2x72 Belts bumping?

E

Emphasiski

Joined
Jun 27, 2010
Messages
402
I bought some belts from USAknifemaker.com a while ago. I finally got around to using them, after deployments and such. I've noticed that the joining part of the belt is causing bumping when I grind on my wheels. The bumping can actually be seen in the metal. The directional arrows are going the right way.

Am I missing something, or doing something wrong?
 
some belts are worse then others for the most part jsut a fact of life. the finer the grit the worse the bump 90% of the time. thats why above 120 grit i use gator belts. only exception is 220 Jflex and 9 micron (for sharpening )
 
I got the orange Norton belts for the 60-80 grit range, Jflex like butcher_block mentioned, and aluminum oxide for the 400 range. The Jflex belts are the only ones not causing problems.
 
Splice bump happens.

If you think it's bad on a wheel, you should see what happens on a platen.

I like the yellow Klingspore J Flex at Pop's, he gets his made with a nice wavy splice.

You can reduce splice bump by taking an old file to the joint and rubbing off the grit. It bumps less and it prevents the bump from showing in your finish.
 
This caused me a lot of stress early on belt grinding as well. But I was using cheaper belts and the bump were really messing up the finer finish on my knives. Read a thread here about the Norax #U264 series being better and sure enough, no bumping. I use them for everything from 65x to 5x now and get a great finish- even to mirror (well, back when I thought that was what I wanted : )
 
I am with Butch the Gator belts are awesome. Just remember the way the do there grit progression is somewhat backwards . J Flex and The Blue J Flex from Hermes at Tru Grit are nice .. Norax . My knives don't require mirror finishes as they a Bushcraft style . But after you start loosing money on steel you will learn what belts work best.
 
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