Finally Did It - Power Sanding

[John Hart]

So...after about a year and a half since I started turning, I finally got my power sanding stuff. Last year, John Timberlake and I took a road trip to meet Robert Mickley, and he introduced us to his power sanding method....And I swore that I would get the same setup after seeing the miraculous transformation of a cherry bowl in just a couple minutes.

Ok...So it took me a year....after battling with hand sanding and a half a dozen makeshift power sanding failures...I am now fully equipped with a dedicated drill, a pneumatic die grinder and a pneumatic Random Orbital sander....And I finally bought the power sanding stuff from turningwood.com.
This set contains all the grits up to 800 and two 2" sanding heads. This will get me started...and really...for the price, I am an absolute idiot for not doing it sooner. Now all my excuses are gone.
powersanding.jpg

[Steve Schlumpf]

John, last July I stopped in at Rockler in St. Paul while visiting our son and his family and picked up two 2" pads and 80, 180 & 220 grit sanding disks. Been using my cordless drill and it sure makes life easier when finishing a bowl! You're going to love it! Now you have to find a place to buy the disks in bulk cause you can go through them in a hurry! Have fun with it!

[Keith Burns]

John, I've had great results from the turningwood discs. I do seem to go thru a lot of the 80 grit though, wonder why

[Bernie Weishapl]

John I did the same thing after turning a year and hand sanding everything. I bought a 90 deg angle drill, a 2" and 3" hook and loop holder. Got everything to 400 grit. Wow what a difference. Nice gloat John.

[Brad Kimbrell]

As many have said, it's easy to wear out those 36 and 60 grit "turning tools" when you use 'em as much as I do!

[Ken Fitzgerald]

Congrats John! I sure like my power sanding device!

[Mike Ramsey]

John, I've had great results from the turningwood discs. I do seem to go thru a lot of the 80 grit though, wonder why

When I attended SWAT in Sept, I wondered over to the Turningwood
booth & met Steve the owner, I bought several grits from him & he
loaded me up with extra 80 grit for free....Some how he knew that
80 was my most favorite grit!!

[Jason Christenson]

Um...where are the rest of the pics?

[Dominic Greco]

John,
If you really want to save a boat load of money, try ordering 1 meter x 1 yard sheets of velcro backed sandpaper from Industrial Abrasives.com. You can get it in grit sizes from 80 to 600 at about $15 per sheet. I purchased 1 sheet each of 100, 150, 220, 300, 400 and 600 grit several YEARS (yes,....years) ago and haven't used it all up yet.

Now you're thinking, "If I buy it in sheets, I'll have to punch out discs." Nope, all you need to do is cut them up square and use them like you would those "wave discs". The corners act like the waves on the wave discs. I cut up about 30 or so of each and store them in zip lock bags.

My friend Mark Kauder (of WC fame) clued me into this source several years ago and since then I haven't looked back.

[Gary DeWitt]

Great gloat, John. I've been procrastinating on power sanding for some time now too, and just ordered discs and holders from craftsupply. Looks like you got a better deal though. Let us know how you like the paper when you've used it for awhile.
Re: all the jeers about 60 & 80 grit, I say hey, whatever it takes to get the piece finished! You can nit pick technique all day long while I finish several bowls.

[Brad Hammond]

you'll love em!! these things are great!

[Reed Gray]

I would suggest that you get pads to go on the mandrils that you have. The pads are much cheaper to replace than the whole mandril. I get my sanding supplies from VincesWoodNWonders. His blue sanding discs are film and not paper, and have the most consistant grit of any of the discs that I have used. They also last about twice as long as any other disc I have used. He recomended to me that I use slower drill speeds as I sand, in the 600 rpm range. The slower speeds are more effective at removing stock, and you don't skip over anything. Also, use the firm pads for the coarser grits, and the softer pads for the finer grits (220 and up). Power sanding is so much faster.

As someone else said, "80 grit is a turning tool".

robo hippy

[Frank Kobilsek]

I have to second Reed's endorsement of Vince's 'blue discs'. I have used Crafts Supplies Artisan discs and Steve's mentioned above and a couple others and I am really impressed with what Vince is selling.

Good gloat ... some demostrator somewhere said 'Use sandpaper like someone else was paying for it' its good advice.

Frank

[John Hart]

Thanks all....I'm looking forward to giving it a try. Probably not for a couple days though. Got some other priorities to attend to.

Cutting discs out of a larger sheet sure sounds like my cup of tea...although, I'm a little concerned about the price Dominic. I paid $2.50 for 10 discs and if I buy them in quantities of 50, they are $11. I'll check out all these links guys. I want to save every dime I can!!!

As far as pics of the other stuff Jason....well...um...That's just pure unadulterated laziness....not to mention they are cheap tools and ya'll will make fun of me.

Thanks again!

[Dominic Greco]

...

Cutting discs out of a larger sheet sure sounds like my cup of tea...although, I'm a little concerned about the price Dominic. I paid $2.50 for 10 discs and if I buy them in quantities of 50, they are $11. I'll check out all these links guys. I want to save every dime I can!!!....

John,
A 1 meter (39.37") x 1 yard wide sheet of velcro backed sandpaper costs about $15. From that one sheet I can cut approximately (342) 2" square "discs". That works out to a per disc cost of $0.02 each. So for (50) of them it would cost $2.00. Now that's what I call a real savings!