Over the years, I’ve told many people that, next to the table saw, the most useful stationary machine in my shop has turned out to be my edge sander. That may be because my woodworking designs always seem to have a lot of curved surfaces incorporated into them. While it is true that an edge sander can sand long, straight edges, I use it to sand inside and outside curves far more often than straight edges. I even sand large, round table tops using a jig with a pivot pin in the center. My machine has a 6” x 108” belt and about a three-foot platen surface. Outside curves are sanded on the front table and inside curves on the end table using the curvature of the idler drum. My machine does not oscillate and neither the front table nor the platen can be tilted. Most of the machines reviewed here are less limited than that.

          My technique is to mark the final profile to be sanded with a pencil line on the work piece and then cut just outside of that line by about one blade width on the band saw. If the work piece is too large to manage on the band saw, I use a jig saw (saber saw) to make the cut. After that, I use the edge sander to bring the work piece down to its final dimensions.

          An oscillating sander keeps the sanding belt from loading up and burning by constantly moving the belt up and down. An edge sander with a tilting front table or a tilting sanding head allows you to sand bevels and even compound angles.

          If you’ve used edge sanders much, you know that at a certain point, the belt is going to go, announcing its departure from this world with some rumblings followed by a big bang. I have never been hurt by this but I have always jumped away from the machine at the first sign of trouble. One good way to keep this from happening is to make sure that your belts are no more than 6 months old because the glue that holds the lap or butt joint together tends to dry out and weaken with time. When ordering belts, keep this in mind. Ordering in large quantities may not a bargain in the end if you are ordering more than you can use up in 6 months. If your machine has a coating on the platen, such as graphite, that will help reduce the friction between the back of the belt and the platen which will reduce heat buildup that shortens belt life.

          Dust collection on these machines is an absolute must and the dust collector must be large enough to handle the amount of sanding dust being created. So, if you don’t already own a dust collector that can suck up at least 600 cubic feet of air per minute (or more) you will have to add the cost of that machine onto this one. So, when considering the cost make sure you are looking at the total cost, not just the cost of the edge sander.

          On to the machines we are looking at in this review. Two are high end and the other two are moderately priced but capable machines suitable for most woodworking shops. Here they are in alphabetical order by manufacturer. At the end, I will give you a side by side chart for easy comparison of the features of these machines.