How To Prepare Wood For Sanding

When you water pop wood you wont have to do multiple coats of stain either.

How to prepare wood for sanding. Tear sandpaper sheets into fourths then fold them into pieces just big enough to hold with three fingers. The wood grain is so open that in one coat you should be able to get the look you want. Do NOT start sanding with very fine sandpaper on unfinished wood.

There are few steps to follow to ready the wood for painting once you are done with sanding. You can create a makeshift sanding aid by wrapping a piece of sandpaper around a block of wood that fits in your hand. It takes four steps to sand wood to perfection.

Use a scraper to remove loose paint from the siding working from every direction. This is a necessary step as you do not want the sanding machine to catch these nails and cause more damage to your floor and the sanding machine. On most raw woods start sanding in the direction of the grain using a 120-150 grit paper before staining and work up to 220 grit paper.

The technique of wetting the wood down before staining is called popping the grain. Repeat this process for every part of the wood youll be staining. Start sanding with 100-grit paper.

Prep sanding is done with progressively finer grits. For small intricate wood projects sanding by hand is best. For large flat surfaces an electric orbital or palm sander can also be used although it is not required.

Sand in a straight line back and forth until you reach the end of the woods surface. For larger surfaces you can use a paint stripper. Work a paint scraper from every direction keeping the blade flat against the wood so you dont create gouge marks.