How Do You Sand the Edges of Door Parts"

[Larry Prince]

My raised panel router bits leave an ogee profile on the edges of both the frame and the panel parts.

No matter what finish I'm going for these edges have to be sanded. I've been using a selection of rubber blocks with various sized concave/convex curves, and laboriously going thru the grits with them, by hand.

While this gives good results it's painfully slow and extends the time factor by a significant amount.

Any other ideas out there to speed this up?

[Quinn McCarthy]

Larry

I usually sand the panel before I put the door together. I use a belt sander with a 120 grit belt in it. Then I sand all 4 edges on the panel. I sand with the direction they were run through the bit. So on 2 sides you are sanding against the grain. With 120 you can't see the marks. I only sand the rail and style profile if there is some bad grain or tear on the grain. After the door is together I belt sand both sides again and hit the corners were you have the 2 pieces coming together quick with a RO sander. Then I just knock down the sharp edges a bit and sand the outside profile the way it went through the machine. Thats it.

Hope that helps.

Quinn

[Jim Becker]

There are some sanders that have the ability to take custom sanding pads you make to the contour you need. That's about the only way you can do this outside of the hand-sanding methods you are currently using. Festool's LS 130 (http://www.festoolusa.com/ProductDetails.aspx?id=7&prodid=567777) is an example of such a tool. They have a "custom profiles" pad kit (http://www.festoolusa.com/ProductDetails.aspx?ProdID=490780&ID=7) for just what you are talking about.

[Greg Heppeard]

The only part of the rail and stile that I sand is the corner of the groove. I just use a square block with 120 paper and make a couple of swipes at it. It cleans up any small knicks on the edge. I sand the panel before assembly with a ROS. You have to hold it at a slight angle to get the profile, but works well. After assembly, I run them through the drum sander lightly, then run the outside edge detail and sand with the ROS to remove any sanding marks made by drum sander Then hinge and mount.

[Jay Brewer]

Hi Larry, I never have to sand the rail and stile profile. Good quality tooling and a power feeder makes all the differnce here. The panel profile is sanded with the sander Jim refered to with custom pads I shaped to fit the various profiles.

[Joe Chritz]

Make a very fine final cut on the profile and your sanding should be reduced to nothing. It is one of the reason I like to run shaper cutters instead of separate routers for profiles. Nice clean cuts with no sanding.

You will need to make sure the bits are sharp.

When I have to sand the stick/cope profile it is a soft pad and a few swipes by hand.

Joe

[Jeffrey Makiel]

I agree with Joe. A very light final pass with the router bit works wonders. However, it may be not be helpful for you now.

I would probably stay with hand sanding using rubber profiles and soft sanding pads. Unfortunately, it becomes rather boring. But, it is effective and doesn't cost much.

-Jeff :)

[keith ouellette]

Yes; a very fine final cut will reduce/eliminate sanding. I start out with the fence and make to passes with the second being about 1/32 or less from the bearing and the make a final pass using the bearing. If you have all your pieces ready to cut it doesn't take much longer to do the cuts.