Which sander to buy?

[Riverman]

Soon, all of my glass work will be finished and the boat will be going outside for the winter. The boat is presently painted blue and I want to sand the paint off the entire boat and have it repainted. I have two questions about this:

What is the best type of sander to use for this application? I have a lot of air available.
What type/grit of sandpaper should I use? I don't want to use too coarse of a grit and make extra work for the painter.
All help appreciated. RM

[Riverman]

ttttttttttttttttttttttttttt

[triple dude]

Are you sure you need to sand the old paint OFF?? Why not just scuff it??

[transomstand]

A DA type sander is pretty much universal for painters. They come air powered or electric. As far as what paper to use, that's a tougher question. Ideally, you would want to talk to the painter doing the work, different guys have different preferences for prep, there's no single "right" way to do it. Since the prep is the most important part of the job, you want to give your painter something he is comfortable with.

Pete

[Riverman]

Are you sure you need to sand the old paint OFF?? Why not just scuff it??
TD, the paint is not properly adhered IMO. You can scrape it off with your fingernail in some areas.

What does DA stand for??
RM

[transomstand]

DA stands for dual action, the 5 or 6" round pad sander you see in any body shop. You have air, so even a cheap air powered one from Home Depot should be fine. Sounds like you'll need to strip all the paint on it now, bad adhesion, probably from poor preparation. You'll want to use the most aggresive paper you can to remove material fast. The trick will be to remove the paint, but not to dig into the fiberglass. If you get down into the glass, your finished product may end up looking wavey, the new shiney paint will magnify even the smallest imperfection.


Pete

[GelcoatJoe]

sounds like your old paint can be mostly blown off wit a air blower, if it was not preped rite , and you could scrape it off wit your fingernail, try blowin it off wit high air presure, i done that many times over the years, or try the presure washer........

[Rickracer]

You do have to be careful not to gouge the glass, but if you get on a roll, you can peel off great big sheets of paint at a time..... :cool:

[triple dude]

Pressure washing is a good idea. You might get lucky and blow it all off. If what's underneath is good, you can just use some "light" sandpaper to scuff it up for adherance. If you want to put a lot of time into it, you can also wetsand with a sanding block. I did that on a car a few years ago. It'd been repainted once since 68 and I wanted to make sure it was "straight". Sanded thru the paint and primer down to the original paint.

[Riverman]

These are all very good suggestions. I don't know if I will try pressure washing as it is starting to freeze every night and the boat may not dry properly. But if get a nice day I will surely try it.
I'm going to price a dual action sander today. As I don't have a painter yet, I guess I will try progressively coarser discs until it starts to scare me!
I'm told that better quality air tools use less air. I will look for a Chicago Pnuematic - any other makes as good/better than CP?
RM

[triple dude]

CP is decent and proably as good as any. I've used some cheapies that have done the job. get yourself a DA and roll of sandpaper (sticky backed). Do you have an automotive paint supply shop near you?? You'll also need something to wipe the boat down with to get it REALLY clean. Sorry, it's been awhile since I did body work so I'm not real familiar with the names of current products. I would think that 220 grit would work?? Also get some 3M scuffpads. Although you might think you've got to sand and sand and ...you can quite often just use the scuffpad, especially in nooks and crannies.

[Bruster]

Look in to have it plastic media blasted. This is a common method for stripping Corvettes (and all cars for that matter). This is quick and not to expensive, which translates in to really cheap when you buy a sander, sand paper and figure your time has to be worth something. :eek:

[Fast Fred]

on vetts we used striper, to 86 the paint, don't let it sit too long.
two three cans o' striper and a roll of duct tape, strip a vett in about an hour :cool:

[1BadAction]

if you want to keep the DA- Snap-on. if you want to use it one time, the cheapest pos u can find.

[Fast Fred]

if ya want to pay for three and get one :eek:

[Riverman]

if you want to keep the DA- Snap-on. if you want to use it one time, the cheapest pos u can find.That's funny. I went to an auto body supply store, their cheapo was $90. Went to the Canadian Tire down the street, same tool was $45. Then went to a discount tool store, same one was $36. Went to a farm supply store, same sander was $27. Bought it, works great. Just need a softer pad because of all of the concave surfaces on the Stream.

[1BadAction]

if ya want to pay for three and get one :eek:

fyi a dynabrade/CP/IR POS thats un fixable (and they DO break) is $190. a snap on that you can fix for $30 IF it breaks is $197.

[1BadAction]

Rman- I do plan on doing boats in the future, thats really the only reason I went the way I did. even a CP type will last along time and probably would have been fine for me, but I wanted to be able to fix it, and it does match my other tools :D ;)

[Fast Fred]

thats funny, i killed the first disc on my PC, got two new ones for 14 bucks :eek:

[jphii]

I've got a dynabride, got it through Klingspor cause I have an account and only paid $110. And they threw in 3 boxes (100ct, 4-5-600) od discs and both 5 & 6 inch pads. Best money I ever spent on a sander.

[triple dude]

We used to carry some made in Taiwan DA's in our warehouse (along with sticky back paper). When discontinued, I bought three for $10 each. That was about ten years ago. Two of them are still unopened so I have a lifelong supply. Wish I would have loaded up on the sandpaper also. When I sanded my GTO, I did it the old fashioned way. With rubber block and bucket of water.

[traderbob1955]

I love my 6 inch portacable electric DA. Sand your boat or house just as fast as air .

[Steve 1]

I have Hutchins and Dynabrade both, good professional tools.