I have both - EITHER will work fine for polishing, HOWEVER-
I think you said that you are doing Silestone? Right???
Many of the Engineered Stones "work"a little bit different
than Natural Stones when putting an edge on them - remember
that Silestone and ALL othe Engineered Stones use a polyester
matrix to hold the Quartz particulat togerther - and quartz
will polish up differently than the polyester - so remember that
when you are buying your pads - there are pads designed
specifically for Engineered Stone, and that's what I'd
want to see you purchase and use -
you'll have less swearing, cussing, wailing and mashing of teeth on your project.

Try Braxton Bragg, Gran Quartz, Hard Rock Tool, Granite City
Tool, VIC International, Keystone (am I missing anybody???)

Here's another unsolicited piece of advice - as one of my
childhood heroes - # 5 - Paul Hornung of the Green Bay Packers
always said: "Practice, Practice, Practice" (wink wink, nudge nudge)

Seriously - IF Fabricating is NOT your maun line of work,
get some scrap and practice until you feel comfortable in doing
your production pieces.

IF this is a purchase for a one time use - EITHER Flex OR Aplha
will work fine for you...

IF you were going to be doing this for a LIVING - I'd suggest
looking at using an Alpha 658 AIR polisher - built like
am M1 Abrahms and will last pretty much forever....

hope that helps

kevin

kevin, thanks so much for your very informative reply. I will go ahead and get it, then.

I have already done our master bath counter from silestone remnants (epoxied together with the seams under the very big rectangular sink, and pretty invisible seams in front :)), and done *most* of the edges (again remnants) for the laundry room--it was *so much fun* once I got good at it! To make a beautiful smooth edge gradually up from low grit to the 1500s and up was so rewarding. I did have to practice to make sure I could move it smoothly--the Flex is supposedly lightweight so that's good--but wow what a great feeling to rub the edge of our counter and know that I did it :) I did get the engineered stone pads, now that I think about it, but I'm not sure I would have remembered if you hadn't posted, so thanks very much for that, too :)

Interesting that you suggest that air polisher--we have a compressor but I would need to see if it's a cast iron stage 2...

Hey... Post some pics of your work - it may inspire other
people with "skills" to do the same - Now remember, I make
a living as a Fabricator, Trainer and a Consultant to
the Natural & Engineered Stone Industry,

BUT... this is NOT rocket science,
and a person with the right skill sets can
do a pretty respectable job if they have the
right tools and training - BUT it takes LOTS of PRACTICE..

as far as the air polisher goes, you'll want to look at the
max CFM (cubic feet per minute) OUTPUT of your compressor -
AND compare it to the CFM usage required by the polisher -
usually... an Alpha 658 requires around 15 CFM which is way low -

BUT.........REMEMBER:

IF your air compressor is only capable of putting out 10 CFM...
and your polisher needs 15 CFM.....
it's NOT going to work .....

you'll need a bigger CFM output compressor...

IF you are only doing stuff for your own home:

an electric Aplha, Flex, Metabo, Bosch or Milwaukee will do
just fine - make sure and get a variable speed model, as
you can fine tune your polishing ability by using different
speeds with different pads - going wet to dry - definately
an "art" to getting it "just right".....

Center water feed would also be really nice, but again -
IF you are just buying the grinder for this job,
and this job only - I would not spend the extra money
(unless it will help you sleep better at night -
then I would say - help the economy and spend the extra dough!!!!...HA!)

hope that helps

kevin

I have the Flex 1503, I bought it new from granquartz 4 years ago for around $250.

with the extra's he is throwing in, it might be worth paying the $200. The pads are $20 to $40 each new, the bit, I have a cheap one I paid $40 for it. The dry sandpaper is cheap $7 a box and the backer is $14. all new you'd be looking at about $400.

Blessings

vr, thanks very much for your reply--I was wondering whether the price was good or not--I get the feeling that you do, that it's not an incredible steal, but at least it's not highway robbery on his part either.

And kevin, love your extended thoughts too. I'm trying to save money at this finishing end of the remodel (which has expanded, of course), so a secondhand electric is probably the way I have to go on this. I always justify these purchases by saying "I'll sell it when I'm done", like my dearly beloved 10" Tilemaster saw, but when I'm supposedly "done", I come up with more new projects to do :)