Jig to punch Festool 5" disk 9-hole pattern in 5" disks with 8-holes ???

[HarveyWildes]

Has anyone ever tried building a jig that will punch the Festool 9-hole pattern for 5" sanding disks in an 8-hole sanding disk?

I have a new PRO 5 and a boatload of disks for my old DeWalt 5" sander.  I was thinking of a jig with three pieces of plywood.  All three have the Festool 9-hole pattern.  One of them has sharpened dowels, or maybe sharpened bolts of the right diameter.  Take the sanding disk and put it between the other two, with all of the plywood holes lined up, the press the piece with the sharpened dowels through.

Another Idea is to have just two pieces of plywood with the 9-hole pattern.  Make a sandwich with 20-30 disks in the middle, and drill out the sandpaper.  That seems like it would be rough on drill bits, but if I went though two or three in the process of drilling out roughly 400-500 disks, that seems like a reasonable tradeoff.

Do I have to punch the inner four holes that are on the pad?  I would think not, since the disks that came with the PRO 5 do not have those holes.

That way I can use my old sandpaper and buy the good stuff at a more leisurely pace.

The downside is that I then have too many holes in my sanding disks.

Thoughts?  Any better ideas out there?  (That are cheaper than just buying a full range of Granat disks?  - For me, 120-1500 grit or so, roughly $400).

 

[Gregor]

When using disks with more holes you'll most certainly destroy the velcro on the pad, at least where the extra holes are. So you should add one (or more) of them into your calculation.

 

[GarryMartin]

How many holes line up to the pad? I wouldn't have thought there would be too much of an issue provided most of your existing holes line up or are close. Obviously dust extraction and management of heat won't be optimum, but just give it a test and see how you get on.

 

[nickao]

Has anyone ever tried building a jig that will punch the Festool 9-hole pattern for 5" sanding disks in an 8-hole sanding disk?

I have a new PRO 5 and a boatload of disks for my old DeWalt 5" sander.  I was thinking of a jig with three pieces of plywood.  All three have the Festool 9-hole pattern.  One of them has sharpened dowels, or maybe sharpened bolts of the right diameter.  Take the sanding disk and put it between the other two, with all of the plywood holes lined up, the press the piece with the sharpened dowels through.

Another Idea is to have just two pieces of plywood with the 9-hole pattern.  Make a sandwich with 20-30 disks in the middle, and drill out the sandpaper.  That seems like it would be rough on drill bits, but if I went though two or three in the process of drilling out roughly 400-500 disks, that seems like a reasonable tradeoff.

Do I have to punch the inner four holes that are on the pad?  I would think not, since the disks that came with the PRO 5 do not have those holes.

That way I can use my old sandpaper and buy the good stuff at a more leisurely pace.

The downside is that I then have too many holes in my sanding disks.

Thoughts?  Any better ideas out there?  (That are cheaper than just buying a full range of Granat disks?  - For me, 120-1500 grit or so, roughly $400).

I just purchased a deep reach professorial quality single hole punch and had the kids change over about 2000 pieces. I gave them 10 bucks it didn't take them but a couple of movies in front of the TV for them to finish.

 

[HarveyWildes]

...

I just purchased a deep reach professorial quality single hole punch and had the kids change over about 2000 pieces. I gave them 10 bucks it didn't take them but a couple of movies in front of the TV for them to finish.

Do you have a web page for the punch you got?

 

[Svar]

I just purchased a deep reach professorial quality single hole punch and had the kids change over about 2000 pieces. I gave them 10 bucks it didn't take them but a couple of movies in front of the TV for them to finish.

[jawdrop]
Good answer to a recent discussion on re-punching sanding padshttp://festoolownersgroup.com/festo...25-what-is-your-use-case/msg479050/#msg479050
where bunch of skeptics (that's right [member=1146]Brice Burrell[/member]  [tongue]) claimed its nearly impossible.

 

[nickao]

The punch I have is made for heavy double thickness canvas, it goes through the sandpaper like butter.

I have this one too that one of the kids used, it worked like a charm. Its made for leather etc:
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0019K3QD8/ref=oh_aui_search_detailpage?ie=UTF8&psc=1

The price will go back down to 24.99 at some point. It only worth it if you have other uses for it as we do.

The kids just used one good sheet as the template and popped them though one by one.  And for the record it was all 24, 36 and 50 grit Saphir so they could only do one sheet at a time. 100 Grit to 400 grit of thinner type you could probably do 5 sheets or more at a time.

 

[HarveyWildes]

Thanks for the info on the punch, Dovetail65!

Just for the fun of it, The extra eight holes left over from the original eight hole pattern reduce the surface area of the disk by a little less than 5%.  At that, I don't think I'm too worried about the pad or reduced efficiency - I'm assuming that the efficiency of the PRO 5 dust handling will more than make up for that (over my DeWalt).  So it still seems worth it to punch holes in my 500 (or so) 8-hole pattern disks, given that they represent an investment of a couple of hundred $$, even if I blow out a punch or some drill bits in the process.

I'm actually more worried that the edges of the holes that I make will be rough and catch on corners and edges, especially if I try to drill the holes.  I might try out a few different grits to see what happens.

 

[HarveyWildes]

Has anyone ever tried building a jig that will punch the Festool 9-hole pattern for 5" sanding disks in an 8-hole sanding disk?

...

I just purchased a deep reach professorial quality single hole punch and had the kids change over about 2000 pieces. I gave them 10 bucks it didn't take them but a couple of movies in front of the TV for them to finish.

Reminds me of the time I paid my kids 1 cent per dandelion for all the dandelions they could pick.  Wowsers was I out some big cash.  Even worse, they made me spend my time to count them all, because I did not initially believe that they could pick so many.

 

[RickyL]

If somebody drew up the punches in cad. I will print them for owners in the UK, FOC so long as they cover shipping. I would appreciate one for RO150 disc's.  [wink]