Wide belt drum sander, One drum or two???

[chris del]

I have been considering a drum sander for a while and have looked at the Perfromax open ended stlye as well as the General international 25" dual drum and now the new General International single drum version.
Can anyone testify to the advantage or disadvantage's of having two drums over one???

Also, who owns a Performax and has experienced deflection due to the unsupported load on the one side.

Thanks

[J.R. Rutter]

I guess it depends on exactly how you use it, but I definitely prefer 2 drums. I just leave it set with 120 and 180. They seem to get loaded up at about the same time with this combination, and I always got burning above 180.

I bought a 22-44 Pro when I set up shop, and now use an Extrema double drum. I was never happy with the single side support. Ended up lowering it a bit on the outboard side to compensate for the flex. But then wider parts tended to get a ridge at the overlap.

If I were you, I would go for the widest double drum you can fit/afford.

-JR

[chris del]

J.R

Thanks for getting back to me. It is nice to hear from a ex performax owner. It seams that all current Performax owner swear by them and are not willing to admit that the design alone invites deflection. I believe that when as people we spend a sustanical amount of money on a tool, we tend to convince ourselves that we made the right choice and nothing could be wrong with the design. Afterall, Performax had sold thousands of these machines so they must be good.
I am doing my best to be openminded about what style to get, but leaning towards the "supported both ends" style.

[Ian Barley]

Chris

I cannot answer your direct question as I don't have experience of the machines you are looking at - BUT - if you are doing this for a living (?) you should seriously consider going straight to a wide belt sender rather than a drum. I went through two different (expensive) drum based sanders before finally spending a bit more money for a belt sander. If only I had spent more money to start with I would have spent a lot less in the end.

[Mark Singer]

I have the General double drum and run 80 and 120....works well!

[Mike Cutler]

J.R

Thanks for getting back to me. It is nice to hear from a ex performax owner. It seams that all current Performax owner swear by them and are not willing to admit that the design alone invites deflection. I believe that when as people we spend a sustanical amount of money on a tool, we tend to convince ourselves that we made the right choice and nothing could be wrong with the design. Afterall, Performax had sold thousands of these machines so they must be good.
I am doing my best to be openminded about what style to get, but leaning towards the "supported both ends" style.

Chris.

The Performax sanders do deflect. It's usually the biggest detractor mentioned, after belt feed problems, and lack of power by most owners.

I have the Perfomax 16-32 sander. It does work, and for what it does it can do it well, but it is slow. The drum deflects somewhat this is why two passes minimum are the norm for me. If I take a piece of MDF, and draw lines across the width with a pencil. I can see that the right side removes more material than the left. Switching it around you see the reverse. The drum is aligned properly, because if you repeat the process on the same board the machine will remove equal amounts from both sides if you do not change the height setting. I carry a vernier in my pocket when working to check that the thickness is consistent throughout the material.
I have tried to offset this problem to no resolution.
That said, I still think that they are nice sanders, and will keep mine as a veneer sander. It works great for that. They simply have limitations, and a person has to look at any sander and determine if it's the right one for their intended application. I do mostly wider panel projects, with 4/4 and 8/4 stock. I also tend to use a lot more exotic,read heavy dense stock. This sander isn't doing it for me. I'm currently looking at the General International 25" sander to replace the Performax. Some of the limitations will be same. The General, at 3HP, is still a lite duty sander, and can only remove so much material at a time, but having both ends of the drum supported should get rid of having to switch that material around for multiple passes at the same depth setting.

One more limitation to the Performax 16-32 is the length of material. The weight of the material can act as a lever as it feeds. Too long and I get snipe in the middle of the board. Out feed rollers, or a table help, but if the amount of friction on the feed changes I get ripples as the material overcomes the mechanical friction to move througth the sander. Like I said though, I tend to use denser woods. Jatoba, Wenge ,Cocobola,Ipe. Sometimes I think it would be nice to work with those lightweight wood like Oak, Cherry, Walnut.;)

As for the advantage of having two drums in one machine. It allows you to have two seperate grits utilized in a single pass.

[CPeter James]

I have the Performax 25X2 and run 120 and 150. It works OK. Having said that, a wide belt would be much better, but much more cost and space. I bought mine used at the time I was looking a a 16-32. The open end design bothered me about the support issue. I would look at the General and also Powermatic makes one. I have seen the General and it looks good, but I have never seen one in action.

http://www.amazon.com/Powermatic-1791290-DDS-Drum-Sander/dp/B00064NGTM/sr=1-1/qid=1158757369/ref=pd_bbs_1/102-7917955-5628948?ie=UTF8&s=hi


CPeter

[Dennis Perry]

Have you checked out Wood Master? I have a 50" 7.5 hp very nice sander.

Dennis

[Jim Becker]

It's important to understand that drum sanders are not "wide belt" sanders...very different animals. That said, for the majority of hobbyists and small pro shops, drum sanders are a bit more affordable and do a reasonably good job if you set your expectations well and operate them correctly.

Drum sanders require very light passes to avoid burning and scoring and as mentioned, they rarely have enough power to really "power through" a pass, pardon the expression. I find that very true with my Performax 22-44 Plus. I really like it, but have had to learn to have a lot of patience with it. The double drum units like the General that Mark mentions add some interesting flexiblity and in some cases, a little more power. You can run two different grits...or run the same grit on both with the second drum set slightly "lower" to the workpiece to reduce the number of passes. Open vs closed end is always a debatable feature. I happen to like the open end design for its flexibility in width without taking up more shop space. It came in handy recently when I was thicknessing a wide slab for a project. If I had the space (and money), I'm sure I could be very pleased with a truly wide, closed end machine.

Wide belt sanders, on the other hand, generally have loads of horsepower and provide a much better surface due to the way that the belt moves and because there is much more belt surface available. (stays cleaner, cooler, etc) But they also cost big-bucks.

BTW, do not even think about a drum sander unless you have a good dust extraction system with enough "real" CFM to handle the tool and excellent fine particle filtration. It's NOT optional... ;)

[Jay Albrandt]

Love my Woodmaster.

Single drum, excellant dust collection, built like a tank.

The paper is really easy to change so what grit you want to work with is of little consequence.

PM me if you want more details.

Jay

[chris del]

I think the single drum would be ideal for me. My main use would be for doing cabinet doors and whatever else..... For All the fine work, I use hand planes.....

Still cannot understand the advantage of 2 drums...... Its not like the drum sander is the final step prior to finishing. I would use the drum sander to do the bulk of the work and then my ROS to work up to the higher grits....

[Mark Singer]

I think the single drum would be ideal for me. My main use would be for doing cabinet doors and whatever else..... For All the fine work, I use hand planes.....

Still cannot understand the advantage of 2 drums...... Its not like the drum sander is the final step prior to finishing. I would use the drum sander to do the bulk of the work and then my ROS to work up to the higher grits....

The piece coming out is easier to finish with a ROS if it is sanded to a finer grit like 120 by a second drum

[Christopher Stahl]

I totally agree with Jim. You need to decide the application and how you're going to use it. It would be great to have wide belt sander, and at some point I'll probably break down and purchase one, but as a hobbiest I'm pretty happy with my Performax 22x44 Plus. Like Jim says, it takes patience and several passes, but I'm not necessarily in a hurry. If used correctly, it does a wonderful job. Since I take lighter passes, I don't have deflection issues.

[J.R. Rutter]

I use the first drum for stock (and glue squeeze out) removal, and the second drum to give a finer scratch pattern. I'm usually only taking off 1/64 to 1/32 on a pass. With 180 on the second drum, I can ROS with 150 to clean up in no time...