A Viet Challenge KRR-211A sander has helped Welsh furniture maker Rathkey Cabinet Makers speed up production by around 40%.
The Llantwit Major, Bridgend-based company, founded by cabinet maker Paul Rathkey almost two years ago, is using the machine, supplied by Trymwood Machinery Sales, to increase the sanding turnaround of oak, ash, walnut and beech furniture panels. The company produces around 25 beds per month plus other pieces of furniture.
Rathkey’s Keith Jones said: ‘You can put a number of boards through one after another with the new Viet machine, speeding things up dramatically. With an ordinary sander you need a lot of time and effort to get the sanding effect that you want.’
The £150,000-turnover company stipulated that the machine, which costs between £22,000-30,000, be able to calibrate the substrate accurately and sand the pressed veneer to strict tolerances.
The Viet Challenge combines two rollers in the first unit. The first is hard for calibrating the substrate prior to veneering, or alternatively for sanding solid wood. The second roller is soft and can be used for the first sanding/calibrating operation on a veneered panel.
By using the two rollers the machine is capable of producing in a single pass the required result on both solid wood and veneered panels without the risk of dubbing through.
The second unit on the Viet Challenge is a 24-segment electronic segmented pad able to sense the thickness variations within the panel to apply pressure evenly.
Mr Jones said: ‘You know that with a Viet sander you are not going to be more than a millimetre out because of over- or under-sanding. If using hand sanding or a different type of machine you might apply too much pressure and could ruin the effect.’
