Mechanical Weed Whackers:

I believe a good scythe can cut more in much less time and make a neater cut doing it. There is a U Tube video that I can not find at the moment. In the video a 17 yr old girl with a scythe puts a very large dude with a magnum weed eater totally to shame. She cuts 2-3 times more area and her finished area looks much neater than the area cut with the weed eater. I have three good weed whackers. I spend half the time I am using them pulling weeds and junk out of a trapped blade. When I am done I am covered in nasty pieces of what I have been cutting, usually including poison ivy. The scythe has none of those problems. The scythe is great low impact exercise involving completely rotating the trunk of the body, strengthening back and stomach muscles.


The Dayton Grinder:

This grinder can use either 2" x 42" or 1" x 42" belts. The side sander uses the adhesive 6" sanding pads. Apparently one can order extra aluminum discs to hold various grit types.

The picture above actually answers most of your questions if you understand what you are looking at... I like the belt tensioning system better than anything else I have seen. The large handle on the top of the belt housing pulls down moving the entire top wheel assembly down and away from the belt making it very easy to remove the belt. There is a good stiff spring that keeps good pressure on the assembly. The handle and the assembly it's bolt is in is a much sturdier system than what I have seen on other sanders.

Not having actually used the machine yet I can only repeat how the instructions explain the belt tracking. If you notice around the belt release & tensioning handle there is a raised "tracking bracket" with several screws attaching it to the housing. The top screw is moved in or out to change the tilt of the top wheel enough to control tracking. There is a bolt the screw goes through that can be loosened or tightened to hold or adjust the screw. The other screws might help too but I think the top screw is the main adjustment. The screw should adjust the tilt of the entire wheel assembly.

I believe the platen you refer to is the metal device under the belt that the belt rides on or over. If you look closely you will see a groove in the an arm behind the platen. There is actually a second arm, just like the top one on the bottom of the platen. It is not visible because it is inside the housing. Both of these arms attach with socket head bolts. A set of hex wrenches comes with the machine, one is an extra long 3mm which is used to loosen the socket bolts. The platen can be moved in or out at will and then the bolts tightened to hold it at any hight one might like. The whole belt platen could even be removed. There is also a small metal plate, "work stop" that can be used to replace the large tilting belt table if it is in the way for specific work. The work stop is similar to the metal plate on a Kalamazoo.

I use to own an Inca Woodworking table saw. Highland hardware in Atlanta sold me a Dayton motor to run it. Used it for many years and had no complaints.

Belts

I love all this information on sanding belts. There is a confusing array of options and it is great to have some input from people who have actually tried the various options.

Hand Tools

Those are some interesting machete type tools KnifeGuy found that I had not discoverd yet. I am looking into several of them.