sander advice please

buzi

i dont know what type of sander to get, i want one to sand down skirting boards, doors, smooth down plaster repairs on walls

any advice will be much appreciated, thanks!

Jaynne

You probably need a palm sander for some of the detail work on doors and skirtings. This will happily smooth small areas of walls but I wouldn't want to do many big areas with one.

cyclonebri1

Maybe you would be better fixed to sand by hand??

I'm serious here.

The last power tool I ever bought was a random orbital sander.

Think if you need anything more urgently 1st.

Gloomendoom

I've got various power sanders but, as above, I do it by hand most of the time. Generally, it gives a better finish and makes a lot less dust.

cyclonebri1

Just to add, get a simple 1/4 sheet orbital sander if you are convinced you need one, but don't pay much, infact I'd say go s/h.
They are a very simple m/c that have simply one function, nothing fancy required of them.

I did find tho' that a tungsten carbide gritted pad was the best thing for filler and plaster, conventional abrasives clog to easy with powders.

Hire rather than buy a belt sander if you ever need one for say a whole floor, it makes more economic sense :money::money:

buzi

many thanks everyone

its an old house that needs a lot of sanding and ive done some hand sanding which is taking forever

which brand of orbital sander is recommended?

thanks again

Jaynne

For sheet sanders they're all much of a muchness in terms of DIY, they're primarily for smoothing rather than removing lots of material like paint. You might want to look at one with a decent dust extractor but I suspect that most of the cheap ones will be rubbish for that anyway and you'd be better off getting a cheapo wet & dry vac and leaving that running while you work or just shut the doors and clean up after.

I have an erbauer detail sander that seems fine to me, the 1/3 sheet ones from Screwfix seem like decent value.
http://www.screwfix.com/p/erbauer-erb107sdr-220w-1-3-sheet-sander-230v/58046

dodgydl

I was in a similar situation where I had lots of sanding to do when doing work on my house (sanding windows sills, doors, walls, ceilings, door frames etc) so I purchased 3 simple items which seem to have been enough for everything I have need to do

1) A 1/4 inch palm sander (small and light enough for the detailed work but could also easily cope with sanding a patch of wall)
http://www.screwfix.com/p/hitachi-sv12sg-sheet-palm-sander-230v/46332

2) Some decent sandpaper - not the cheap stuff that just falls apart after a bit of sanding. If you have a lot to do buy on a roll as it will work out cheaper. Choose the grit depending on what you are sanding. Sold at most DIY stores / sheds
http://www.screwfix.com/p/norton-aluminium-oxide-roll-80-grit-10m/85046

3) A hand sander for doing walls and ceilings (or large areas). You can even buy hand sanders that will attach to a pole for doing ceiling if you do not want to have a full on arm workout with a standard one!
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Silverline-634002-Hand-Sander/dp/B0015NSTO0/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1344595127&sr=8-1

buzi

just an update - i bought a multi sander and started to use it and found it was useless so returned it for refund and am now going back to hand sanding :cool:

cyclonebri1

buzi wrote: »

just an update - i bought a multi sander and started to use it and found it was useless so returned it for refund and am now going back to hand sanding :cool:

What did I tell you?, :rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::money::money::money::money::money: