I was lucky enough to come across this ski grinder a few months back on Craigslist, for $100. It's an older Toko grinder, with an 8" wide belt (not wide enough for snowboards, but certainly wide enough for even silly-wide skis).
It's a bit rough aesthetically, but 100% functional. The motor works great (220v, single phase), and the water pump works great too. To top it all off, the guy gave me a small quick hot waxer (not sure its much quicker than just using the iron), and a huge bucket of really nice granular wax. Not a bad deal! Came with 3 brand new belts for the grinder too.
I thought I'd put up some pictures of my restoration of it, basically I'm tearing the whole thing apart, removing all of the rust, and re-painting it. I'm already well along my way of removing much of the old paint, and should have it all painted and back together in a few weeks!
Last edited by twizzstyle on Sat Jul 17, 2010 9:29 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Yeah its nothing but a large belt sander with a water pump. $500 on McMaster-Carr could easily build something like this. The only expensive bits are a large motor, and good sub-pump.
The water is sprayed on the belt on the left side in those photos, on the left drum (which is the belt tension and skew adjustment). The water pours down into a collection tray, that has a grill in it to hopefully collect most of the gunk, then the water pours down to the holding tray on the very bottom, where the sub pump sits (in a filter sock).
You probably know this on the water but put filter paper in the collection tray over the mesh: http://www.svst.com/ItemForm.aspx?item= ... e2eec6cff5
Its cheap and will keep things from clogging up. Good luck getting the old girl running.
Montucky--noticed you are on a quest for a belt grinder. It might be a longshot but Chalet Sports in Bozeman had an old Montana Monty wet belt collecting dust in their basement for years. Might have gone away when they renovated a while back (after my time there) but would be worth asking...
couldn't you just try to modify some metal pipe? i think i could have it PU-coated pretty cheap, just need a solution to mount it and make it run smoothly.
chrismp wrote:couldn't you just try to modify some metal pipe? i think i could have it PU-coated pretty cheap, just need a solution to mount it and make it run smoothly.
If your drum isn't perfectly flat while spinning at a ridiculous rpm then your grind won't be flat. Right? I thought I read on here somewhere that the drums are center high so when they are spinning they are flat.
I want to build one. Let's put our collective abilities together and make this happen.
doughboyshredder wrote:If your drum isn't perfectly flat while spinning at a ridiculous rpm then your grind won't be flat. Right? I thought I read on here somewhere that the drums are center high so when they are spinning they are flat.
chrismp wrote:
I want to build one. Let's put our collective abilities together and make this happen.
Well let my re-build be inspiration, and a source of info to help you design your own!
One key thing to remember, you don't do the sanding/grinding on the drum! (at least not on mine)
Look halfway between the big drum and the little drum, see that curved metal plate in the middle? That is the grinding surface, that is perfectly flat laterally, and the belt runs over that. When you grind the ski you keep it over that surface. The big drum on the right (the drive drum) has a rubber outside for grip on the belt.
I think the tricker part with the drum would be balancing it, if its not balanced right once running it would shake the whole machine apart High speeds and lots of mass!
does the drive drum have to be so big? i came across conveyor belt rolls that could fit our needs at a reasonable price, they just don't have the big diameter.
if you want to use industry specific belts ie silicon carbide, like wintersteigler belts or someone you will need to make the machine displace like 72" of belt length. So the larger the drum the smaller the footprint of the machine. you could use conveyor rollers but the machine would be 3 ft long.
