What they are and what they are made for
An Angle grinder is a tool that is used for cutting, grinding and other
coarse work.
It is usually electric, and uses exchangable grinding dishes. These dishes
can be of stone, metal, sand-covered metal, or even diamond-coated
materials.
,-'"""""""'-.
d b
d¨ ,-~^^^~-. ¨b
__________ __.-' d b .
d . . . ¨¨¨¨¨¨¨¨ d b
____,d¨ . . . . . . . m m
=======____. . . . . . . . m () m
"q . . . . . . . q p
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~q~~~~p~~ q p
on/off trigger -> | | w _____ w <-- Grinding plate
"~~"
Okay.. You may stop laughing at my ASCII art now. Anyway.. It should
give a pretty good impression of what it looks like.
Angle grinders are usually two handed. One hand goes on the trigger and the
handle (like you'd hold a drill) and the other one goes on another handle that
sticks out on the opposite site of the grinding plate (in the drawing, it would
stick out on the opposite site of the little ( ) thing in the middle of the
grinding plate.
Angle Grinders in Show Use™ :)
For some reason, the Norwegian extreme-entertainment genre (of which I
used to be a part) has taken to using angle grinders instead of chain saws,
because angle grinders are safer, and they make lots of dramatic sparks.
To use angle grinders in shows, find a hard, coarse grinding dish. Then you
need some hard metal that makes nice, big sparks. Myself, I've found that old
umbraco tools etc. (basically all stainless steel) are of great use for
this, because they are fairly hard and make nice sparks.
Making sure to protect your eyes, have a friend use the angle grinder to
shoot loads and loads of sparks at you. They might hurt and burn into your
skin, but if you are on stage, and you have enough adrenaline and endorphines
running through your body, you won't notice (just make sure to remove the steel
splinters from your hands). The sparks will light up the stage (provided,
of course, that it was dark in the first place), and the red-hot steel splinters
flying into your hands will bounce off, looking really cool.
-30-