Official Luthiers Forum!

Looking for some second opinions here on this question...

My three student builders have bushed on 15 coats of EM6000, to get a solid base coat (and to give them the experience of brushing lacquer); we're now ready to level those coats in preparation for shooting the last 3-4 coats. I started thinking that we could save some time (and dust!) by using my Festool orbital and the handy automatic vacuum. I've never used it before for level sanding, but I think it would work fine, and not leave swirl marks. The highest grit discs that I have are some slightly used 400 grit. Festool grits seem to run soft though, so maybe these will be OK. We would finish finish the sanding by hand, with 600 or 800 grit, before going to the spray booth.

Does this seem like a reasonable step? Anyone ever used an orbital sander for this step before? Any things to look out for, other than the obvious, like 'don't burn through!' ??

TIA,
Ken

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Ken Mitchell
Durham, NC

I used one on KTM-9. It worked fine, just don't sand through!

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Pat

use an orbital for leveling EM6000. It works really well.

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http://www.Harvestmoonguitars.com

I have used a ROS a few times. You don't want to go to far into the waist, use a light touch and use 600. I just do a quick once or twice over then hand sand

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Joe Beaver
Maker of Sawdust

Pretty much all I use is my craftsman ROS with a vacuum attached, and I use it for leveling after about every 5 or 6 coats, using abranet discs and superpad discs in grits starting at 400 thru 2000 grit. http://www.supergrit.com/

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MK5acoustics.com

Wow, OK, maybe I'm on to another way to save my elbow from more wear and tear!

Wes, do you use this instead of wet-sanding? I'd love to eliminate all of that as well, and just use the Festool!

Joe, ditto that on the waist area! We already used the Festool for the pore fill (Z-Poxy) and of course the waist area was the trickiest area.

Thanks, guys, for all the info!
Ken

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Ken Mitchell
Durham, NC

Stay off the edges, that is where the sanders tend to burn through. I wouldn't bother going to 600 -800 grit if you are going to be spraying more lacquer on top of it, 400 should be fine.

I use Festool Granat for dry sanding nitro using a rotex or ETS. 800 and lower don't load at all, 1500 will a little and sometimes use a spritz of water or skip it. I only wet sand areas that I can't get to.

I dry sand all the way, never been a fan of wet sanding, way to messy for me!!! the superpads in the final stages work really well, they are a thicker foam type of disc that makes it difficult to have sand thrus even around the edges...like everything else practice first and do what works for you..

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MK5acoustics.com