The Most Terrifying Tool Ever

[minaret]

Check this one out. We use these for building large fish holds in commercial fishing boats. A couple of feet worth of expanding foam is sprayed in between mold frames against the steel hulls. Then we shape the foam flat and fair to the mold frames with one of these, the worlds most dangerous tool. It's a pneumatic hi torque hi speed grinder motor attached to a shaft with a whole bunch if thin kerf skil saw blades attached to it at an angle. The guard is a joke! Don't get yer beard in it! Was just using one so thought I'd show a pic for your edification. Our broken one gets the trigger stuck on!

[estarzinger]

neat . . .wish I had one when we were smoothing the sprayed in foam in Hawk's bare hull. We broke a bunch of electric carving knives doing that job.

[minaret]

Originally Posted by estarzinger

neat . . .wish I had one when we were smoothing the sprayed in foam in Hawk's bare hull. We broke a bunch of electric carving knives doing that job.

I can get one if anyone ever needs it. Not cheap though.


After rough shaping with these, we soft pad sand for final fairing, then get out the chopper gun and glass the crap out of the entire hold, whole thing at once. External mix chopper gun in an enclosed space is good fun!


I'd take a pic of it running, but you can't see a damn thing when it hits foam!

[rebel heart]

I hate all you extremely handy and capable people.

[minaret]

Originally Posted by rebel heart

I hate all you extremely handy and capable people.

Believe me, if you ran this thing for five minutes you'd be perfectly happy to pretend you are not "handy" enough to do so again!

[Stumble]

Originally Posted by minaret

Believe me, if you ran this thing for five minutes you'd be perfectly happy to pretend you are not "handy" enough to do so again!

Or be missing hands! That looks like a fun way to spend an hour, and a miserable way to spend a week.

[Cheechako]

Ouch!

[Delfin]

Originally Posted by minaret

Check this one out. We use these for building large fish holds in commercial fishing boats. A couple of feet worth of expanding foam is sprayed in between mold frames against the steel hulls. Then we shape the foam flat and fair to the mold frames with one of these, the worlds most dangerous tool. It's a pneumatic hi torque hi speed grinder motor attached to a shaft with a whole bunch if thin kerf skil saw blades attached to it at an angle. The guard is a joke! Don't get yer beard in it! Was just using one so thought I'd show a pic for your edification. Our broken one gets the trigger stuck on!

That looks pretty gnarly, although using the 4" x 4" spiral cutter turning at 12,000 rpm on my shaper that I used to turn the corners on Delfin's inside window frames made me feel like a bomb disposal specialist. One false move and it would grab the work and fling it across the room, or possibly your arm. Poked a hole in my garage freezer that way (piece of wood, not my arm).

[shorebird]

So the blades are angled to cut a swath as wide as the swath of the next blade? Does it vibrate much? Looks like it would have to be pretty well balanced just to hang on to it. I would hate to see the results of a "runaway."

[minaret]

Originally Posted by Delfin

That looks pretty gnarly, although using the 4" x 4" spiral cutter turning at 12,000 rpm on my shaper that I used to turn the corners on Delfin's inside window frames made me feel like a bomb disposal specialist. One false move and it would grab the work and fling it across the room, or possibly your arm. Poked a hole in my garage freezer that way (piece of wood, not my arm).

Too true, I've seen a shaper cutter head come out during operation, and it blew a hole in a wall like a cannon ball. The guy responsible for installing that cutter head got an earful! But I'm talking hand tools here, no need to get into the serious equipment horror stories. I worked in a cabinet shop once that had a "wall of shame", which contained artifacts and pictures from every accident which ever happened there, and that wall was fully covered!

[minaret]

Originally Posted by shorebird

So the blades are angled to cut a swath as wide as the swath of the next blade? Does it vibrate much? Looks like it would have to be pretty well balanced just to hang on to it. I would hate to see the results of a "runaway."

Yes, yes, and yes! It makes a flat surface in between the guard runners. As long as the guard is touching a flat surface it can't gouge. Really moves material, the peeler isn't even close. Only a turbo shear is in this realm of material shifting, but it's not quite as batsh*t crazy as this tool.

[estarzinger]

If anyone wanted to build a couple aluminum cruising hulls at once . . . this would be a terrific way to get the foam and rough ceilings in.

[minaret]

Originally Posted by Delfin

That looks pretty gnarly, although using the 4" x 4" spiral cutter turning at 12,000 rpm on my shaper that I used to turn the corners on Delfin's inside window frames made me feel like a bomb disposal specialist. One false move and it would grab the work and fling it across the room, or possibly your arm. Poked a hole in my garage freezer that way (piece of wood, not my arm).

Speaking of bomb disposal tools, I once worked with a similar device to the one depicted here that went south in just that fashion. It was a standing pneumatic grinder built by my friend who restores classic Indian motorcycles. It looks similar to this tool but is table mounted and has a bunch of grinding discs/cut off wheels installed on a shaft side by side. He builds motor blocks from scratch with it, it grinds the cooling fins into the block. Very complicated stuff. Well one day he came over to our shop and wanted to bum a box of discs to finish a grind. I gave him what we use, which unfortunately was not rated for the RPM he was running (25k), and the whole thing exploded in his face mid grind. Lots of stitches, fortunate not to lose an eye! Building your own high end complicated tools and jigs is dangerous stuff.

[minaret]

Originally Posted by estarzinger

If anyone wanted to build a couple aluminum cruising hulls at once . . . this would be a terrific way to get the foam and rough ceilings in.

Sure would. Especially if you had the tool built so that the guard runners are at the same width as the spacing of the frames in the boat. Or vice versa.

[Delfin]

Originally Posted by minaret

Too true, I've seen a shaper cutter head come out during operation, and it blew a hole in a wall like a cannon ball. The guy responsible for installing that cutter head got an earful! But I'm talking hand tools here, no need to get into the serious equipment horror stories. I worked in a cabinet shop once that had a "wall of shame", which contained artifacts and pictures from every accident which ever happened there, and that wall was fully covered!

Good point, although if the tool moves to the work or you have to move the work to the tool, the danger level is there. I only lost a small piece of a finger and bone on my last major project, so I count myself lucky.

I'm kind of surprised they didn't build a leveler for foam out of a guarded horizontal band saw or something similar. That beast looks like it was designed by the Marquis de Sade.