Perishable items

Using things while it’s fresh is always a good practice, whether in the kitchen or in the shop. Glues and finishes come immediately to mind.

They’re affected not only by their actual age, but by their storage conditions while waiting around to be put to work. Batteries, duct tape, rubber washers and fittings, erasers, markers, and dozens of other things can just “go bad” over time.

I talked last time about the maple slab table I’m making, and it’s coming along great. However, the slab was a bit cupped – very slightly crowned on one side, concave on the other – and while it was so minimal – I could probably have ignored it – I decided to level it out. The fastest, easiest method seemed to be with a belt sander.

Now, I don’t use belt sanders much. In fact, the last time I pulled one out was maybe nine or 10 years ago to quickly trip the top of a picnic table. But this was a perfect job for one. So, I grabbed my sander, put in a new belt, and went to work for about 15 seconds. The belt snapped at the taped joint. Installed another belt, and it lasted only 20 seconds. Put on another and it not only snapped after a few moments, but it managed to jam up the sander. I tried a different brand, with the same result.

After half a dozen tries over a mere five minutes, it occurred to me that those belts might be past their unimplied expiration date. The belts themselves were fine, but the tape used to join them had long since grown weak, letting go the first time they were put under stress. And why not? Those belts had to be a minimum of a decade old, probably older. Time to mentally add belts to my woodshop list of perishable items.