Hey guys,
So something that I've been seeing for a while now, is that people generally seem to absolutely hate sanding. In general, it seems to be something that people don't want to do, but HAVE to do, and when doing it, they hate it. So this weekend I was sanding a set of drawers that someone else built out of Mahogany. The set of drawers was built by a guy who bought a bunch of tools and a bunch of laminated sheets of Mahogany, but he didn't really have a good idea of what he was doing. He used those corner blocks to "join" the wood on the corners, and then filled the gaps with wood filler putty. The drawers he built wasn't straight and the drawer boxes fell off the rails on the inside as a result. I was tasked with fixing it.
What I ended up doing was straightening the rails, fixing the drawer faces into the rest of the drawers so that they remain well in place, and sanding. A lot of sanding. Oh yes, and a little bit of routing to just finish the drawer faces to just make them look a bit more "finished". Anyway, what I want to focus on is the sanding.
It's obvious that the wood panels he purchased were made in a mass production facility, and the wood wasn't properly dried when it was laminated. As a result the wood was quite rough, some of the panels cupped a bit as time went on and there were some gaps between the boards laminated together (joinery not done properly). I was very negative about the entire project but hey, money is money.
So when the sanding started, that's where I realized that I don't really dislike sanding. I mean, I stick earphones in my ears, jump onto Spotify, get my dust mask on and have at it. I started off tackling the whole thing with 80 grit on my Bosch RO sander. This involved sanding off an huge amount of the wood filler putty, and also sanding out the misaligned corners so that they just look more matching. I finished off the 80 grit, proceeded to 120 grit, then 150 grit and finally 180 grit. Once I hit the 180 grit I decided that I actually like sanding. Yes, it takes a lot of time and the vibration makes my hand itch, but for me this is the first time you can see how wood finishes in the entire building process.
The wood still has its problems, yes, but the rough, unappealing wood turned into a smooth, flat, satin-like finish. It's like half of the issues with the entire project is sanded away, and reveals beauty that's previously unseen. This beauty obscures some other issues as your eye is drawn to the grain of the wood, and your hand can feel the silky smooth wood that's been given just a coat of clear lacquer. You don't even see that the sides are mismatched, or that the top is bowed, or that the drawer faces aren't completely evenly spaced. Sanding fixed a lot of that, and I feel that way every time I work with wood and I get to the sanding stage.
Am I the only one? I'll say it - I quite enjoy sanding.
