In my wood turning, and most other projects, I sand to 180 or 220 and finish with various  finishes as needed for the project. All is fine.

In turning, I read where some people sand to 1000 or 2000.  Yet, almost all sandpaper higher than about 400 or 600 is silicon carbide. That is black and often seems to shear off and get in the pores of the unfinished wood. 

 

So, I see a lot more sanding of finishes with wet/dry silicon carbide. I can do that. I have done that with finish, oil, or even paint thinner as the lubricant.  

 

My question is what do turners and others mean when they say they sand to 1000 or 2000?  Are they sanding the wood to that fine a grit, or at some point are they putting on a finish and sanding the finish?  Where is the break point in grit between sanding wood and sanding finish?  

A those higher grits, most turners are changing over from sand paper to the newer "weave" or "screen" type sanding medium. Here's a link to something you might be able to use-

https://woodturnerswonders.com/collections/wonder-weave/products/wonder-weave-pro-net-6-sanding-discs-high-grits-sample-pkg

 

I'm going to put this in today's "Wednesday's Wisdom..." and hopefully you will get additional comments.

Bob those finer grits we use are not the black wet&dry papers. I use Finkat and Klingspor but those are not the only ones. As Lew mentioned there are weaves and something I use is Abralon which has a spongepad with Abranet as the sanding agent. Yes the finer grits can cause some burnishing and that does not help the finish stick. However since I started going up to at least 600 I can see scratches I did not see before and my finishes are much better.

     All this depends on the use of the turning and sometime the finish you will be using.

Men, thank you for the names of these non-silicon carbide sanding media. It looks like for me, they will be online orders as the two woodworking shops "near" me (60 miles) carry nothing like that, just regular sandpaper up to 320 or 400.

 

I still have a question about the breakpoint between sanding the wood before the finish, or smoothing the finish once it is on.  

At what grit do you change from the wood to smoothing a finish?

 

Thanks

Robert

When finish is applied depending on the type finish you use will determine what if any sanding is done.

   1. for a finish like Watco Danish Oil no sanding between applications and a Beale buff after all finish is cured.

   2. For film finish (varnish or Poly) start with thinned coat to seal and sand with 350 or 400 and then between coats . This gives the next application "tooth" to get a hold. After final coats you can once cured sand (beginning at 1000 and up to 12000) or use very fine steel wool and the buff.

   3. For lacquer sand after first coat to smooth and then only if need for subsequent coats because each coats melt into the previous one. Buffing lacquer is difficult to impossible at best. You can hand buff as you would an auto finish.

   4. Shellac is another animal and does not need any sanding and no matter how many layers you apply it is still only one coat.

   This did cover other parts of finishing such as applying BLO to pop the grain but that is mostly what we do as far as sanding the finish. Oh by the way I think most everyone buys sanding products online . In addition to the products I mentioned you can also get sanding discs for power sanding from Turningwood.com, woodturnerswonders.com, the sanding glove and there are a few more.

Edited September 27, 20187 yr by Gerald