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So in this video, I want to talk to you about random orbit sanders. I've already talked to you about that before
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Some of the limitations and advantages of random orbit sanders. So I'm not going to go into that. I'm going to be talking more about buying
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Because a random orbit sander makes sense as one of the first power tools you'd want to buy
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And the sort of the basic model you'd want would be a five inch. So that refers to the diameter
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a 5-inch plug-in random orbit sander, you're going to find all kinds of good machines at reasonable prices
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and it's going to get you into the power sanding game. Not perfectly, as you recall
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because random orbit sandsers tend to leave swirl marks on the wood
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The best you can do is to work through the different grits and sand with a light hand pressure
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the heavier the hand pressure, the more the swirls show up. but this is a good style of model to get
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They usually have a built-in dust collection system, a bag, or in this case, this is hard plastic
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but it's porous plastic actually. The air can go through this plastic, but the holes are fine enough that it acts as a sort of a filter
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So not a whole lot to think about there unless you're tooling up to do different kinds of sanding
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other than your woodworking sanding in whatever shop space you have. If that's the case, if maybe you've got a wooden deck that you like to keep refinished
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or you've got some other outdoor wood projects, that's where you're going to benefit from some more power
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So the five inch, it's a good sort of light to medium duty machine
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But a tool like this for instance this is a six inch random orbit sander so the diameter of this thing is six inches instead of five
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It doesn't sound like a lot of difference, does it? But this is much more powerful, and it actually has a bigger sort of orbiting action, a bigger diameter to the orbiting motion
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What that adds up to is much more aggressive sanding action. So probably twice as much. I mean, I could cover twice the ground if I'm sanding a deck or preparing a gazebo for finishing
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I could get through twice as much with this as I could with that
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Now, the drawback, it's going to be more expensive. And mostly, the biggest drawback is that there's no built-in dust collection in the six-inch random orbit family
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I mean, there may be. Maybe there's the odd machine that I don't know of that has some. some sort of built-in dust collection. But mine, I have a couple of six-inch random
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orbit sanders, none of them have built-in dust collection. And because they remove so much wood
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they can kick up a lot of dust. So that's the drawback. You get more power
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costs more money, but then it's also a dirtier tool. So you might want to use it outside
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for instance. And that's not a bad idea. I actually, I have a shop here. I have dust collection
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I have an ambient air filter, the whole thing, but I still like to sand outside because
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sanding is dirty and I want to get as much of that sawdust as I can outside
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Please don't be confused about a tool like this, for instance. I mean, this doesn't look a lot different than that
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You wouldn think well what the difference The difference is huge actually This is what called a quarter sheet finishing sander and it gets its name because it takes a quarter of a typical sheet of sandpaper on the platinum
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But whereas the six inch random orbit sander was twice as effective as the five inch, I would estimate that this is probably at least twice, maybe even three times more effective than this sander
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This sander is not meant for removing anything like large amounts of wood
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This is a finishing sander. One even says right out of it. Finishing sander
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So that means it's very gentle and it doesn't remove a lot of material
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That's actually a good thing. You don't always want to be removing lots of material
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I bought this and I've used it for hundreds and hundreds of hours
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The main use for this is sanding between coats. of erythane, for instance
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As I explained before, it raises the grain, gets a little bit rough
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This knocks all that roughness down without actually going through the urethane
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because you don't want to remove the erythane that you just put on. The five inch random orbit sander would definitely
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remove all the erythane you've put on there as you sand between coats, so that's no good
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They look similar, they're not. Random orbit sanders always, always, always have round platins and they take round abrasives
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Finishing sanders like this never have round platins and they hold their sandpaper on with these little levers here
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Kind of a clamp arrangement and the paper goes in here like this
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and then clamps it down. That's the easiest way to tell them apart
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If you're going to buy one sander and you don have a deck or a gazebo or any outdoor work to get to finish the 5 inch random orbit is going to do the trick for you One more thing This is a 5 random orbit sander and it cordless It takes a battery
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and that is an advantage in some situations. The drawback is, and to be honest, I think the drawback
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is serious enough that you as a beginning woodworker would not want to bother with something like this
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but I want to introduce it to you anyway. The drawback is twofold, first of all
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It's going to be much more expensive. This one's going to be much more expensive than this one
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even though they do the same amount of work. They're about the same power. So more money for the same output
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That's one thing. And then the batteries add a fair amount of weight
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And this is a very big battery. But even a battery half that size
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it adds a fair amount of weight. So this is heavier and more awkward
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and not as well balanced as a corded model. But sometimes cordless is just the ticket
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because some people don't always work around power. You know, if you're refinishing the woodwork on a yacht
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or something like that and it's out in the middle of some yacht storage yard, that's where something like this might work
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I've used this sander lots of times when I'm up on scaffolding and I'm sanding
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some woodwork and I'd really rather not fish a long cord up there. That's a valuable use for this too
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but I still consider it something of a specialty tool. There are not a whole lot of random orbit
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sanders that are cordless right now, and I think they're going to remain more or less a specialty
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tool because of the cost issue and the weight issue. Like I said before, if you want one
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just get an ordinary plug-in model. You can build your sander collection
