Building a 37" drum sander

Nope, they are flat. Maybe it needs more tension. Have you looked at either grizzly or woodmaster for borrowing parts?

Thanks for the reply, now I know that they should track ok if they are flat. I
haven't look at borrowing parts, I think I found my problem. I used 2" rigid metal conduit for the rollers, I then heated 2" pvc and "sleeved" the conduit. I made a jig up and used a router to skim the PVC to make sure they were round. Somehow when I did that I ended up making the center of the roller a smaller diameter so the belt wants to track off the rollers. I guess I just need to re-skim the rollers and make sure they are more accurate this time.
 
You could also use galv fence pipe. This stuff is plenty strong and really straight. OK im of to try and get some sleep. 6am comes to early.
 
I've followed this thread... wish I had some of the skills you guys have... would be an interesting build... I think I'll just take all my stuff across town to my friend's house... he has a nice new and clean Jet drum sander...
 
Here is an update, I have most of the sander finished. I found that the conveyor motor I was going to use wasn't powerful enough, so I need to redo that. Not really a surprise I figured it might not be big enough but I had it laying around so I tried it. Most of the sander is finished its just all the small things that need finished now.
 

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Got me thinking about building one of these too. Figured I could probably find an old treadmill on craigslist and use some parts from it, such as the speed control and motor.
 
Here is the new conveyor motor, It should be strong enough, I tested it with an 18v drill battery and I couldn't stop the conveyor. I have a dc motor drive on the way so I should be sanding in no time
 

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The sander is almost complete. It runs and sands really nice. I still need to finish welding some of the stuff, a lot of the joints I just tack welded until I knew things were where they should be. After I finish the welding I will take the sander all apart and paint it, reassemble and finish installing the conduit for the wiring. I need some opinions on paint color, reasons for the opinions would help too. I already have black and rockwell/ delta grey, but I was thinking that yellow or red might be nice too.
Heres the colors.
http://www.rustoleum.com/CBGProduct.asp?pid=150
I was thinking sunburst yellow or sunrise red
 

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Heres the sander finished. It works nicely, I may need to fine tune some of the adjustments though.
 

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That came out looking great, Dave. :thumb: I'll bet you're gonna get spoiled having a sander that wide. Very nice work, and thanks for taking us along for the journey.
 
Oh! That is definitely going on my project to-do list...very nice work Dave. :thumb:

If you have the option I would definitely do a variable speed conveyor motor. If you watch ebay you should be able to find a 90v DC gear motor and a controller for a reasonable price. With the variable speed I can slow the feed rate to about 4"-5" per minute if I need.
 
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