Bought another big old house; needs to be rebuilt top to bottom. Figure by the time I refinish these beautiful floors if I rented a floor sander I’d have paid for at least 1 1/2.
Now my question;
I’ve used drum sanders, edgers and hand sanding to re-finish a number of old floors. Pretty confidant with those. But have heard lately that floor re-finishers like the orbital. Seems to me you would have quicker sandpaper usage and need more fine because you’re not following the grain.
What would you buy?
Replies
> What would you buy?
A newer house.
Funny!But between what I've seen in the construction of new homes vs. old; I like old.
I like old too, so long as I don't have to clean or maintain it.
So convenient a thing it is to be a reasonable Creature, since it enables one to find or make a Reason for everything one has a mind to do. --Benjamin Franklin
Points!
I rented an orbital to do my new floors, so they weren't in bad shape. Took forever, and even with forever they still aren't great. I'd get the drum sander and rent an orbital to do the final sanding and buffing.
Of course the problem with the drum is that you can gouge the floor in about two seconds.
So convenient a thing it is to be a reasonable Creature, since it enables one to find or make a Reason for everything one has a mind to do. --Benjamin Franklin
Yep. One's too fast, t'other's too slow. The orbital (actually I think it was a floor buffer with a sanding screen and not an "orbital floor sander") did a fine job, but that meant that you spent hours upon hours sanding the floor with 60 grit. And no dust collection.
Yeah, the first time I used a drum sander, couple decades ago, in my first house; I dug great drainage trenches round the sides. Quickly learned, don't let the m-f hit the wall- it'll dig in fast.
"Quickly learned, don't let the m-f hit the wall- it'll dig in fast"
That one had me laughing Muggs.....
Well... at least when I don't do good work, I'm good for laughs.
i bought a obs orbital sander 600.00 from hd out of there rental fleet.12x18 pad ,it goes pretty slow but you can not screw up a floor with one. there is a orbital that uses 4 pads that they say is faster.i had a chance to buy one for 850 and passed.
if you think your compentent enough to run a belt type,you might rent one for a day or 2 and sand the whole house with 40 grit,then take a orbital that you own and go from there.. larry
hand me the chainsaw, i need to trim the casing just a hair.
I'd pick up a small buffer.
Beer was created so carpenters wouldn't rule the world.
I've been intrigued by the U-Sand and expect to rent one sometime soon for a parquet floor sanding job. Home Depot now rents them so you could try before you buy.
The claim of one machine has obvious appeal as does easy paper change.
Ijust did about 1200 sqft of floors with a U-Sand machine that I rented from HD. This is the machine somebody else mentioned that has 4 round pads that run in a random-orbital pattern. A week before that I did 800 sqft with a "SquareBuff" sander which is a large (12"x18") vibrating pad sander. The old fashioned "orbital" motion.Most of my floors are pine but about 400 sqft are oak. There's also a smattering of very old chestnut in there. (Much harder than I expected!) The U-Sand was quicker and more aggressive than the SquareBuff and just as easy to control. Both are far easier to control than a drum sander.I used the orbitals because I know I don't have the skill to do a good job on softwood floors with a drum sander. In fact most of the hard work in my project was a result of bad drum-sanding by the previous homeowner. (I assume it was a DIY job because it was so bad I can't imagine anybody paying for that job.) It took a long time to sand out those deep corrugations in the pine.The U-Sand worked well on both the pine and the oak for normal refinishing. The remedial stuff (sanding out the divots) was difficult with either sander but a little easier with the U-Sand. I've sanded hardwood with a drum sander before and the U-Sand was much easier to control and just as fast on floors that are good and flat. On my oak floors which were in good condition it took only about 4 hours to sand 400 sqft to bare wood and run up through the grits to a final surface. If your boards are cupped or heavily damaged the time may go up dramatically from there. In short, I'd recommend the U-Sand type random-orbital sander over the large pad sander hands down (faster and just as easy to control). Comparing the random-orbital to a drum sander I'd say it depends heavily upon your skill with the drum sander and condition of your floors because it is faster to remove material but harder to control.If you have softwood floors I'd definitely recommend the random-orbital.