tube grinder

[SNAFU]

I needed something to notch tubes that were hard to hold in a vise. The commercial tube grinders run from 3K up!!! Looked thru the scrap pile, ordered some bearings and pulleys, and slapped this together. It is a real timesaver and will get a paint job soon...

[yorkiepap]

Tube grinder...

Hey SNAFU,
Hmmmm...You must be ex-military...

Nice setup...looks like it will really hog off some material. I use those kinds of belts at work also....love those 20/30grit belts. I noticed the vertical Allen-head bolt....is that your belt tensioner? Think I'll make one for some odd jobs I do on occasion....Thanks....Denny

[N20Silverado]

A local chassis shop just rounds off a grinding stone on their grinders with a dressing tool. I copied their idea and it works great.

Tim

[paulrbrown]

SNAFU, one heck of a scrap pile you got there, very nice machine....did you turn the Aluminum parts, or were they just the right size bar stock???Thanks for sharing, I may have to break down and fab something like that...Paul

[terry welds]

snafu

nice job on tube grinder. i like the way you think!!!!

[SNAFU]

did you turn the Aluminum parts, or were they just the right size bar stock

They were turned with a crown to the middle so the belt would track right. The middle roller is on a spring loaded arm that makes changing belts easy. I get good life out of a belt, really surprised at how well they hold up.
Thanks for the compliments, I will post some pics after painting.

[bob_e95482]

Yeah, that's cool.

[JHCHOPPERS]

Nice Job.... I gets me thinking...

[HMW]

Great job, looks good.

[dabar39]

Snafu

Great job, just wondering how many hours you got into the machine work involved. We use a tubing notcher on our stock car roll cages but this looks like it may speed things up a bit. Guess I gotta try to build one like it now. Dave

[SNAFU]

Between sketching up a basic plan, rounding up parts and building, probably 20 hours. I had to get a bigger, faster motor. Wound up with a 1 1/2 HP 3600 RPM. The machine is a huge timesaver for us. There are smaller versions available similar to this, but all use a 2" wide belt. This has a 4" belt. Went with a foot switch so both hands are free.

[SNAFU]

ready to rock...

[HMW]

Can you change the roller, at the end, to cut different size tubing? I saw a commercial one sorta like yours that all it did was use different rollers to match the tubing size. I like yours, you can use it as a regular belt sander too.

[dabeldesign]

Nicely done! It looks like you don't have a fixture for holding the tubing, are you holding it by hand and eyeballing it? (that's what I do!)

[SNAFU]

Can you change the roller, at the end, to cut different size tubing?

Yes, I haven"t made them yet, but it will be a quick change for 4 different size front rollers.

It looks like you don't have a fixture for holding the tubing, are you holding it by hand and eyeballing it?

I didn't want a rest for vise. It is much faster to freehand the contour.