Corrective action needed

Susan Hod

Member
Messages
6
Hi. I am unskilled and need to tap your collective wisdom. I have been without a real closet in my bedroom for 30 years so it was with much excitement that my boyfriend and I had a professional install a veneer-lined and pine-trimmed closet. We chose to do the finishing ourselves ie. filling nail/screw holes and varathaning. My dear sweet boyfriend (who has very little experience with wood) incorrectly assumed that the closet first needed a thorough sanding with a power tool. It was a "Surprise!" for me. Now the wood is covered in a multitude of chatter marks :( How do I best tackle the problem of minimizing them? Thank you thank you for any advice!!! (Please bear in mind I am a novice.)
 
Welcome Susan!

Like Don said a picture or two would help us all advise you on the right course of action.

What kind of power tool did he use?

Was it a sander?

Something like this.....

PC-353.jpg
or this...
PCBR362VRBeltSander.jpg
It might be a case of just using a finer grit sandpaper, if he started out with an #80 that is very coarse, maybe he just needs to change to a #240 or even #320.

I'm sure we can help you out, but we need a bit more info!

Congrats on the closet!

Cheers!
 
welcome susan, and like the others have said pictures and info needed.. also another possibility is that if you were close to a member here they might be able to help you out. we are a pretty giving group and will help one another when ever possible.
 
Welcome. Sanding is a procedure of creating finer and finer scratches until the scratches are so fine that we call it "smooth". If the marks are gouges where the sander was moved too quickly or skipped as control was occasionally lost it will be a matter of "how deep" they are. You mentioned veneered with pine trim. Are we talking about thin wood skins on a particleboard or plywood base? If so, did the chatter marks cut through the veneer?

Sorry for answering a question with questions ;-)
 
First I want to thank you Stuart and everyone else who kindly replied so quickly. My boyfriend says he used an orbital sander. I am not equipped at the moment to upload a picture so I will try to describe the chatter. It is a series of parallel ripples like a washboard, not deep but still visible. I am afraid that simply applying varathane over the raw wood would make the ripples more visible.
 
Thanks Glenn. The veneer is birch on plywood and the chatter did not cut through, just left a faint ripple pattern.
 
if this is normal veneered plywood from one of the box stores i wouldnt do much more sanding or you can go threw the veneer and have more trouble than you now have.. i dont see how a orbital sander would make ripples, unlees one stayed in the same place to long and pushed to hard but even then not a common happening. did the contractor put a cedar veneer on the birch plywood? if that is the case then i can understand how the cedar would do this..cedar is very soft,, the best fix in that case would be to take small wooden block that was flat and wrap some sandpaper around it and then hand sand with the direction of the grain..what happened prior was the softer wood sanded off but the harder part of the grain didnt go as fast therefore making the ripples you need to sand the highs till they meet the lows..
 
if this is normal veneered plywood from one of the box stores i wouldnt do much more sanding or you can go threw the veneer and have more trouble than you now have.. i dont see how a orbital sander would make ripples, unlees one stayed in the same place to long and pushed to hard but even then not a common happening. did the contractor put a cedar veneer on the birch plywood? if that is the case then i can understand how the cedar would do this..cedar is very soft,, the best fix in that case would be to take small wooden block that was flat and wrap some sandpaper around it and then hand sand with the direction of the grain..what happened prior was the softer wood sanded off but the harder part of the grain didnt go as fast therefore making the ripples you need to sand the highs till they meet the lows..

What he said:thumb::thumb::thumb:
 
Thank you Larry :) Now you have me wondering what the wood is. In any event I am eager to attempt repairs. What grit of paper should I start with on the veneer? I assume I can start with a coarser grit on the solid pine?
 
First I want to thank you Stuart and everyone else who kindly replied so quickly. My boyfriend says he used an orbital sander. I am not equipped at the moment to upload a picture so I will try to describe the chatter. It is a series of parallel ripples like a washboard, not deep but still visible. I am afraid that simply applying varathane over the raw wood would make the ripples more visible.

welcome.jpg

The chatter could likely be from an uneven contact with the sandpaper and the surface. I would use a 180x - 220x for both the veneer and the solid wood. Getting effective sanding is having a "feel" for handling the sander. If you've ever buffed a floor with a large round floor buffer, it's the same principle. You can with technique get a balance with one hand, or, without the control, that buffer will hippity hop and take you across the room.


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