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My old shop teacher in Tulsa said I sanded like I was mad at the wood, and that line stuck
Back in my high school woodshop class, Mr. Hargrove watched me fight a walnut cutting board for twenty minutes and then said, "You're sanding like you're mad at the wood." I had been pressing hard and rushing through grits 80 to 220 in one pass. He made me drop down to 120 and go with the grain, slow, and check the surface with my hand after every step. For like two months after that I hated it because it felt slow, but then my boards started coming out glassy with no swirl marks and I noticed I was finishing way faster since I wasn't redoing anything twice. I even dug out my old scratched-up oak nightstand from 2012 and re-sanded it proper, and the grain came back looking like a totally different piece of wood. Odd how one sentence hangs around in your head for so long. Anyone else get a tip from a teacher or mentor that bugged you at the time but turned out to be right?
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kai_knight17d ago
Read somewhere that slow sanding actually cuts faster because the grit stays clear instead of clogging up, which makes total sense with what your teacher said. Pressing hard just burns through paper and heats the wood, and you end up going back over the same spot anyway. Took me years to stop rushing grits, but now the paper lasts way longer and the finish looks better.
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