Belt Sanders, Festool

[Ben Abate]

Hi Fellows,

I once owned a belt sander and didn't have much use for it. But in the last few weeks I've had the use for one when installing some cabinets for certain jobs. I don't like them but when doing the scribes for installations they work. I'm so used to my Festool sanders that I was wondering if anyone used a Rotex or any of the other sanders for this purpose. I haven't tried them just because I'm too lazy to lug them to the job site. The Festool sanders aren't heavy it's just the idea of the vacuum.

That belt sander puts off a lot of dust. I went out yesterday and bought a Dewalt DW433 or something and have found it to be lacking. I just don't like it. But I was thinking that the rotary movement of the Rotax might dislodge or separate the laminates from the substrate if it catches an edge. That has been my concern and that is why I haven't used them for that reason. Any thoughts on this???? I think I'll take the Dewalt back.

Thanks

[Emmanuel Weber]

Hi Ben,

I just finished installing some kitchen cabinets and I tried to use the RO 125 for scribing them. What I have found is that the RO is easy to control which make it fool proof to scribe exactly to the line. I did found however that it is much slower even with lower grits than my belt sander.
Whenever I had a lot of scribing to do and I had to use a sander I would grab my makita belt sander.
Hooked up to the CT-22 the makita is actually not too bad in term of dust.

Emmanuel
PS: I am just a hobbyist so don't take my words too seriously.

[Per Swenson]

Hi all,

Ben,

For Laminate counter tops I use this

http://www.amazon.com/Makita-9031-16-Inch-21-Inch-Variable/dp/B00004YOH7/ref=cm_lmf_tit_3_rsrssi0

hooked to a festool vac.

also for particle board filler strips on the less then high end kitchens.

For solid wood I use the Festool 150-3.

Per

[Steve Dewey]

I've had good luck with the mini porter cable belt hooked up to my festool vac. (used the PC hose). Good excuse to pick up the "mini" dust extractor.

[Dan Clark]

I have a Makita 9903 that I bought about a year ago. I got it to flatten joists in a master bathroom remodel. I love my RO150, but it's not the right tool for that job.

So I got the 9903. It's a high quality sander that's easy to use and has some nice features. Belt alignment and replacement is very easy. However... The key reason I got the Makita was that it hooks up easily to my Festool CT22 portable DC using a $5 Fein hose adapter. The combo works great and dust collection is almost perfect - easily 95%.

Although you wouldn't want to use it as a permanent spindle sander, the Makita is designed so that you can clamp it on it's side or back as a fixed belt sander WITH dust collection.

I wrote a short review (with lots of pics) of the Makita 9903 and how you can use it with a Festool DC (or any DC) and MFT. Brice Burrell hosted the review on his non-commercial web site here: http://www.burrellcustomcarpentry.com/subpage36.html. I hope you find the review useful.

Regards,

Dan.

Here are the sander and hose adapter on Amazon...

9903: http://www.amazon.com/Makita-Belt-Sander-21in-Model/dp/B000GAWYT4/ref=pd_bbs_sr_2?ie=UTF8&s=hi&qid=1197643846&sr=8-2.

Hose adapter: http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_hi/104-9758174-0623124?url=search-alias%3Dtools&field-keywords=fein+hose+adaptor.

[Ben Abate]

Hi Guys,

It's funny that you weighed in on this Per because you were one of the people that I thought would have a good insight to this subject. I don't think I've seen one of those up close so I'll have to make an effort to get to one of the local tool distributors and get some hands on time with it. So Per, that small of a machine will remove material pretty good hey. Thats good to hear, I'd rather use a lighter weighing machine than a big heavey one.

Dan, Nice review; I'll also look at this model, I like the idea of being able to hook it up to the vacuum. I finished up that commercial kitchen yesteday, you couldn't believe the dust from all the scribing that went on. The Dewalt has it's own system for dust extraction, a small boxey looking bag that continually fell off and didn't collect much of the dust anyway. I like the idea of the variable speed wheel. The fellow that gave me a hand on this kitchen agreed that the Dewalt was lacking for speed. Not that I'm looking to win any drag races with a belt sander but I thought to myself that it needed a bit more power/speed. I almost stopped it a few times, which is my fault for putting too much pressure on it but, I didn't think it was up to the task.

I have some time off coming, I think I'll return the Dewalt, I don't like to purchase a tool and then use it and then return it. But, this may be the first time that I'm not in the least satisfied with a tool. I'll usually live with a tool that is "OK" but this one is lacking in my opinion.

Emmanual, your description is how I thought it might be, scribing is hell on a tool. Your just trying to remove material as fast as you can. You need a tool that can take it. My thoughts were that I hate to beat the heck out of one of my Festools. I had my doubts about tearing up the discs and as I mentioned the discs catching an edge and then having a real problem. I was doing a laminate install.

Fellows thanks for your time to give me options.

Ben