Conical vs Flat Sanding Disc

[cincinnati10]

For those of you who invested in the Conical Sanding Disc:

Would you buy it again?

When you need a disc sander, how often do you use it over the Flat disc that came with the machine?

In what situations do you use it over the Flat Disc?

[Bruce]

You can't beat it for edge sanding. Also, if you have the planer/jointer sharpening jig, it is a must have. Yes, I would buy it again.

[alancooke]

Yes, I would buy it again.

As stated, it's a must for using the jointer/planer blade sharpener(and that use alone makes it worth having).

I think one of the biggest selling points is the swirl free sanding you can get on boards up to 4" wide. It's kind of like having a 4" thickness sander.

[dusty]

Yes, I would; in fact, I did.

I now have three flat discs and the conical sanding disk.

The flat disk is not obsoleted by any means but the conical disc does so much better a job of edge sanding. There is no comparison.

One word of caution. Do not use the disc sander to "resize" lumber. Use it only for light finish sanding. If one attempts to take off too much, the paper will separate from the disc (at the gap) and destroy a sanding disc.

[charlese]

For those of you who invested in the Conical Sanding Disc:

A) Would you buy it again?

B) When you need a disc sander, how often do you use it over the Flat disc that came with the machine?

C) In what situations do you use it over the Flat Disc?

A) Yes I am very happy with the conical sanding disk. Knowing how it performs, If I lost it, would buy another in a New York Minute!

It has a kinda weird quirk that I didn't expect. After putting on a sandpaper disk, there is a resulting space between the closing edges of the sandpaper. At first, I thought I had done something wrong, but used it anyway - with success in sharpening by planer blades. After reading this forum, I found I was not alone in concern about this gap. After thinking about this quirk, it was evident that when putting a flat piece of sandpaper onto a cone - there has to be a radial slice in the paper. It is a whole lot better to have a small (1/8") gap rather than a fold-over. The Shopsmith design of both the disk and the paper is right on. The gap is a given and does not affect sanding.

B) I use the flat disk when I want to leave the table in the horizontal position. This is mostly for removing a very small amount from the end of a piece when using the miter gauge with the sander. I have three sanders with my SS. The flat disk, the conical disk and the belt sander. They are different animals and are used whenever I feel the situation demands a particular one. Can't say I use the Conical over the flat one except when I want to run a longer piece across the disk to achieve a flat, straight edge. Guess this is what it was designed to do!

C) I have used the conical disk for small edging jobs and have also used it to square off the stiles with the rails for door frames. This would also work to square the frames if the rails were not perfectly square with the rails.