Dumbest grinder question ever

[Bill Boehme]

I haven't had a problem so far. My grinder cost about half what a CBN wheel cost, so the cost/value relationship has changed. Now it is the grinder that is a consumable and the wheel that lasts. Of course if I bought a Baldor or a Tradesman...

Maybe it was Dave Schweitzer who said there was a problem with cheap grinders or maybe Sawmill Creek. Nobody here repeats rumors ... do they?

 

[Mark Hepburn]

Nope. Not here.

By the way, I just heard...

 

[Leo Van Der Loo]

I haven't had a problem so far. My grinder cost about half what a CBN wheel cost, so the cost/value relationship has changed. Now it is the grinder that is a consumable and the wheel that lasts. Of course if I bought a Baldor or a Tradesman...

I'm using a set of D-Way wheels and another set of Hurricane, all 1.5" and all pretty heavy. Takes a bit for them to come up to speed, but what is pretty noticeable is that they spin for several minutes after the grinder is switched off. I am not exaggerating. Minutes. The wheels are very nicely balanced.

The CBN wheels being heavier and most of the weight in the rims, they should spin a while.

Good grinders last for decades, I have a 1942 grinder made for the US Navy, a Stanley, it is still just humming, and CBN wheels do wear away to.

Check out what good rests should look like on a grinder.


This is an older picture, both rest are back on now.

 

[John Torchick]

One source= plagiarism.
Two sources= research.

 

[robo hippy]

I have never heard of a grinder wearing out from trying to push the heavy steel wheels. I have commented that I think it would be an eventual problem, but didn't know for sure. When the Rikon 1/2 hp slow speed grinder first came out, that was one comment I made about them. I had an old blue no name grinder from Woodcraft, and it would struggle to come up to speed. I expressed the same concerns about it. I did concrete construction for 30 years, and learned to prefer overbuilt rather than underbuilt. Hated seeing wall forms blow during a pour because the boss was in a hurry, or some one was taking a short cut....

robo hippy

 

[Mark Hepburn]

One source= plagiarism.
Two sources= research.

 

[Mark Hepburn]

I have never heard of a grinder wearing out from trying to push the heavy steel wheels. I have commented that I think it would be an eventual problem, but didn't know for sure. When the Rikon 1/2 hp slow speed grinder first came out, that was one comment I made about them. I had an old blue no name grinder from Woodcraft, and it would struggle to come up to speed. I expressed the same concerns about it. I did concrete construction for 30 years, and learned to prefer overbuilt rather than underbuilt. Hated seeing wall forms blow during a pour because the boss was in a hurry, or some one was taking a short cut....

robo hippy

I'm with you there, I usually prefer overbuilt too. And I do want to move up to a couple of beefier grinders one of these days (and I'll turn these into buffers). I hate buying a tool twice because I went cheap. Took me a long time to learn because I guess I'm a slow learner.

 

[John Torchick]

My grandfather always said- Little bit good, Whole lot better.
I agree- overbuild is the way to go.

 

[Owen Lowe]

Owen, how long does it take for the motor to come to a stop when you turn the switch off? This could possibly be an indication of the bearing friction which , if excessive, would put a greater strain on the start capacitor during the half-second or so when the grinder is accelerating to running speed. When I turn my grinder off, it takes one minute and thirty five seconds to coast to a stop. Another member of my club has two of these grinders and one of his takes about the same length of time to coast to a stop. The other one comes to a stop in about 20 to 30 seconds as I recall. He said it was like that since he bought it several years ago.

I finally remembered to time the shutdown: mine goes for at least 1min, 20 secs. so I don’t think it’s excessive friction. Guess needing a new start capacitor every 5 years is just a quirk of my grinder.

 

[Bill Boehme]

I finally remembered to time the shutdown: mine goes for at least 1min, 20 secs. so I don’t think it’s excessive friction. Guess needing a new start capacitor every 5 years is just a quirk of my grinder.

I don't recall the problem that your grinder has. Is it slow startup or sometimes needing to be hand propped? Both of those are indicative of a dying start capacitor. However, if the problem is that it starts normally sometimes and on other occasions it needs to be hand propped to get it started then that sounds more like the centrifugal switch needs maintenance.

 

[Owen Lowe]

Bill,
When switched on, lately it doesn’t seem to know which direction to spin; it vacillates until I give it a little encouragement by hand. Doesn’t happen every time and just recently started doing. The last time this happened I changed out the start capacitor and it solved the issue (about 5 years ago).

 

[Bill Boehme]

That is definitely the start capacitor.