The belt-grinder is mounted on a low wooden table and the whole business only weighs about 70-80lbs so on nice days I can snatch it up and set it down outside.
The vacuum system for it is powered by a shop-vac so it just trundles along behind.
I still use a set of mill bastard files and man made or Ark Stones.
We will get into this a bit more when the next article hits but I slack belt convex the edges with a coarse x-weight belt, grind with grits 80-120-320 and knock off the bur by stropping with 400 grit sandpaper.
That sounds more complicated that it actually is
I set my grind pretty high. You can get away with being a little higher on an Imacasa or Gavilan than a Cold Steel/Lasher IME.
Well used Martindale:
Much higher than this and you will start to get edge ripples on hardwood or if you get clumsy.
Also, the higher, thinner grinds make any edge damage incurred far worse.
I maintain the edge during use with a coarse/fine DMT di-fold and a short double-cut mill "handy" file for bigger boo-boos and give it a good 400 grit stropping at the end of the day.
If cutting a lot of wet grasses a final edge from the file can be useful since it is "toothy" and catches grass that would otherwise slide away
If I start getting too much of a bevel from filing that won't strop out with undue effort. I give it a couple quick passes on the belt-grinder.
All that said, and just spitballing a number, I figure you can get maybe 90% of the
shazaaaam! out of a machete with nothing more than a big honkin' file.
It ain't rocket surgery after all.