# 30" Flatmaster Sander In Reverse and Using a 3400 RPM Motor



## kelvancra (May 4, 2010)

I ran a piece of wood over the left end of the sandpaper and now know why the suggestion of using a magnet to mark the area, for avoidance, is sound.

In short, running a piece of wood into the end of the sander is a quick way to end up with a lot of mangled sandpaper.


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## Andybb (Sep 30, 2016)

Cool. Interested in learning what your overall impression is. I have had my eye on them. Seems like a good concept so let us know.


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## kelvancra (May 4, 2010)

Just ran a piece of 1/8" 6" x 24" long mahogany through. The 100 grit was taking forever, so went to the 80. The 80 took bandsaw blade marks out quickly and I was happy with the results. It went fairly quick and left a good finish.


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## kelvancra (May 4, 2010)

Months in, it's becoming obvious the longer I have this sander, the more I like it.

I find I use the coarse grades of sandpaper most.

This unit does a nice job of smoothing pieces of walnut, koa and so on I use for my turned ornaments (they have to be smoothed to allow me to sandwich plastics). This is true even with pieces with chain marks from cuts made with my chain saw.


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## copythat (Sep 28, 2016)

Where did you buy your sander and do you recommend it?


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## kelvancra (May 4, 2010)

I bought my sander from Stockroom Supply (addy below).

It's hard to know how to respond to a request for a recommendation for various reasons:

As to quality, I have zero complaints.

I am glad I went with the metal table top they offer. Among other things, it lets me attach rare earth magnets to serve as slow cones, to remind me to stay away from the ends of the sandpaper. Too, I know the top is flat.

I have never ran a belt unit. That aside, I wanted one. I went this route because I saved a bundle this way. Now that I have it, I am happy with the choice I made.

I note sanding things is not always a quick operation. Cleaning up a six inch wide board may take ten to twenty passes, even using coarse grit. Of course that isn't so bad when you're talking ancient paint and a slightly cupped board.

That said, I cleaned up some short pieces of walnut, sycamore and maple the other day and they went quickly. In the end, I doubt a self feed unit would be any faster. Where this shines, up against my friend's Jet, is, the paper doesn't load. I've been running the same paper for a while and I don't anticipate having to swap it anytime soon.

The SandMaster actually works a bit like a jointer, but it would take thirty, forty or fifty passes to get the results of one pass on the jointer, and you are the belt drive. This means you have to maintain a steady run across the drum. Of course, a driven unit cannot "joint."

Keep in mind, once set up, there is no real adjustment, other than how tight or lose you wrap the paper, the table is the control and it's up to you to hold the wood to it and keep it moving (to avoid cupping (not that hard)).

Choosing a version can complicate the recommendation, but that applies to choices in belt driven versions too. I opted for the biggest, so I could put two or even three grits on, if I wanted to. So far, I've only run two, because that's all I've found need for.

For some, the thirty inch model might be overkill. On the other hand, if someone got the smallest, they might long for the bigger version.

The dust collection on this trumps every drum I've watched running. I do get the occasional wisp on the table, but I don't seen anything airborne. Though I have it connected to one of my four baggers, it remains the collection port is only a few inches, so it I opened the port up it'd probably suck the wood being sanded into the collector (okay, that might be a bit of an exaggeration).

The directions for assembling the unit, making your own top and so on are pretty good. As I noted, I modified the unit to allow me to run a 3,400 RPM motor and stepped it down to 1,700 by swapping out the pulley. Doing that, including opening up the top where the pulley would have rubbed, wasn't hard to figure out.

Can't think of anything else that might help. If you have specific questions, feel free to ask.

Oh, and in more succinct terms, I'd recommend this.


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## 1Woody (Mar 20, 2013)

I have the larger flat master also. Very happy with it, not quite sure why they don't add a motor and switch from the factory and they never told me that at the woodworking show where I bought it in Milwaukee. Only complaints I have I bought the upright angles to be able to do edges of boards. They are about 8" high and out of square by at least 3/16- 1/4". They are stamped angles and virtually impossible to correct. They also need it be raised so the paper doesn't grind on the base.
Very poorly engineered and obviously never gone through any quality control. I need to contact them sometime and tell them about it.


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