Festool polishing pads?

[Randall Frey]

Can anyone better explain the purposes of the different polishing pads Festool offers? The Festool website is pretty poor on descriptions for these.
What exactly would you use each for? and what type of compound would you use?
Coarse and Fine sponges ( for weathered surfaces?)
Honeycombed Sponges (pre polish?)
Soft and Hard Felt (Polish?)
Thanks

[Per Swenson]

Maybe I can help here,

Lets talk polishing compounds first and take Menzerna

as a example. There are 4 grits. The first one is roughly equivalent

to maybe 2000 wet or dry. Depending on your surface condition,

when they say weathered they mean pits and bumps. You can

have a surface like that brand new, just change pits and bumps to

dust and scratches. You want to apply the the first coat with a course

sponge if its bad and a fine one if its acceptable.

If your surface is pretty close to flat you can forgo this step

and sand with 2000 and 4000 rubin.

This is tuff, I know.

Next level of polish, we use the hard felt pad.

Same for the third.

Note... do not mix your pads up once they have polish on them,

wipe down the tool, etc.

Final polish, soft felt.

Then buff that baby out with the lambs wool bonnet.

Remember, and this is really important.

Make sure your finish is completely cured before polishing.

A month is not out of the question.


Oh yeah, a little bit of polish goes a long way.

Per

[Bob Marino]

Randall,

What Per said, but it is 2000 and 4000 PLATIN, not Rubin. And polishing isn't an exact science either, different folks have their own procedure. Hopefully, Festool will be coming out with a more detailed explanation of the various polishing accessories.

Bob

[Glen Blanchard]

I have been meaning to bring this up myself - just have never gotten around to it. However, my question is much more specific.

Does anyone know if the Beall buffing system (Tripoli, White Diamiond, Wax) can be used with the Festool polishing pads? Bob?

[Jim Becker]

Glen, the compounds that come with the Beall system are off-the-shelf products and not unique to Beall. You can use them with any buffing system. But remember that best results require you have a separate buff for each compound.

[Glen Blanchard]

Glen, the compounds that come with the Beall system are off-the-shelf products and not unique to Beall. You can use them with any buffing system. But remember that best results require you have a separate buff for each compound.

Indeed Jim. Actually I was wondering if the speed and the travel of the Rotex (5") sander is sufficient for these compunds.

[Bob Marino]

I have been meaning to bring this up myself - just have never gotten around to it. However, my question is much more specific.

Does anyone know if the Beall buffing system (Tripoli, White Diamiond, Wax) can be used with the Festool polishing pads? Bob?

John Lucas is pretty familar with the Beal system, but he was not able to log on here today, so he sent me this message:

"Beal system works great with turning because of the higher speed. Heat of the turning friction helps the wax work. I have used the Rotex 150 with the system and using a hard felt buffer and it can work but is very slow and a bit hard to control without burning the finish. I wouldn't recommend it. The Menzerna buffing compounds that Per mentions are great system and, I think, much better suited for the typical furniture type finishing projects."

Bob

[Glen Blanchard]

John Lucas is pretty familar with the Beal system, but he was not able to log on here today, so he sent me this message:

snip, snip

Bob
Thank you John and Bob! That is pretty much what I had figured, but just had never got around to asking.

[Randall Frey]

Thank you for the feed back on the pads. I get the general idea on, start with a sponge for heavy clean up then felt for finer work then onto wool to finish. But I was hoping for reasons why the pads are made like they are. For instance, a heavy sponge holds more compond or soft felt is used before hard felt because? And what is honeycombed sponge? And why would you need one of these? Bob, give Festool a call and tell them to get going on the product descriptions I am sure their sales would go up. Also ask them to lower the prices. http://www.sawmillcreek.org/images/smilies/wink.gif