Excellent value in a belt sander
Rating:4 out of 5 stars
I upgraded from a B&D belt sander so this was quite a jump up in quality. It is sturdy, solid, well made, and has lots of power. The sanding belt tracked perfectly when in use and I was glad to not have to contantly mess with the tracking adjustment as I did on my ancient B&D BS. The spring loaded lever to change belts worked as designed and was simple to use. The dust collector bag and how it connected to the sander didn’t work very well. A small tweaking of the bag is required to get it to fit proprerly and then the bag lock clip seemed kind of flimsy. The bag also didn’t seem to collect a lot of dust. After extensive sanding, I had more dust in my lungs, face, hair, and shirt; then I did in the DC bag. I wasn’t concerned about the lack of variable speed since I would rather vary MY sanding speed (and technique) instead of the sanders speed. IMHO I reckon variable speed in a belt sander causes more problems than it solves. All in all, I am really pleased with this sander and would have given it 5 stars except for the ill fitting and ill operating dust pool system.