Thread: clean up bench grinder wheels

made the mistake of grinding some aluminum with the bench grinder and one of the wheels in particular is loaded up with ali and not cutting\

what is the best way to clean it up?

Personally I would bin it. You can't clean it properly and it's potentially dangerous. They're cheap to replace.

Could you dress it.

Phil

Originally Posted by Steamwhisperer

Could you dress it.
Phil

how is that done ?

You should be able to get a plain dressing stick which is pretty low tech. Things like star wheels are good but expensive.

Plain dressing sticks are ok, but I get big diamond wheels that are nearly spent from a concrete cutting mate and cut the wheel into wedges. Each wedge still lasts for ages despite there being only 1mm or so of diamond left. I don't see why you couldn't even buy a cheap diamond cutting wheel and use that.

Originally Posted by burraboy

You should be able to get a plain dressing stick which is pretty low tech. Things like star wheels are good but expensive.

at an industrial supply place like waughs industrial in bayswater??

I did hear stories of grinding wheels (used to grind ally) exploding when I was working in the shop. It may have come from the same source who saw someone welding ally milk bottle caps, but you never know,!!! Diamond grinding wheel dressers are available on ebay for around $17 or you can get a single point dresser from China for $5.50, they're very quick and do an excellent job.

I didn't have any luck trying to dress ally out of a grey wheel with one of those black sticks. Maybe I did it wrong. Or maybe my heart wasn't in it because of the stories about exploding wheels.

Originally Posted by old_picker

at an industrial supply place like waughs industrial in bayswater??

Yep, I have seen them there. They look like very coarse grinding stones but square.

Phil

Something like this. You push it onto the wheel whilst under power to clean the wheel face. Auminium heats up and can cause the wheel to fail. It can also put the wheel out of balance, increasing the likelihood of failure.

Carba Tec also sell a dressing tool.

Thanks Groggy,
for the life of me I couldn't find a pic.

Phil

I've got one of those grey dressing sticks. The stick wears down faster than the white ALOX wheels. Is that normal? I find it impossible to get a nice square edge on the wheels because the stick is constantly changing shape. Rapidly moving the stick from side to side helps, but the result is still dodgy.

Just bin it and learn from your mistake.

As stated above they are not expensive,
And the piece of mind would make you much
Happier to use the grinder.
Just my .2c worth.
Matt

I binned an 8 inch wheel after my brother ground aluminium on it: one of a long line of broken power tools. I used a silicon carbide dressing stick but it seemed to slip over the aluminium clogged area and removed wheel material from the unclogged area, it got increasingly unbalanced until I gave up and tossed it.