Lapidary combo Options

[James and Cyndi]

Breaking into the piggy bank and going to Casper on Thursday to check out this little unit.

[Crusty]

Whoa! That's a serious machine!

Hope y'all had a Merry Christmas!

[Denise]

Pretty cool lapidary setup there! Looks like it would work great for what you are needing.

[James and Cyndi]

Well I did end up getting this unit it's in great shape other than the grinding wheels. There is a new saw blade to put on which is nice. It's motor stamps are from 1979.(just older than me and in better shape. Ha)
My thoughts were 100 and 220 Grit diamond wheels and 600 grit belt and maybe a 1200 grit belt. Anyone have suggestions? but I'm not sure what the difference is between the buffing wheel and polishing pad. The old buffing wheel appears to be a canvas but I can't find anything like that just felt ones. Took a minute to figure out how to disassemble everything but no rust was nice. None of the factory paint had been touched on any of the bolts so pretty sure everything on it was original. Barely used. The seller was unhelpful on info, she said she used it but couldn't give me any details. I feel I got a good deal on it. The arbor speed is adjustable by changing the belt pull slots just not yet sure on purpose for different speeds. Yet. Still lots to learn. Probably the hard way.

[EMac]

Seems like a nice score; are you sure it's big enough?

I'm excited to see what you do with it!

[CP]

Nice machine, hope you guys have a blast with it too! Seems like it's in great shape!

On grit suggestions for your wheels......our cabber which you've both seen has 4 wheels and a polish pad on the end.....grits are spread like this....wheel #1-200 (diamond carbide metal), #2-600(diamond carbide metal), #3-1200 (diamond impregnated vinyl belt), #4-3000( also diamond impregnated vinyl belt), .....then polish pad is leather.

We used to run a canvas polish pad but they wore out too quickly compared to leather ones so we use only leather on the polish pad now.

Good luck with the new tools and projects to come, can't wait to see your new lapidary work from it too!

[James and Cyndi]

[quote name='EMac' date='Jan 6 2017, 03:04 PM' post='44965']
Seems like a nice score; are you sure it's big enough?


Could say the same thing about the gold cube.

[James and Cyndi]

Thanks CP. Did some research and with the diamond carbide wheels it is nessesary to have more wheels with progressively finer grit. I have opted to use silicone for now. I read with the expandable drum belts using silicone carbide belts, all that is needed is to get down to 600 grit because it wears and effectively becomes the finer grit. So a little extra work changing and saving used belts but I blew my load on this machine and cant yet afford the upgrades. But scored some goodies at little cost thru an estate sale on friday. A couple slightly used silicone carbide wheels 100 and 220, a box of about 75 or so belts, about 10 lbs tripoli, 2 lbs cerium oxide and some other small amounts of other compounds im not familiar with. Also, a few extra polishing laps for using the various compounds separately from one another.
Got her up and running today and made a Frickin mess over filling my saw oil resevoir. Did I mention I tend to learn things the hard way. Missing the front splash guard so had to ghetto rig one. Then found out how much mist that thing creates and made me realize that it probably had a dome on it originally. I also noticed that I should be able to set it up as a gravity self feed. I couldn't resist cutting something despite needing some more thought for splash control. So I cut a geode of unknown origin that i found in a box the other day of some minerals I collected as a kid. (Mostly store bought) Frickin time capsule... the newspaper packed in the box were from 1997. Never got unpacked since I guess. Funny timing on finding the box.

[James and Cyndi]

Oh and I found out the answer to my question earlier on . Still have to figure out what my rpm adjustments actually are but I do know polishing is best at a lower rpm and buffing is slightly faster than polish. Eventually I will mess around with different polishing pads. Hard felt or soft felt leather or elk leather, suede or etc.....going with leather for now. And got a flannel buff for pre polish.

[EchoBravo]

Hey James and Cyndi,

Very nice machine!

The one I have is a covington 6inch combo unit. The grit sizes I went with was 80g diamond wheel, 220g diamond wheel, 400g expandable drum, & felt pads on the end that I switch out using diamond pastes of 14,000g, 50,000g, & 100,000g.


Then my buddy bought a cab king that he graciously leaves at my house


This one we have 220g, 360g, 600g, 1,200g, 3,000g, & 8,000g.

for face polishing large agates we use a 10" covington vibrolap.



Someday I would love to get into faceting but daamn those machines are spendy. Rarely have I seen them for sale 'used' and when I do they still demand high dollar.. Oh well someday.