Mike

[Mike Cutler]

Near as I can tell Jet's "smartsand", Powermatic's "feed logic" and supermax's "intellisand" all do the same function of automatically slowing the in-feed rate of speed if you are taking too deep a cut.
I could see this severely damaging a project piece while going through the sander by cutting in a big deep gouge across the board.
Is this a common problem? The solution being to take lesser cuts, but is the sensitivity of the technologies function a common problem?

James
It can not only damage the material, but the abrasive also. It will load it up with so much material, that actually kind of "burns in" to the paper. The sanding strips for my dual drum sander are ~ $8.00 each, so it can add up in a hurry.
I work, when I do work, with a lot of oily tropicals and you have to take light passes. with acetone wipes in between. It's an "acquired feel".

[John K Jordan]

I adjust mine so that the roller hits the wood, but not the sanding drum. Then, as the wood is feeding through I turn the crank to move the head down until the drum is just contacting the wood. I miss the first part of the wood but I just run it through a second time to get that part.

Mike

That's exactly how I work (Performax 22-44) - crank down during the first pass until the sandpaper just barely touches. Then adjust down a "calibrated" bit and run the piece through again. I ignore the light since I can tell by the sound if I'm taking too much of a bite. In fact, I can barely see the light since my shop lights are so bright! On the first few passes I do keep my hand on the crank to turn back quickly if I misjudged.

I've learned how much to crank for various wood - less for something like cherry that is prone to burning, more with others like poplar, walnut, etc. I mostly sand short pieces so running more passes at less pressure per pass doesn't take much time.

I've never had the drum sand a divot across the piece unless I've fallen asleep. I do sand a lot of turning blanks to give me flat, parallel surfaces for mounting, such as 2-3" thick and 7-10" diameter using 60 grit. For thick and small diameter blanks I learned very quickly to hold down the leading edge with my left hand as the wood exits the sander. This prevents the chance of the short blank rocking up and sanding a bit of snipe near the trailing edge after it leaves the first roller.

BTW, one of those big sandpaper cleaning sticks helps: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00AJW0CY8

JKJ

[Art Mann]

I couldn't get along without one of those rubber sand paper cleaning sticks. It also works on spindle sanders and even random orbital sanders.

[Corey Pelton]

You'll know the sander after several uses, and you'll get the feel of how much you can or should be able to take off in a pass. My 19-38 took some getting used to, but after a lot of use, I know what's going to trigger the intellisand function, and avoid it. Regardless, I run my work pieces through several times at each depth, to make sure it gets everything.

[ed vitanovec]

I have a Supermax with this feature. I think it is good to have and has worked well for me. Lets say you are sanding a wide board with small passes and did not notice the board was thicker mid-way on the length of the board, the smarts will slow the feed rate down. The LED light will light up in this mode. Without this feature the Drum will stall, board will be damaged and Sand paper strip will most likely tear. I think Supermax was first to use this feature and others have followed.
With my experience using Drum sanders it is best to take small passes and use it as a sander, not a Planer. Also dust collection is a must. Drum sanders are a great machine to have.

[glenn bradley]

I couldn't get along without one of those rubber sand paper cleaning sticks. It also works on spindle sanders and even random orbital sanders.

Amen to that. Not using one is just wasting abrasives IMHO.

393499393500

[Dave Zellers]

The bottom line is people need to stop thinking of these machines as planers. They are not designed to remove significant amounts of material. I've had people tell me you can't use the finer grits (220) on a drum sander. You certainly can, and get great results. You just have to think thin. Thin, thin, thin.

There is a reason why the rollers contact the wood way before the drum does. Easy does it.

[Joe Jensen]

The bottom line is people need to stop thinking of these machines as planers. They are not designed to remove significant amounts of material. I've had people tell me you can't use the finer grits (220) on a drum sander. You certainly can, and get great results. You just have to think thin. Thin, thin, thin.

There is a reason why the rollers contact the wood way before the drum does. Easy does it.

Amen to that. I installed an Ammeter on mine. I wondered how much I was loading the machine and I have never gone past 50% max current. I however use a jointer and planer to make each board flat and straight before glue ups so I don't level with the sander.