Festool Sander for Bowls

[Steven Park]

Has anyone seen a sander like Festool with a vacuum but for bowls? Right now i use and angle drill with the sanding pad, but it would be nice to have something that sucks up the dust right away. Just an thought

[Sam Beagle]

No. Festool doesn’t make a designated sander for turning. But I use a few of there’s on every bowl. Rotex works great and a 5” palm as well

[Steven Park]

I found the Metabo SXE400 on amazon and gonna test it out next week. its an angle sander with a small 3" pad and a hose connection so hopefully it will work

[Trevor Mills]

I've been looking for the same thing so I hope you'll report on the Metabo after you've tried it out.
I'm sure it'll work on the outside of bowls but wonder how well it will fit the inside of medium sized bowls.

[Sam Beagle]

I have the metabo too. I use it for staircase work, I tried it on bowls. I don’t like the scratch pattern it leaves.

[CHARLES D Richards]

check out TP Tools 3 inch orbital sander (# tp-3003)

[Jon McElwain]

I use a Festool RO 90 for sanding the outside of bowls. It is 90 millimeters or about 3.5 inches in diameter. Does a good job with the dust, and variable speed to adjust to the situation. I really like having the vacuum as well as the additional random orbit to break up the sanding marks. It won't really sand the inside of the bowl unless the bowl is quite large. I have had success sanding the inside of a 22 " bowl with it. I also use a Milwaukee 0370-20 Close quarters drill for the inside, or for use with a smaller diameter pad.


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[Roger Chandler]

The best solution, IMO, is to have a dust collector with an outlet hose where you can position it near the bowl, and collect the dust into the system. There are 1250 - 1350 cfm collectors available for less than $300, which is near the cost of the Metabo unit pictured above [I have one in my shop]. Not sure how much the Festool is, but usually Festool is expensive. Even a large shop vac with a 2.5 inch hose should do better than a vac line hooked up to a sander. A 4” or 6” dust collector hose will have so much greater volume of air flow, and can keep most of that dust out of the air you breathe if it is positioned right.

Of Course, I also use a Trend Airshield Pro respirator and an overhead air cleaner unit to catch any fines floating in the air.

[Mike Goetzke]

I have a RO 90 and tried it but personally found the dust collection no very efficient because the pad doesn't sit flat on the work piece. I currently use a HF right angle chuckless drill with shop made pads. Combined with my dust collector find it works much better.