Homemade contact wheel.

Keith Willis

Keith Willis

Well-Known Member
I bought the wheel off ebay.It is used for a hand cart,or buggy.It had needle bearings,I removed those,and my friend bored it out for roller bearings.It runs good and grinds good,I hope it will last a while.If it does i'm going to order some more sizes.

Do you all think this will work well.

I have finished 1 knife,since I built my grinder,I will show it later tonight.I have 5 more about ready to put handles on.

Sorry guys I deleted the pic.

God bless,Keith
 
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I'm too much of a noob to know for sure.
But I've been married 30 years and I guarantee you that your wife is going to be really mad when she sees what you have done to her washing machine. :p
 
It looks like it should work OK, the thing I would ask is how hard is the polyurthane on the wheel? Does the knife tend to bounce off it when you grind? If not it should be good to go.

By the way those huge saw blades in the background remind me of old road runner cartoons.
 
Thanks guys.

Hey Diver,I won't tell if you don't.

Hey Chris,that's what I thought about before I purchased it,however,It was cheap enough,so I thought it was worth the chance.It is soft enough to press with a fingernail,however it is not to soft,and the knife does not bounce,so maybe I did good.

Thanks again,
God bless,Keith
 
Keith, I have a wheel similar to yours that I am going to use on my grinder when I get it built. I'm still waiting for all the parts then I'm good to go. The poly on mine is 70 durometer so yours probably is too. Let us know how it works. Your grinder looks good.

Larry
 
Thinks Larry,I saw Tracy on one of his videos,press on one of his wheels with his thumb,and just looking at the way it pressed in,this one looks close to the same stiffness.

Does yours have roller bearings,or needle bearings?

God bless,Keith
 
Keith, My wheel has roller bearings, was ordered from either Northern tools or Harbor Freight. I've ordered so much stuff lately I can remember where it's all coming from. Just look in the caster section. Can't wait to get mine started.

Larry
 
I bought a Grizzly 10" wheel from them, made for their "knife grinder" and had a machinist buddy bore it for the proper roller bearings to fit my KMG. It was about 20% of the cost of a KMG 10" wheel, which was a good thing. However, I have a 8" KMG wheel and I can tell the difference- particularly at higher RPMs. The Griz wheel is not as well balanced. Beaumont (KMG) balances their wheels better and that does make a difference. Also the shoe is thicker and the overall weight is heavier on the KMG wheel and that makes a difference as well- keeps the blade cooler, less bounce, just smoother operation. Now with all that being said, Im not ready to drop 4 bills on a Beaumont wheel just yet. I've gotten used to the Grizz wheel and it's limitations. And since Im not good at high-speed hollow grinding, it's not much of an issue. But high RPMs will expose even a slightly un-balanced wheel.

I said all that to say this, it looks like your wheel will work OK, much like mine, but in the words of a car salesman "you can never really appreciate a BMW until you get behind the wheel of one..."
 
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