jumping belt

Brett Long

Well-Known Member
my 80 grit belts for my no weld grinder will not track straight. they jump back and forth.my wife got them for me as a surprise from a dealer in town. but only those belts. i purchsed few belts from usa knifemakers and they dont have a problem tracking at all. so my question is does it realy make a differance what brand they are or is it that they are just stiffer than the other belts? or am i doing somthing wrong.
 
i think i do. how tight should they be. twang tight or like a drive belt on a car tight. i am so new to this it is unreal. i am trying rearl hard to learn all of this. so please be patient with me.. newbie aleart...
 
the tighter the belt, generally the better it is going to track.

BY FAR, the most common issue with belt wobble is the belt tension is not strong enough. You may need a stronger spring if you built the grinder. On the No Weld, when using a door spring, you have to double it over.

Always switch to a known good belt before you start tearing the heck out of your grinder. It may be the belt. When I get a wobbler, I automatically tighten and then check with a good belt.

Don't try another of the same batch/brand. Try a complete different brand as a grinder check.

Belts wobble way more on a flat platen than a contact wheel. Use wobbly ones on contact wheels or slack belts or just learn to grind with a little wobble. Your grinder should NOT wobble on every belt. If it does, it is the grinder.

If the belt on flat platen tracks fine at full speed until you put it to use, it isn't tight enough. Contact wheels same thing but it less obvious.

There are couple other things to know about belt wobble.

Cheap belts wobble WAY more often than better ones. In fact is is rare for a belt over $4 to wobble. If it does, it is usually just one with a bad glue job. Maybe 1 out of 200 better belts might wobble. The wobble rate on cheap belts is much higher.

You might try switching the direction they run.

If you get a wobbler, put in in the machine and leave it full tension. You want it to stretch and straighten out a little. If that doesn't work, so what. It didn't work before.

Mark wobbly belts and use them for something where a wobble doesn't matter.

Hope that helps..
t
 
ok now that i am in front of the grinder i started off with an 80 grit belt i got from you. works just fine. put the other belt on. all over the place. tried the other belts from the other shop and they to are all over the place. tried running them in the other direction, no better. moral of the story. just buy belts from you and dont worry i guess. i guess these were just cheap belts. at least it was not me or the way i put my grinder together..
thanks for the lesson on cheap belts.
 
bad deal on that.
that might be why they were so cheap.
 
well the wife thought they would work. at least she tried. i can still use them so they wont go to wast.
 
I had a similar situation a long time ago with a local vendor of industrial supplies. They sell 2x72 belts about every 4 or 5 years so they sat in the back room coiled into a ball until I (sucker) decided to see if they had them available. They were crap!!!

My advice is buy from knifemaker supplier that sell them all the time and keep the stock moving and new. Plus when you have a problem they will be a lot more sympathetic to your situation if there is an issue.

That is a good woman you have that will buy you knifemaking supplies.

Later
 
That is a good woman you have that will buy you knifemaking supplies.

I concur. My girlfriend is worried I'm going to hurt myself...but she did ask me to make her a knife so at least she's interested!
 
I had a similar situation a long time ago with a local vendor of industrial supplies. They sell 2x72 belts about every 4 or 5 years so they sat in the back room coiled into a ball until I (sucker) decided to see if they had them available. They were crap!!!

My advice is buy from knifemaker supplier that sell them all the time and keep the stock moving and new. Plus when you have a problem they will be a lot more sympathetic to your situation if there is an issue.

That is a good woman you have that will buy you knifemaking supplies.

Later

Are you the Jonesy that made the (in)famous lowest cost ever knife making tutorial?
 
Yes that is me :).....Why what have you heard :confused::D

Awesome place you are building here.

I look forward to joining in.
 
I just remember seeing it one time and it was so low tech it was great. I thought Hossom wanted to have your baby over that at one time.

Is it still posted anywhere?
 
Jumpin' belts, wobbly belts....eerhg! There's nothing more frustrating when you are holding your breath in a butt-clinch trying to grind a perfect plunge.

I get these phones call a few times a year.

"my belt won't track...it goes back and forth about 1/8" and adjustments on the tracking knob doesn't help."

This is a classic description of belt wobble...and it's caused by wobbly belts. This is never a popular answer when you are sitting on a new order of fresh belts. Some belts just wobble more than others. Even the premium belts will wobble from time to time. It is caused from skewed belt seam, belts cut from fabric that is not perfectly aligned, belts that have an inconsistent width and belts that have been distorted by grinder tension and humidity.

I have seen belts that were 2" wide at one spot and 2-1/8" at another.

If you leave a belt on your grinder for an extended period such as overnight, or for a fews days, the tension may distort it so when you flip the switch the next morning, it wobbles. "What the heck??? It ran great last night...now it won't track..?"

Take the belts off at the end of the day.

Humidity will make J-weight belts curl up. Generally, they will true-up after running for a few minutes.

Yep, like has been suggested. Save the wobbly belts for general stuff..and save the truest running belts for those nail biting plunges.

-Rob
 
If you leave a belt on your grinder for an extended period such as overnight, or for a fews days, the tension may distort it so when you flip the switch the next morning, it wobbles. "What the heck??? It ran great last night...now it won't track..?"

Take the belts off at the end of the day.

-Rob

I never thought about this. It answers alot of questions. Thanks2thumbs
 
I think Wayne Goddard addressed this on a video. I will look to find out, becase if I am right he has a solution for it. If you know about Wayne he builds alot of his equipment. He explains alot on the video.
 
I've only ever had one batch of high quality belts with wobble.

it was a 10 Pack of 80G J-Flex belts, and every single one of em wobbled nearly 1/2"


I've bought cheapy budget belts and have yet to put a single one on that DIDN'T wobble

good belts will occasionally wobble, cheap belts almost always wobble.
 
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