Turning a Bench Grinder into a Belt Sander

We had a bench grinder that served us well over the years, but we found that the stone discs didn’t accomplish what we needed when working on our projects..

By modeling a design in Fusion 360, we made an attachment for our bench grinder to fit a 2” x 42” sanding belt. We printed the sketches to scale on 8.5” x 11” paper and used spray adhesive to stick the templates onto a 3/16” steel plate for easy cutting. You can download the templates by clicking the link below if you want to try it out yourself.

Here is a list to most of the materials we used for the build (these are affiliate links where we earn a commission for each sale):

2 x 42 inch Sanding Belt Assortment: https://amzn.to/3d6KKLG

2 x 72 inch pulley set: https://amzn.to/2WhLyGY

5/8 – ½ Reducing bushing: https://amzn.to/3bVLgfu

Extension spring: https://amzn.to/2zMqhxf

3/16” steel plate: https://amzn.to/3d7yZEF

Two part epoxy: https://amzn.to/2Ws8frW

We really love the way it turned out and will definitely be the most used tool in the shop. Hopefully we can keep this around for years to come.

You can check out the whole build video by clicking the link below.