Mortiser/Drum Sander Questions

Sayer Fancher

Member
Messages
169
Location
Hudson Valley NY
I'm thinking of taking a ride to Grizzly in Muncy Pa. after the holidays. I am thinking of buying a G9976 Mortiser and a G0459P 12" Drum Sander. I was wondering if any of you have either of these and how well they work? Are they worth having in a small shop? The sander really looks like it would save a lot of time and would help get a real flat surface. I have never used either and was wondering if anyone has any experience with them. Thanks.
 
i have the g0645 mortising machine, and it's a real trooper. if you're only doing a hand full of mortises, i'd recommend the one i've got (and you'll save some $$ too). cannot say anything about the sander, but the service people at grizzly are good. i've bought several machines from them.
 
drum sander? you need to look at that drum sander as a flat surface sander but its not a finish sander you will still need to sand by hand with a RO or sanding blocks, they work well for figured woods that your planer wont plane smooth without tear out.

mortiser? like dan mentioned you need to look at how many mortises you plan to make, sometimes just a drill and chisel plus your table saw will suffice..

to many of us, me included bought this tool or that tool because we thought we needed it then to find out it just collects dust most of the time:)
 
Thank you all for the info. I did look into the attachment for the drill press but as I will be using this a lot I think it would be easier to have a dedicated machine. I also have a few of those had to have items that collect dust. Allen, thank you for your generous offer, I sent you a pm. I will need to rethink the sander, I thought it could also be used as a finish sander with the correct grit paper.
 
with fine paper you can get a decent degree of smoothness but not ready for finish on anything i have ever done with one.. a random orbital is one tool that you will always need unless you get into hand tools heavily and can smooth wood with a plane effectively. let alone it takes time to change out the grits to do a proper sanding job with one of the drum sanders .. in my opinion its tool for getting things close and flat.. and for that the right one is indispensable:)
 
another thought, if you need to flatten something fairly large-ish, you can always check with a local woodworking/cabinet making shop, and see what they would charge to run it through their rather large sanders.
 
dano's suggestion is a good one, i had a piece to big for me to sand flat and done just that, it was so much an hour and that was reasonable due to it takes time if you do it or they do, and you dont have the expense of the machine.
 
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