Buffing wheels

[mick]

I've decided rather than buying a Beall buffing mandrel I'm gonna make my own and mount it on my ShopSmith as a dedicated buffing station. Although it's huge, it's already sitting there and taking up space so I might as well use it.
What I'm wondering about are different types of buffing wheels. Are some better than others? Are different ones needed for different compounds? I've seen flannel wheels and muslin wheels. Triple stitched wheels and other wheels. Where do I begin?

 

[DozerMite]

Just like anything else, there are different levels of quality.

YES, use a different wheel for each compound.

Depending on the process you plan to use, a good starting point is a concentric wheel for the tripoli, and a loose wheel for the WR.
The canton wheels work well, but the dommet wheels are softer. You can either get the higher ply wheels or just stack them. I prefer either a 40 ply or 80 ply depending on what I'm working on. A single wheel will get the job done.

Hope that helps...

 

[rherrell]

You can find everything you need to know here......
http://www.caswellplating.com/index.html

 

[Boz]

Don't buy buffing wheels from the Eastwood Co. I bought some to polish up parts for a motorcycle restoration and they flew apart and covered my shop floor. To their credit when I complaned they sent me replacements but they did the same thing.

 

[nativewooder]

With my limited experience, it seems it is necessary to use a rake to rid new buffing wheels of all the excess fluff and threads. Yes, I read the directions from Beall and I already had the rake, but it has been necessary with replacement buffing wheels since then and it doesn't matter what company sells them.