One very big grinder!

That's a much newer version of the grinder I have. Mines direct drive off a large special made motor and doesn't have guards but is otherwise nearly the same.

If somebody is interested in this grinder keep in mind that grinding wheels are very hard to find for it. If you do find them they're rather expensive.

Wayne Cook Shamrock, TX

Wayne, what kinds of things would people grind with such large grinders?

i

Isn't that kind of scary?

I once saw a few at the local state-run fedral surplus outlet that were about 50% larger than this, but conventional edge grinders, just like huge bench grinders. The motor was integral with the spindle, just like a bench grinder, and the pedestal was integral with the motor housing. The wheels were about two feet in diameter and about 5 inches across the face. I can't imagine what the things must have weighed.

Dan Mitchell ============

I don't know for sure, but I suspect for sharpening large cutting tools as used in very large lathes and planers. Also for grinding large castings, removing molding sprues, and such. The ones I mentioned in my earlier post had more-or less normal wheel guards and tool rests. They were exactly like HUGE bench grinders.

Dan Mitchell ============

I guess it depends on what you need. They can be used to true up a angle or square cut on a piece. If you set up the sliding table properly you could get very accurate grinds on the ends of pieces. But I've not even got the sliding table installed on mine right now since I've only got one wheel. Mine only had one sliding table and the other table is plain which is what I use. My main use it to dress up larger flat surfaces such as when I make a flame cut on 2" plate or the like. It works pretty good if you're wanting to make a reasonably flat surface in a hurry. The biggest problem is the wheel that I've got is to soft and wears to fast and unevenly so I have to dress it flat to often. I don't use it very much because of this. My machine came from my former employer and he told me that the last wheels he got for it where custom made and cost like $500 each. But then mine has 18" wheels and the one in the auction looks like it might be a little smaller.

My plan is to someday make a plate to bolt to the original back plate on which I can mount some 20" sanding discs. At least these would stay flat and true.

Lets see if I can find a picture of mine.

Ok here's a really old shot that I took when it was still at my former employers. It's not very good. I took these with a film camera and had them do scans when they developed the film. I wasn't happy with the quality of them.

You can see it in my shop in the left of this pic.

and the back ground of this one

Here's a slightly better shot.

That seems to be the only shots I've got online at the moment.

Mine was made by the US Electrical Tool Company and has a 7 1/2HP

1200rpm motor on it. The grinder just to the left is a old home made one from my former employer and then to the left of that is another pedestal grinder from the same company as the big one.

Wayne Cook Shamrock, TX

It's not something you want to play around with that's for sure. There's been more people hurt by it with it turned off than with it running. When running you really respect it and thus take do care. However my former employer told of several people who had fingers run between the table and the wheel when it was off. This is because it's almost irresistible to some people to spin the wheel when they see it and the mass is more than enough to put some real hurt into you if you get something caught. I can't remember how many people I've told to not spin the wheel because it was dangerous and they still keep doing it after me repeating not to a dozen times over.

Wayne Cook Shamrock, TX

Wayne,

You have a very serious shop! I am most impressed.

i

I was thinking about the possibility of the wheel coming apart at high speed.

Thanks.

Wayne Cook Shamrock, TX

In truth I'm not to worried about that in this case. It isn't just one big unsupported stone. There's a metal backing plate the same size as the wheel which has a lot of bolts going into the wheel from the center all the way out to the edge. I'd have to go out and count but I'm pretty sure there's more than 20 of them.

Another thing is the fact that you stand to the side of the wheel when you use this type of grinder.

Wayne Cook Shamrock, TX

| This one is set up as a face grinder, like a giant 'carbide grinder'. | | I once saw a few at the local state-run fedral surplus outlet that were | about 50% larger than this, but conventional edge grinders, just like | huge bench grinders. The motor was integral with the spindle, just like | a bench grinder, and the pedestal was integral with the motor housing. | The wheels were about two feet in diameter and about 5 inches across the | face. I can't imagine what the things must have weighed. | | Dan Mitchell | ============

I apprenticed to this fellow in high school and he had no normal sized bench grinder. His was a monster, with wheels about six inches across. It had no motor starter to get it going, so we had to get it moving by fingers in the opening, then when moving a decent bit we'd hit the switch. Shop lights would dim for a few minutes while it came up to speed, and when we turned it off it would take almost an hour to coast to a stop. I truly was scared of that thing.

I would be scared too.

When I was a high school student in Russia, we had some sort of a "work class", where we would choose the kind of work we wanted to learn. I chose to be a lathe operator, wheres my friend chose a barbering class, where the pretty girls were.

It was a sort of a facility like school, we would go there for one day per week (IIRC, it was 18 years ago)

The lathes that we worked on/trained were pretty big. 10 kW motors, all geared, with rather large spindles, very heavy devices. It was, in fact, quite useful learning, as I learned some basics of metalworking there. They had a milling machine also, which we also learned a bit about.

I want to own a lathe, but shun the cheap stuff that is sold to consumers at affordable prices. And I do not want to pay unaffordable prices, so, I live without a lathe.

This work education class also included visits to actual factories, which left me very convinced that I definitely needed to work on getting higher education. On one factory, I found very large ball bearing balls, about 2" in diameter. They are still with me to this day.

i certified lathe operator 2nd degree