# Anyone using a grinder



## painterswife (Jun 7, 2004)

I am curious if anyone is using a grinder for hoof work?


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## wr (Aug 10, 2003)

I don't and I wouldn't. Trimming is pretty precise work that I don't feel can be achieved with a grinder. 

I'm kinda of the opinion that farriers train extensively for a reason and their skill and expertise can't be replaced by power tools.


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## goodhors (Sep 6, 2011)

The big problem is chance of overheating the hoof of horse, burning the inner parts badly. Grinders seem the "go to" tool for the Barefoot disciples, instead of learning skills with nippers and rasping. Very easy to hurt a hoof, using a grinder, and sometimes that damaged part just can't fix itself even over time. 

Grinders make it easy to take off "WAY too much" very fast, by knowledgable or the ignorant hoof worker. Not much good at "putting hoof needed by horse, back on". Big WHOOPS times can happen easily, and do.

I would not recommend any hoof worker using a grinder in their work, to another person.


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## jennigrey (Jan 27, 2005)

I use a cheap Harbor Freight 4" angle grinder to do my horses' hooves. 

My horses never have any excess sole so I don't use grinder on the sole at all. I use a knife on the frog to pare off the flaps along the edges. 

I use a fresh 50 grit sanding disc. It removes material fast enough that there's no opportunity for heat build-up. Also, hot-shoeing generates a lot more heat than this grinder does. If you were using a fine-grit disc like an 80 grit, I bet there'd be significantly more heat. Or if you didn't pay attention to the life span of the sanding disc and tried to stretch the use of an old one. I use a fresh disc on hooves and then retire it for use on wood or metal. You quickly get a feel for when the disc is getting too smooth for hooves and you need a new one.

I finish with the rasp across the bottom to make sure I'm level. Someone with a more experienced "eye" might not need that step but it helps keep me on the straight and narrow to do it that way.

My back is shot. I sit on a milk crate with my horse's hoof in my lap to pick it clean and tidy up the frog with the hoof knife. Then, still seated, I buzz most of the excess hoof horn off with the grinder. Then I stand up and hold the foot the "proper" way and finish/level it with the rasp in a few passes. Then I take the hoof stand and place the hoof forward onto it and round the edges of the hoof with the grinder. In this way, I can still do my own hooves even with my bad back.

I have very large hands for a woman. My hands and wrists are quite strong from years of off-road motorcycling, driving horses, and constantly battling vicious invasive Himalayan blackberry canes with pruning shears. If a person had hand or wrist problems, or had small hands, the angle grinder might not be an option for them because it is a big bulky tool to be using it one-handed. There are other, gentler options, though, like a pneumatic grinder. Someday when I get a big air compressor, I will invest in a nice little svelte pneumatic grinder with a dead-man's trigger so it will automatically stop when you release it.

The operation does generate a lot of nasty, stinky hoof dust that gets all in your nose. 

I've never taken too much off with the grinder, or lamed my horse. Been doing it this way for about four years now. It has worked well for me. I wouldn't necessarily recommend it as a trimming method, but then I don't necessarily _recommend_ that someone trim their own horses. It is easy to screw it up. But I can't afford to pay what they charge around here. I'd have to give up my horses. 

I don't have any need to shoe my horses, which is good because I don't know how to nail a shoe on. I guess if it came to that, I'd have to learn. I do sometimes have to boot one of my horses, when we go out on the big rocks in the mountains. But that one has some kind of mineral imbalance and grows crummy hoof and coarse hair. We've tried every kind of supplement with no success, and she's the only one here with that problem. But I digress.

There's a type of rotary trimmer that uses a chain of some sort that alarms me. That, in comparison with the sanding disc, seems like it would remove material too quickly. But there's people who really like that tool also.


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## countryfied2011 (Jul 5, 2011)

I used a grinder all of the time on one my horses...heck even my farrier used my grinder and my hoof jack on this horse. I never worried about hurting him...his hooves are hard as concrete, I did have to worry about me though because I have taken a couple of chunks out of my leg a couple of times. 

I wouldnt suggest it to everyone or every horse though. The rest of my horses I use to use nippers and a rasp. Now days I don't do anything because they keep their own feet trimmed, occasionally in the winter I might have to rasp a little if we have had a wet winter.

My farrier taught me how to keep my horses trimmed.


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## painterswife (Jun 7, 2004)

Thanks. I know this can be a bit polarizing but I would like to hear from those that do use grinders or know those that do.


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## SFM in KY (May 11, 2002)

I'm interested in this discussion as well, as both DH and I have trimmed our horses for the most part ourselves for years but we both getting old enough we don't have the strength we need in our hands to do the nipper/rasp techniques as well as we used to.


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## ElecHoofKnife (Apr 15, 2014)

Just thought I would stop by and mention that the Electric Hoof Knife is a miniature grinder, specifically designed for hoof trimming. It's embraced by farriers the world over who consider it a safer, faster, and more efficient way to trim. You can read more about it on our website or give us a call at 877-320-8203 if you'd like to know more. 

I only posted because I noticed some people saying they don't have enough strength in their hands to use traditional tools anymore and the Electric Hoof Knife is a great way to ease the pain of trimming (but only if you're comfortable with trimming yourself - we always recommend you don't use the Electric Hoof Knife unless you are comfortable with trimming hooves).


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## haypoint (Oct 4, 2006)

25 years ago, I bought a steel disc that went on my grinder. It had 4 or 5 "cutouts" and best described as a heavy duty salad shooter. Along the cutouts was a sharp piece formed into this 1/8 inch disc. It didn't take hoof off smoothly and the horses hated the noise and feel of the electric grinder.
Over the years, I have bought dozens of hoof rasps, most of them junk from China. Now I buy a name brand in an oversized rasp. Longer stroke takes hoof off faster and I can check for an even hoof better. I do a much better job with the nippers than I first did, so less rasping needed.
I don't know what homesteadingtoday's position is on advertisers that use this site to promote their own products. An electric hoof grinder might be a useful tool that many might not be aware of. Not sure what the best way to promote your product would be, Paisleytree.


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## painterswife (Jun 7, 2004)

haypoint said:


> 25 years ago, I bought a steel disc that went on my grinder. It had 4 or 5 "cutouts" and best described as a heavy duty salad shooter. Along the cutouts was a sharp piece formed into this 1/8 inch disc. It didn't take hoof off smoothly and the horses hated the noise and feel of the electric grinder.
> Over the years, I have bought dozens of hoof rasps, most of them junk from China. Now I buy a name brand in an oversized rasp. Longer stroke takes hoof off faster and I can check for an even hoof better. I do a much better job with the nippers than I first did, so less rasping needed.
> I don't know what homesteadingtoday's position is on advertisers that use this site to promote their own products. An electric hoof grinder might be a useful tool that many might not be aware of. Not sure what the best way to promote your product would be, Paisleytree.


I am not the same person as the one who is talking about the elctro knife. Thanks for the warm welcome and the accusation.


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## malinda (May 12, 2002)

If grinders were better or more efficient at trimming hooves, farriers around the world would be using them - you know how guys love their power tools! But, they're not using grinders.

As I was trimming some 13 horses this morning, I kept thinking of how on earth you could ever do a decent trim job with a grinder? You still need to trim the frog, sole, and hoofwall - and all are trimmed differently - not just ground down or hack hoof off. I'm certain my knife, nippers, and rasp are much faster and better - I trimmed these 13 horses in less than 3 hours, of which seven of them are foals from this year and there was bit of wrestling involved... though it did take me a few years of full-time shoeing and tens of thousands of horses trimmed/shod to be as proficient as I am.


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## haypoint (Oct 4, 2006)

Sorry, Paisleywood. I owe you an apology. I had just read, in the goat fourm about a newly designed electric hoof trimmer and the company owner was telling about the new and improved model they are selling. I thought it was a bit borderline on being helpful and just getting free advertisement.
I surfed over to the Equine forum and there is an open question about electric hoof trimmers. I made the assumption that this new to this site, first time poster with the same topic about hoof trimmers was simply looking for a place to market his newly redesigned electric hoof trimmer to the horse owners here. If I were going to sell electric hoof trimmers to a group of horse people, I might start out by asking who uses electric hoof trimmers and see if I could generate enough conversation to sell a few of my new and improved hoof grinder.
That was wrong of me to make such an assumption. Sorry.

Electo Hoof Knofe.


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## jennigrey (Jan 27, 2005)

Kind of off-topic but I went to the Electric Hoof Knife web site and clicked on the link for Horse Owners. 

Do people really still dress hoof walls like that? Can anyone tell me what the purpose of that might be?

I think the Electric Hoof Knife is an interesting idea but I think it would take me a while to get any good with it. With the 4" wide angle grinder I can get the bottom of the hoof mostly level just by eyeballing it, since I can sight across the 4" wide sanding disc to extrapolate the plane at which I am grinding. Then I finish with a couple passes of the long hoof rasp. With that tiny chainsaw chain nibbling away at the hoof wall, it would be harder for me to keep everything level. Maybe if I left the horses longer between trims, I could just take off most of the excess with the Electric Hoof Knife and then finish (level) with the rasp.

Interesting tool, though. And the idea of generating slivers rather than dust is attractive.

It didn't take my horses long to get used to the sound of the grinder, but their tie stalls are in the barn next to my shop and they hear me using all manner of noisy tools just a few feet away. If I was doing feet for a living, the extra time of desensitizing a horse to the noisy angle grinder would probably negate any possible benefits that tool might present. The dust makes a huge mess and I bet clients would NOT appreciate that. When I use the grinder, I put the horses in the barn doorway and turn on an industrial fan to blow the dust OUT the barn door.


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## jennigrey (Jan 27, 2005)

I also noticed that one of the sale points of the Electric Hoof Knife was "no back ache". I don't know what other peoples' backaches were from, but it wasn't the rasp or nippers that hurt my back. It was just bending over and holding up feet. The EHF wouldn't negate that for me.


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## Muleman (Nov 8, 2013)

The heat generated by the grinder would be a non-issue, unless some one is getting down into the sole. When I put shoes on my mules, which is not often, I use handmade shoes and hot set them, so any heat a grinder may make would be less than a hot shoe, and there are some benefits to the heat in a hoof. But that is actually another subject all together.

My take on using a grinder is similar to my take on all the little gadgets they have now for sharpening knifes and chainsaws. A person should take some pride in having spent time developing the proper skill set to do the job correctly without taking shortcuts or using unnecessary aids. But that is just me. I am sure there are a few who have spent time with a grinder and learned how to properly use it to do the job, but there does seem to be the ability of such a fast cutting tool in untrained hands, to do a lot of damage quickly.


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## jbo9 (Oct 30, 2012)

Every year when I make it back to the in-law's place, loading the horses into the trailer and getting their feet trimmed is on the priority list. We had tried all the farriers in the area, and one of the young vets was the best.

For the last two years, he used a grinder to finish off the trimming of the hooves. He used a knife and nippers just like any other time, but the grinder was used in place of a rasp. I was a bit concerned about it at first, because these horses are older, 15yrs plus, and spend most of their time wandering on the pastures without any responsibilities. The horses had no problem with the noise or vibration of the grinder on their feet. In fact, the vet said that most horses seemed to like the grinder, really relaxing while he used it.

I don't know that I personally would use a grinder, simply because I don't like the idea of a cord anywhere near horses' feet. But if a farrier used it? It wouldn't be a problem by itself. Far more important to me is that they trim the hoof according to the horse, and not the text book.


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