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Has anyone here build their own knife grinder? If so how did it work out for you? Anything you would have done differently.

This is a link from a site called Homemade Tools. This one is specifically about Grinders and Belt Sanders

Belt Sanders


Also if you are not a member of Blade Forums it is a pretty good resource for questions like yours. Example below.

Homemade 2 Wheel Belt Grinder

Main Forum where you will find all you seek.

Shop Talk Questions and Answers

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twofish

I've built my own grinder and it turned out fine, but I have background so knew what I was trying to accomplish. Having said that, I would probably recommend that someone just buy a basic grinder unless you just want to do it for the experience. You might save a hundred or two, but it will offset itself if you get anything out of alignment, or just don't know what the expectation is from a knifemaker's perspective. The pre-built ones have all the design issues already sorted out for you.

Dale

Yes, so/so hence I got rid of it, doing it again I'd start with a grizzly.

If you have the tools to make a nice job of it and a sufficient amount of scraps it's not a huge job. If you're guying a new motor, contact wheels, steel, etc and factor in a modicom of value to your time you're ahead buying one.

Quote{" "Im 100% of the belief that with a grinder if you by a $2k-4k unit it's money well spent. Then you can just make knives."}

All well and good if you have 2-4k in your wallet and you know you want to make a lot of knives. No so good when all you have is a few hundred bucks and you just want to find out whether you enjoy making knives.

Guess you had best find a maker in your area. I am sure most makers would open up their equipment for
a budding maker long enough for you to make a decision whether of not you want to move ahead.

Or buy a cheap 1"x42" belt grinder and grind a piece of steel into submission. Not the best choice of equipment, but you can
use it for other things too.

I ground way too long on 1x42, 4x36, 6x36 , 1x60 and a 9" disc grinder before buying a decent 2x72.
Man I wish I had made that move sooner, and I wish I had spent $300 more on it.
Tim

10 seconds on ebay says you can buy one to get ya started. I doubt you can build one for a whole lot less when you start trying to source all the pieces. I can save a few bucks by building one myself, but I know what I'm doing. Might find even cheaper with more searching, but the first one I found in 10 seconds was 550 bucks. Make one alignment mistake and you've blown the savings on a build your own. You want one that will likely get you started, try ebay... Maybe add wheels etc. as you go.

Ebay Knife Grinder - $550

What I really want to find is somebody who has one sitting in the corner because they upgraded and now they just want to get rid of the old one to make room for something else.