Thread: Sanders

I would love a Maklita or Bosch the realities of my bank balance mean I will get Ryobi or similiar.


What about a Festo, good machines, little pricey .
Will last you for years.

Al

The dewalt palm sanders are very good and i think they are only $99. Also u should buy good sand paper.

For that sort of general use and on a budget.......like me, I'd look at the dual use type that B&D have. I've got one which is an orbital and has another plate you can attach which is shaped like a steam iron and gets in all the corners etc. It came in a case and was only about $60 at one of those clearance places. It's bloody good value.

I have a Bosch detail sander that I got when I had some cash, and I've also got two Black and Deckers - one a palm sander that stopped dead today (although it's done a lot of work) and a sheet sander that makes funny noises and vibrates your hand but doesn't take any timber.
What I need is either a 1/3 sheet or a 5 inch round sander for doing larger areas.

Anyone know what the difference is between the rectangular and round sanders.
Cheers
Smidsy

The basic difference (generally) is that the rectangular sanders are orbital, the round ones are random orbital - they spin while they make little circles, which means fewer swirl marks as the result.

I have two Bosch green 5" random orbitals, the Bosch green delta sander, and the B&D Mouse sander. The B&D never leaves the plastic box stuffed away in a corner somewhere, the delta is good for some smaller stuff. The larger 5" is great for large, heavy work and the smaller 5" is a great general purpose machine. Comes with a good dust collection setup too - pleated paper filter in a plastic shell.

The mid sized Bosch green random orbital is a good choice, and not scarily expensive - around $100 I think.

Smidsy, as DarrylF pointed out, an orbital sander rotates the pad in small circles, at a guess about 2 or 3 mm.

By contrast, a random orbital sander (ROS) also rotates the pad (usually circular) in small circles but the whole pad rotates in a random fashion as well, this random action translating into less noticeable swirl marks.

In practice, the orbital unit is probably the least aggressive sander you could buy, a belt sander is probably (potentially) the most aggressive, and the random orbital is a good compromise that falls somewhere in between.

I think the ROS is a good all rounder, I recently scored a Metabo 5" for half price through work but have an Arlec Enforcer 5" ROS that has done the job well for the past couple of years, cheap at $49 or so at KMart. Changing sandpaper reasonably regularly and letting the abrasive do the work without undue downward pressure probably helps maximise the machines life. The velcro pad on most ROSs makes paper changing quick & easy.

I'd thought having an orbital was pretty unnecessary when I already have the ROS, but I recently got one of the cheapo orbitals that Bunnings has for about $12 after reading someone's comment about using an orbital just to take the sharp edge off dressed timber that he didn't want to fully round off with a router.

Attaching any sander's dust port to a vacuum to collect the dust makes a difference to the effectiveness of your sanding, the cleanliness of your workshop air, but particularly to how long the sandpaper lasts.

Hope this helps................Cheers...........Sean

Hei Guys,
Thanks for all the advice.
I ended up going with a Bosch 270w random orbital sander for $109 from Bunnings.
I know it's the bottom end of Bosch but it looks way better than the top end Ryobi which was only $3 cheaper.
I also considered Dewalt & Makita but they were more than $50 pricier than the Bosch with lower specs - the Makita is only 220w and Dewalt only 245w and both are over $150.

Thanks for the advice guys I appreciate it.
Cheers
Smidsy