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Cordless "Sander Thing" Recommendations Please


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My boat needs repainting, and it'll be a slow  job done in stages over the space of a year or more.  I want a cordless power tool for prepping surfaces but I don't know what to choose.

 

My criteria is as follows:

▪ Cordless

▪ Have at least two batteries so one can be charging while the other is being used

▪ It needs to cope with taking off paint and rust (fairly rough stuff) and sanding between coats of paint (gentle stuff) 

▪ It needs to be as lightweight as possible, (I'm not strong and I fatigue easily)

▪ I need to know what accessories/replaceable parts it will need too please 

 

It doesn't need to be a scabbler because the bad rust is only in patches. But it will need to be able to sand large areas of peeling topcoat like the whole cabin and roof. 

I think I need an orbital sander but honestly don't know. And if that is what I need, what make, model etc? Recommendations from experience would be helpful. 

Thanks all. ?

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36 minutes ago, BlueStringPudding said:

I want a cordless power tool for prepping surfaces but I don't know what to choose.

What kind of budget do you have?


And yes, you want a random orbit sander and you’ll do better with Abranet disks as opposed to regular sanding disks. 

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Lowest budget possible. It's not like I do this professionally or may ever do it again ?. But I haven't set a figure for the budget coz I genuinely didn't have a clue what I needed! 

Irrelevant of the price, if it's too heavy I won't be able to hold the thing up for more than 10 seconds without going for a kip. So I suppose meeting my criteria is more important than price. I'm hoping for a few options to weigh up the pros and cons of.

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I recognise that battery powered power tools have come on apace over the years but I fear you may be looking for the best of both worlds. ( I have a fair selection of recent cordless tools). I am also bang in the middle of taking the roof of my boat back to metal

 

a) To do what you want with a DA sander it needs to be fairly powerful, be ideally 150mm with variable speed. If such a cordless tool exists it will carry the additional weight of a battery. I have a Bosch 230 v with soft start. Had it years. Not sure of price but I think it's around £180. Not sure of the wattage but it's not that great. a smaller generator or mid sized inverter should support it. All theses not sures can be easily checked. Whatever DA you wind up with buy your discs in  bulk from a vehicle refurbisher and screwfix or Liddles 

 

Should add that the filter on my Bosch is very effective

Edited by Slim
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I bought a mains random orbital sander, as recommended on here a couple of years ago, to strip the loose paint on my roof and smooth what remained. But it wouldn't take the skin off a rice pudding, and the velcro-attached discs would fly off long before the sandpaper was worn out. In the end I used flap disc on an angle grinder to go back to bare metal.

I very much doubt you will get anything cordless which is powerful enough. Generator is the only way to go if you have no access to mains.

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Question me this.  If you don't have mains, how are you going to charge a cordless tool? They don't change by 12 volts.

 

You really need two sanders. A orbital disc that spins in a circle to remove the rust and really rough stuff.. Much faster and much more aggressive. Will leave scratches in the metal that need to be dealt with. Or something else aggressive or you will working on those rough spots for a long time.

 

A ROS Random Orbital Sander is more of a finish tool, as the name implies it spins in am random orbital pattern. It will do a good job with the right grit at smoothing up the rough spots and and it will remove old paint but it not aggressive and can be slow at some tasks. It will be the go to tool for most the job, prepping for paint.

 

I know you want to keep it cheap but you are taking a really big job. You can do with it nothing but sandpaper but I sure wouldn't want to take it without the proper tools.

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A random orbit sander is not designed to tackle much  rust; a light gjngering at most..  For real rust you need either a sander/polisher or an angle grinder.  

 

Battery tools are much better than they were, but are still best at short bursts of work.  That may suit you, but each session  will need to leave the roof protected till the next.  The higher voltage tools are usually better, and it is always a good idea to avoid anything obviously cheap if you have a long job on.  Makita, above, is a good name, but the suggestion has no battery, or charger.  They will be dear!

 

I would rent a decent generator and an angle grinder with a wire brush and some sanding discs.  Then bribe a passing simian to help give the rusty bits and any other bad areas a good going over with the grinder and follow up with a coat of Fertan or Vactan which can be repeated as needed to hold the rust off.

Then you can prime and undercoat  in slower time, using an orbital sander between coats.

 

You are a bit late in 2020 to be starting doing a whole roof outside.  It is a big job, and bloody hard yacker.  Without a good deal of energy, and mains power,  it will take a long time: October maybe? It will also have to be fitted into the weather.  Better maybe to tackle just the rust this year, and make an early start in '21.

 

N

 

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19 minutes ago, Kudzucraft said:

Question me this.  If you don't have mains, how are you going to charge a cordless tool? They don't change by 12 volts.

 

 

Please see post #6

10 minutes ago, BEngo said:

A random orbit sander is not designed to tackle much  rust; a light gjngering at most..  For real rust you need either a sander/polisher or an angle grinder.  

 

Battery tools are much better than they were, but are still best at short bursts of work.  That may suit you, but each session  will need to leave the roof protected till the next.  The higher voltage tools are usually better, and it is always a good idea to avoid anything obviously cheap if you have a long job on.  Makita, above, is a good name, but the suggestion has no battery, or charger.  They will be dear!

 

I would rent a decent generator and an angle grinder with a wire brush and some sanding discs.  Then bribe a passing simian to help give the rusty bits and any other bad areas a good going over with the grinder and follow up with a coat of Fertan or Vactan which can be repeated as needed to hold the rust off.

Then you can prime and undercoat  in slower time, using an orbital sander between coats.

 

You are a bit late in 2020 to be starting doing a whole roof outside.  It is a big job, and bloody hard yacker.  Without a good deal of energy, and mains power,  it will take a long time: October maybe? It will also have to be fitted into the weather.  Better maybe to tackle just the rust this year, and make an early start in '21.

 

N

 

I'll be doing it in short stages over a year or more, as I said in post #1. 

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I would point out to BSP that the temperature span at which modern cordless tools will charge is somewhat limited and inside our boat they would often refuse to charge during the day because the cabin temperature was too high. Likewise in the winter it was often too cold.

 

I also would go with generator, angle grinder, and random orbital sander. However I did some prep work on JennyB with a mouse/delta sander but a lot was done by hand with no power tools.

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My suggestion to you, seeing as 

3 hours ago, BlueStringPudding said:

Lowest budget possible. It's not like I do this professionally or may ever do it again

would be 1) not to look to buy a tool, and 2) not a tool to do both jobs - what you could do is to see if you can borrow a tool from whoever is around at the time to tackle the first job of removal. That could be a cordless drill or angle grinder. Then all you'd need is either a poly abrasive wheel for a drill or disc for a grinder, a mask and goggles, all of which shouldn't break the bank. Same with sanding, although more people seem to have a cordless drill/grinder than a ROS so then you may have to buy. 

 

Hmm. Having written the above, I'm wondering now whether your strategy of 

18 minutes ago, BlueStringPudding said:

doing it in short stages over a year or more,

means a series of prepping and painting small areas over a year or more. If that's the case, hopefully you have neatly-defined sections so that you can avoid a patchy overall result.

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3 hours ago, WotEver said:

What kind of budget do you have?


And yes, you want a random orbit sander and you’ll do better with Abranet disks as opposed to regular sanding disks. 

Don’t get abranets  get autonet discs  there the same but cheaper to buy

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6 hours ago, Kendorr said:

A quick search brings this up

https://www.screwfix.com/p/makita-dbo180z-125mm-18v-li-ion-lxt-cordless-random-orbital-sander-bare/5839j

No idea of the quality though, but might give you a start.

Plus another £250 for two batteries and a charger...

5 hours ago, jacko264 said:

Don’t get abranets  get autonet discs  there the same but cheaper to buy

Yeah, whatever make, it was the ‘net’ bit that I was recommending. 

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Thanks everyone.

Regarding these "net" sanding discs, I assume you mean the mesh kind? If so, what kind of grade(s) of disc would I need to buy? 

 

I'm not taking the whole boat back to bare metal. But some small rust patches will be. And the rest of the boat will need the paint just sanded but not stripped all the way back to metal.

In some places I'll be sanding back where the grippy paint on the roof or gunnels is peeling, which looks like it was created by sprinkling sand between layers of paint. I'll only be taking off what is already lifting there. 

And later I'll be doing light sanding between layers as I repaint. So I'm assuming I need different grades of sanding discs for these different jobs? If so, what grades for each stage do you suggest? 

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I'm about to start the same project. I say start as it's been in the start phase since September when we bought the boat! Treated some rust spots with sanding and Owatrol oil as a test and happy with he results so far

 

Decided to go with Erbauer 18v tools as the batteries are interchangeable and charge quickly. B & Q were doing a deal at the time so got a random orbital sander charger and battery. 

 

Since then I've added a multi tool and next will be an angle grinder all via that well known auction site.

 

So far we've been impressed as they are light weight and battery life is good

 

Also I've found the batteries are Makita compatible and there are "compatible" batteries and tools on auction sites and Chinese websites

 

Like you we have no 240v except in the marina, but quite rightly we cannot sand the boat there as we'll coat everyone else ?

 

I did hire a genny and needle scaler as recommended by someone in our marina but half a day of noise and sweating like there's no tomorrow I gave it up! Too fat, too old too unfit!

 

So it's gently does it as all threads and advice is take your time and preparation is the key. 

 

However a word of caution, it's taken us longer to decide on a colour scheme than it'll take to paint. Perhaps I should paint it quick before another change of mind ?

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1 hour ago, BlueStringPudding said:

Thanks everyone.

Regarding these "net" sanding discs, I assume you mean the mesh kind? If so, what kind of grade(s) of disc would I need to buy? 

 

I'm not taking the whole boat back to bare metal. But some small rust patches will be. And the rest of the boat will need the paint just sanded but not stripped all the way back to metal.

In some places I'll be sanding back where the grippy paint on the roof or gunnels is peeling, which looks like it was created by sprinkling sand between layers of paint. I'll only be taking off what is already lifting there. 

And later I'll be doing light sanding between layers as I repaint. So I'm assuming I need different grades of sanding discs for these different jobs? If so, what grades for each stage do you suggest? 

Yes, mesh type discs. You will need a variety.  Try to find them in small boxes (25's)  as the big boxes run expensive, and you won't need hundreds.  If you have difficulty with small  enough quantities PM me and I can get some for you.  Aylesbury sell them in 1's to dock users.  They are Mirka discs usually.  Otherwise look for a local car bodger under a railway arch/cheap industrial unit.

 

To rip rust off 40 or 80 grit.

To get the  loose sanded bits off  80 -120 grit

For feathering edges, shifting loose paint etc.  120 or 180 grit

To key old but sound paint 240 grit

Sanding between layers 240, 320 or 400 grit depending on the  shinyness of  finish you are after.

 

Do not be mean with the discs.  Change them frequently for the easiest/quickest job.

 

N

 

 

Edited by BEngo
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An other thing you will need are some industrial strength kneeling pads and proper FFP 2/3 face masks. You can always wear them to LIDl and Waitsburco afterwards.

 

Screwfix and Toolstation do a selection.

 

N

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6 hours ago, Paul Gwilliams said:

I'm about to start the same project. I say start as it's been in the start phase since September when we bought the boat! Treated some rust spots with sanding and Owatrol oil as a test and happy with he results so far

 

Decided to go with Erbauer 18v tools as the batteries are interchangeable and charge quickly. B & Q were doing a deal at the time so got a random orbital sander charger and battery. 

 

Since then I've added a multi tool and next will be an angle grinder all via that well known auction site.

 

So far we've been impressed as they are light weight and battery life is good

 

Also I've found the batteries are Makita compatible and there are "compatible" batteries and tools on auction sites and Chinese websites

 

Like you we have no 240v except in the marina, but quite rightly we cannot sand the boat there as we'll coat everyone else ?

 

I did hire a genny and needle scaler as recommended by someone in our marina but half a day of noise and sweating like there's no tomorrow I gave it up! Too fat, too old too unfit!

 

So it's gently does it as all threads and advice is take your time and preparation is the key. 

 

However a word of caution, it's taken us longer to decide on a colour scheme than it'll take to paint. Perhaps I should paint it quick before another change of mind ?

I'm too old, I'm too fat, I'm too unfit but I took my roof back to metal using a scrabbler about 3 - 4 weeks ago when it was v v hot. Was I knackered? Don't know I was too knackered to know :tired: 

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A few weeks ago I bought one. It is a Bauker, got it off the net, think it was £85 complete with one battery and charger, you will need to buy another battery though. I didn't care if it fell apart after sanding the boat but its really good for sanding paint flat and general sanding. I hate sanding and therefore use a hell of a lot of sanding discs so they are always sharp. As a sander I would recommend it, It ain't a scabbler though!

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