Shopsmith Forums

I may be asking a weird question, but is there any reason a person couldn't drill a few holes in a sanding disk and use it for a faceplate? What alternatives have you guys seen for a faceplate, homemade or otherwise, as it seems buying one on evil-bay or otherwise is expensive for a guy who does not have a fulltime income.

fiatben wrote:I may be asking a weird question, but is there any reason a person couldn't drill a few holes in a sanding disk and use it for a faceplate? What alternatives have you guys seen for a faceplate, homemade or otherwise, as it seems buying one on evil-bay or otherwise is expensive for a guy who does not have a fulltime income.

Makes sense if you do not mind the holes later when sanding. It may cause the disc to warp, but I doubt it will. The larger size will get in the way.

Face plates are usually chosen to be smaller than the piece being turned. You may find that the size of the sanding disc, ie: larger than your piece, represents at least an inconvenience and at worst a danger. It will also limit the angle at which you can approach the left hand edge of your workpiece with a chisel.

Paul M

I don't know what sort of torque turning might put on a faceplate, but I can imagine the screws being pushed sideways pretty hard during turning. I see the holes in the disk getting deformed as the screws are pushed sideways. In the best case this would eventualy spoil the ability of the faceplate to keep a piece centered, and in the worst case could result in a pretty dramatic failure. The thickness of a "real" faceplate is probably there to resist these sideways forces. I would want to know a little more about what forces the faceplate will be dealing with before I tried using a (relatively thin) sanding disk as a faceplate.

Just my thoughts.