Spindle sander not working

Hey everyone,

I forgot to post this the other day, but it looks like the spindle sander may be broken. Whatever mechanism causes it to rise and fall isn’t working, and it makes an awful clunking sound when it’s running.

I put a defective tag on it Friday.

Also, I could not figure out how to put a new belt on the belt sander for the life of me… every time I turned it on, the belt would slowly shift off to the side. Any idea what I’m doing wrong? Here’s what I tried:

  1. Lift the top,
  2. Pull the orange lever,
  3. Put the new belt on,
  4. Push the orange lever in,
  5. Close the top.

Thanks!

I looked at the spindle sanders this morning. The Harbor Freight (Chicago Electric) sander is shot… The vertical motion drive is broken, that that’s the noise it’s making. Repairable? Not sure, but it’s not expensive for a new one. I also looked at the Rigid oscillating sander. It does work, but needs some TLC. Most of the rubber drums are gone, and the top knob is pretty chewed up. I could only get one of the drums tight enough to use. It also has a belt drive stored on the back, but no belts. I’ll look into the parts needed to get this one up and running. I think that it’s a better investment than fixing the Chicago Electric sander.

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Nice, thanks @cfstaley

Eric ordered the parts. I won’t be in this weekend. Someone can coordinate with him, if you want to do it together. Top knob replacement, rubber drum set. Washers are iffy. We need to confirm what is there first, then identify which are needed. Documents are online. Rigid oscillating drum sander.

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