The 40-grit sandpaper arrived today. I cut a couple of pieces to fit my Black & Decker mouse sander and tried it on one of my hard yellow pine stair treads.
It works, sort of. At least, it gets the tippy-top layer off. The dirty scratches in the recessed grain, not so much.
Now, I'm not looking to have these floors mint-perfect. I mean, the staple holes are part of the house's history, right? But I'd like to get the worst of the dirt out, so the grain will actually shine through under the shellac.
I've been online to see if anybody can recommend a small hand-held electric sander that might have a little more horsepower than the B&D. No luck. Looks like I'm just going to have to cut a lot of hook-and-loop sheets and go at it.
And at it.
And at it.
And at it.
And at it.
And at it . . .
2 comments:
We had three different sanders we used last winter during our two month long sanding marathon. Hands down, the best one was the Chicago 5" RO palm sander. Surprising, because it's nothing fancy - a cheap thing at Harbor Freight actually. It makes a dusty mess, but it cut through stuff that bogged the other sanders down.
But regardless of how long it takes your stairs are looking great!
If my friend's husband doesn't have anything appropriate (cf. subsequent post), I can check into the Chicago 5" RO. I think we even have a Harbor Freight store here in the Pittsburgh area.
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