All,
I’m thinking about getting a 16″ or 18″ Performax sander. I’d love to hear your thoughts or experiances from those who own or have used this tool. Service, performance, longevity, sandpaper changes, stock feed issues, or anything else that you think I should know before I purchase this unit.
Thanks much,
GRW
Replies
I purchased a Performax 16-32 and used it for a few years. I replaced it with a Woodmaster unit because I found the Performax to be vastly underpowered, among other things. Here are some plusses and minuses, and this is purely my own opinion.
Minuses:
1. The bed uses a band of sandpaper between tensioned rollers. I had to continually adjust the tension on the rollers to keep the band of sandpaper tracking properly. (I think there is an engineering fix to this, but I found it extremely frustrating to ahvfe to do this ... and if the sandpaper tracks poorly and you din't fix it, it is liable to run up against some fittings and tear itself to shreds ... an expensive problem and one that shuts down the sander until it's fixed.
2. Since the head is open on one end, so you can sand a wider piece and then flipflop it to sand the other side, you need to be very careful in adjusting the head. If the outboard end is too low, you'll get a divot in the middle of a wide piece. Too high, and you have a high spot in the middle of a wide piece ... or your regular pieces are thicker towards the open end. A tricky adjustment. I set mine so that the outboard end was just ever so slightly high, and when planing "normal" boards I'd flop them so that first one side was toward the open end and then the other side was towards the open end.
3. When you try to abrasive plane wide stock the sander is underpowered and will trip an internal breaker very quickly. You absolutely must take very shallow passes when abrasive planing ... which is frustrating because it takes so long.
4. If you aren't careful, you can ruin sandpaper by getting pitch in one spot which becomes shiny. This creates an area where the sandpaper won't sand, and creates a black line in the boards being sanded.
Plusses:
1. This sander is wonderful for taking extremely light passes so that you can dimension stock to whatever thickness you want. I used a sled on mine so that I could sand down shopbought veneer banding so that when installed in a dado it was almost dead flat with the surrounding material. Quite a time saver.
Hope this was helpful.
John
I've had the Perfomax 16-32 for just about a year. After initial set up and testing, I had only one problem with mine. The feed belt started to delaminate and had to be replaced. This was not a tracking problem. It just started coming loose at one end, gradually working it's way across. I replaced (and ordered a spare to have on hand) and have had no subsequent problems. I have used 36 grit paper to rough plane some panels, and it worked ok. I used to use 80 grit, but have recently went to 120 grit. I have not had any trouble with burning. I usually take 1/8 turn at a time, but sometimes 1/4. I vary the speed to something between 40-80, depending on width of wood being sanded, and hardness. I have tripped the internal breaker maybe twice.
I think this is a great sander for flushing up face frames, evening up panels, dealing with difficult wood that is prone to tear out. It is important to recognize the limitations of any tool. This is not for gross removal of material. Use a planer for that. It is a 1 1/2 horsepower, 115 V motor. Most big commercial shop sanders are 5 hp or more. Use it wisely, with these limitations in mind, and you will be pleased with it. Alan & Lynette Mikkelsen, Mountain View Farm, est. 1934, Gardens & Fine Woodworking, St. Ignatius, MT
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