Festool 150/5 random orbit sander review
Lots of you will remember that I recently acquired a Festool 150/5 random orbit sander and a CT mini vaccuum. I built an order of doors and drawer fronts and I thought I should report on my impression of the tools.
First of all the vaccuum. It really does a great job of getting the dust. I mean all of it. I could see little to no dust moving during sanding. It keeps the surface clean and free of dust that impeeds the sandpaper making contact with the wood. It also keeps the sanding disc free of buildup. I actually got to wear a sanding disc out rather that pitch it due to the buildup. Even the worn out disc is still sharp enough in the center to do some more work but it wore out on the edge as do other ro sander papers and I didn't want to damage the pad. I also like the tool actuated vaccuum. I do not care for the vac hose, it hangs on the edge of the table and drags as I work. I did suspend a bungee cord from the truss directly above the workbench and hung the hose in the air about 1 ft above the bench and I was pleased with that arrangement. I just wasn't going to be able to get along with it dragging across the bench's edge.
The sander is a very well engineered machine with features that work well with what I do with it. Most of the work that I need a ro sander for is to sand out drum sander cross grain marks on rp doors. This sander has a 5mm stroke, larger than anything I have ever used before. It is amazing to me how well the tool did it's thing and the speed is awesome. The sander also has variable speed that I found handy for easing the edges on the back side of the doors that I was doing today. Full speed is a bit agressive for easing edges but turned way down the sander still works very well and is much easier to control the amount being taken down. I noticed my hands and arms were not nearly as tired today as usual but that may have been because I did a mid sized order (27) instead of some of the bigger jobs (60 last weekend)I have been getting lately. After I got the durned vac hose up out of the way I really enjoyed using the sander. I can sand a door with it in much less time than I could when I was using the Dewalt 5" ro sander. I did not like the heat that came off the sander in the area just above the pad and just below the hand grip. I have been holding my other sander around the outside and tried to do the same thing with this one but had to find another place for my hand to go. Maybe I'll like that this winter. http://theoak.com/tools1/smilies/biggrin.gif Oh well everything new has to be gotten used to.
I want to claim false advertising on Festool when it comes to their sandpaper. :eek: It was advertised that you should be able to get up to 30% more use out of their paper. I want to tell you what they claim is wrong, wrong. :D PLEASE READ ON. Last weekend I did a big order of doors (60) and used 12- 5" discs when doing the finish sanding using the old dewalt 5"er. Today I did 27 doors and used 2- 80 grit and 1 -120 grit disc. The 120 and the second 80 have still got a lot of mileage left on them. There is NO BUILDUP of wood dust pitch on the worn out disc that I finally tossed out because the edge was breaking down. These discs last longer than they say they do. :cool: Of course at 38 cents each they should be good but I expected to spend more than $1.14 on sandpaper for 27 doors.;) Only big complaint that I have is the cost.:( Nice tool, big expense. :confused: It is worth it? Probably. :D I just love new tools.
Thanks Bob Marino for putting me onto the right tool for the job.
