Use a good fine filter, or the dust will shoot out the other side! I smoked out a pool hall by using a poor vac once, woops. As far as taking off too much material by grinding or honing...You have a good 1/8" of clearance in the rails so that shouldn't be an issue. The worse slate I have honed down has been trouth to peak variance of about 0.020" though I am certain worse are out there. Taking the top 0.01" of a crest down will make a very noticeable difference in playability. Perfection is a theory, excellance is the closest you get. Always a better way. BTW, How long has Gabriel's been doing this to thier slates?
Wanna see something cool, research Granite hole saws from Egypt.
Great quote!... Perfection is a theory, excellance is the closest you get.
i have a 5x10 1 1/2" slate brunswick arcade. just checked it with an 80" straight-edge in two different places. the maximum peak to trough measurement appears to be between .001 and .002 inches. would blocking the slate help?
Looking for any updates, especially from readers that are first-timers using the granite machine plates to sand down their slates, and an answer to someone's question above about whether or not to level, glue/bondo slates before starting the lapping process.
I'm also wondering if a block of sandstone that meets the same dimensions would work. I don't know what grit the surface would naturally be at, but it could very well be around the 60 grit mark, and then one would never need to apply sandpaper. To keep dust down, spray some water on the slate, no? It may be the sandstone's density, modulus of rupture, and moisture absorption may be prohibitive to the ideal that granite provides?