What grit do you normally start sanding at after milling?
I know this is vague and depends but...
I’m curious what grit others start their sanding routine at after milling? The planer is typically always the last step on both faces and edges unless the stock is wider than 9”, in which case I can’t feed it on edge through my planer and will rip to width on table saw or possibly tracksaw depending on the scenario.
I have an older 20” industrial level planer with a 4 straight knife cutterhead. The cutterhead is about 5” in diameter and leaves what I would call a great finish in well behaved woods. Knotty woods really crazy grain are generally not as well behaved and do result in some tear out. I typically like to work in well behaved domestic hardwoods and some premium softwoods (vertical grain DF, WRC, Alaskan yellow cedar, etc)
Said well behaved woods will have minimal milling marks and I usually start at 150 grit with my Festool ETS-EC 150/3 orbital. Mill marks from the planer typically clean up pretty quickly and easily at 150 and depending on the need / finish, I may begin and end with 150 and have had good results.
If I have to clean up ripped edges from a table saw I may use the Rotex 150 with 120 grit, maybe, but rarely feel the need to start at under 150. I am happy/ok with this approach but often read of folks starting well below here. I have tried this at times in the past (starting at 100 or 120) and noticed no difference in the end and only more time and sandpaper down the drain. The exception to this is if there is tear out that needs a good bit of material removal around the tear out area and I may start with even 80 depending on the severity of the tear out, but this is typically rare.
What grit do you guys normally start the sanding routine after final milling?