Wide belt sander down [RESOLVED]

Space Teams Woodshop
1

We just signed up for membership today, when we got to the shop we realized the wide belt sander was down (for maintenance? Or just down)

I guess just a heads up to folks planning on using it. Could someone please post something when it’s back up?

That was the only tool on our agenda. So I’d appreciate knowing when it’s available again.

Thanks
GB

2

Thanks for sharing here. It seems to have developed the problem mid-day today, and @BillM had only just updated the stewards channel, and I was coming over here to post. Thank you for having already done that.

As things become more clear I’ll try to keep this thread updated. I sorry your work got delayed, Also, welcome!

3

Thanks so much! We would’ve raised a red tag but there was already someone working on the problem so I figured I’d check here.

4

I believe you would have met either Bill or Jeff who I understand were both working on it.

And always ok to err on the side of lots of communication! Just a few days ago I was in to use just the wide belt sander, so I know other members will benefit so they can adjust their work plans accordingly

5

Stewards channel is reporting that one of our intrepid heroes has managed to get the sander functional again.

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6

Thanks for the confirmation! We’ll try again tomorrow :slight_smile:

7

Yes, it stopped literally midway through sanding a board this afternoon, but Jeff got it working again. Apparently the sensor that tells the machine the air is on got jammed with dust somehow.

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8

Unfortunately it’s still not running today. My husband turned it on and got the height measurement to work but as soon as he went to feed a board through the amber light came on. We raised a red tag for it

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9

The drum sander recently came back online: 25-50 Drum Sander Operational

Not a 1:1 replacement for the belt sander, but maybe for your specific project it will do?

(Edited to update wiki link to our current drum sander :slight_smile: )

10

Thanks for reporting again - given the amber light, it sounds like the same problem that surfaced yesterday. Posting to the stewards slack again

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11

Thanks Luke! We ended up using the drum sander for today it’s just taking longer than we planned. All good.

12

it was working last night. It’s an air/sensor issue . I can’t stress this enough , as with all the equipment - the sander needs to be cleaned after each use .
Not always, but most times the sander doesn’t get cleaned up after its used . In this particular instance it looked like MDF was being sanded and in volume. This resulted in a very fine dust layered outside the machine and throughout the inside - it wasn’t a gradual accumulation . This most likely lead to the issue .
I’ll look at it again today and call tech support monday as well as getting replacement sensors ordered .
I agree it frustrating , I have several pieces i needed sanded this weekend as well.

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For what it’s worth I cleaned out as much dust as I could as we were troubleshooting, but there was quite a lot.

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14

Thanks @Jeffmc for being our hero today! We were able to get all our panels flat using the powermatic wide belt sander. <3

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