Which high speed belt sander?

I'm preping for building headers and doing some other fitting so looking at H/S belt sanders.

Jet Kalamazoo Dayton

2x42 ~ 2x48

Don't want some sheet metal crap or something that is going to shake off the bench

I have a handheld portable unit (3" wide belt) and I really like it compared to the big stand types. It's obviously limited but for how rarely I need it, it gets the job done and stores nicely.

Bryce

I much prefer a large disc sander. There are some limits to what you can do with one due to differential sanding feed rates but for squaring up material, trimming, and deburing they are the bomb. Also much quieter than belt sander.

Some people don't like Sears Craftsman but I have one of their 2X42 inch belt sanders and it works great. You can get the belts there as well but I bought some on line cheaper.

I love a good 6" wide belt sander and use them instead of bench grinders. They all have a disc sander on the side so they do dual duty.

Keep your eye out on CL for a quality vintage piece. I have been using the HF ones for a decade, a Jet and a Delta. Of the four HF, 2 were awesome and two were junk. The Jet was a bit quieter than the good HF ones and the delta was in between the good and bad HF's. The runout on the disc portion varied from 1/4" (HF and Delta) 1/16" (good HF) and less than a 32nd for the Jet.

We recently picked up a vintage Wells 10" disc/6" belt sander and it is many orders of magnitude better than any of them. Dead flat bed, huge motor with tons of torque, the belts track perfectly with minor adjustments and the disc sander has no perceptible runout. This thing is a keeper and every bearing is a standard pillow block so I can keep it running for another 60 years easily.

Cruise CL for a few weeks and pick up a used vintage one that will last you several lifetimes, for the price of a HF unit.

I got a cheap delta 4x36 belt/disc sander on craigslist to play around with and the disc is basically worthless. What crap, they use a set screw to install the disc to the arbor but it doesn't cut it and the damn thing has massive runout as mentioned above. Buy used quality on craigsdork.

Plugging "Wells belt sander" into my search thingie! Thanks

I use a 2x72 grinder from Brodbeck Ironworks just because I use it for a few different things, including blade making and it's very useful across the various types of applications I use it for. It's not cheap, but they're excellent belt sanders and they work very well. Unfortunately, Brodbeck only makes 2x72 grinders. If you're looking for a 2x42, I've heard pretty good things about Eastwood grinders and they're pretty affordable. I don't know if you've started looking at belts, but for metalworking, I'd highly recommend ceramic belts over aluminum oxide. They'll last longer and you'll get more bang for your buck. I've switched brands a few times, but these are my favorite brand so far. These belts last quite a long-time. https://www.redlabelabrasives.com/collections/edgeforce-ceramic. They sell 2x42 belts too. 

In reply to bentwrench :

Mikita is the quietest  and most reliable according to all the professionals I spoke to. But do not ignore A portable planer.  I've used my Mikita portable planet to get things close and then hit it with the belt sander. Go with the 3 inch wide not the 2 inch