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For those of you who have built your own buffing stations, did you just get any steel rod or did you specifically get a drive shaft rod? I was going to get some cold rolled steel rod from Metal Supermarkets but I'm not certain if it's going to be straight enough or if I should get something like this from McMaster Carr:

http://www.mcmaster.com/#rotary-shafts/=ja1ibs

Thanks for your input.

Charlton

When I looked into this, I considered Go Kart axles.

But, you can buy a full arbor from Grizzly for what an axle costs. ($99). So why bother? Unless you want something really wide.

http://www.grizzly.com/products/Buffing-Assembly/H3559

Mike

I purchased a Go Kart axle off of eBay (1" dia, 48" length) for around $25, including shipping. ( I plan to use it to make a drum sander.) Seems pretty straight, but I haven't checked it against my straight edge.

For both shop built drum sander and buffer I dont think dead nuts straight is critical. On the drum sander you'd true the drum to the table so the drum will true any wobble in the shaft. For my drum sander I used the cheapest 1" steel rod I could find.. About $20. The overall stiffness of the axel is more important than straightness, otherwise you'd have to re-true the drum from time to time.

I used a 30" piece of cold roll steel for my buffer and it has been working great. I almost wish I would have gone with a little bit longer piece though.

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Thanks. I think I'm just going to go with the cheapest piece of cold-rolled steel. Anyone have suggestions on how much threading to do on each end? I was thinking maybe 7.5"?

Thanks,
Charlton

You don't want cold rolled steel, you want ground and polished shafting.

I threaded the end of mine for 5" (i think). Don't forget to do reverse threads on one side. I guess the other option is to use locking nuts or washers.

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ELEVATE || Next Level Lutherie
http://elevatelutherie.com
&
http://ensorguitars.com

Yup. Maybe EBay?

I've looked on ebay for go-kart axles and while the axles can be had fairly economically (say $40-$50), shipping to Canada generally doubles that cost.

Let's clarify. What you want for anything wider than 36" is at least 3/4", 1" is better. 1" shouldered down to 5/8" for the nuts. Last time I looked at these, they were closer to $100. Has this changed? (go kart axles)

Mike