On Sep 19, 9:45*am, Davej wrote:
Thanks to all for the responses. I guess it is a drum sander and not a
belt. These items look like what was in the store...

http://www.homedepotrents.com/diyToo...rum_sander.asp

If I tried the drum sander what grit would be safe for my initial
"education period" with less chance of doing damage? I guess I'd be ok
if I just kept the unit in constant motion? Will the drum sander use
less paper? If I went with the safer orbital what would be appropriate
starting grit for removing one layer of old varnish? Thanks again.

If you're starting out a drum/belt sander is a much riskier
proposition for you. Unless you have 'the touch' you'll leave ripples
in your floor. Even some "professionals" leave ripples in the floor
with a drum sander. They're particularly hard to use in smaller rooms
as the start and stop marks are almost all in the same place.

The U-Sand orbital sanders that HomeDepoo rents are excellent
machines. Like everything else you rent, don't take the first one you
see. I end up Frankensteining a machine together by using the skirt
from this one, the bag from that one and always choose the one with
the best condition pads (remove the leftover sandpaper so you can see
the pad itself).

You would be hard put to mess up your floor with a multi-head orbital
sander. If your floor is in reasonably flat condition you can start
with 36 or 40 grit paper. The 24 grit is for floors that need more
work with gouges and such. Skipping grit sizes is usually
counterproductive - you _might_ save a little money, but you'll
definitely spend more time than you have to.

You can expect to have the rental machine for the full day. It's very
unlikely that you'd be able to rent the machine, bring it home, sand a
15' x 20' floor and return it within four hours.

After you've run through a grit size, and you feel it's ready for the
next step down in grit size, vacuum off the floor (always vacuum
between grits!) and wipe a section with a rag dampened with denatured
alcohol. That will show you if the swirl marks are all of a uniform
size. If the swirls are not uniform it means you are not spending
enough time on a particular grit size. It is _much_ harder (read
almost impossible) to take out coarser swirl marks if you are using
too fine of a grit paper.

R