Lost $400 on a drum sander I didn't need, here's what changed my mind

I bought a new open-end drum sander last spring for faces and panels. I spent 3 weekends fighting with it, burning edges and wasting cedar. Then a guy at a local shop in Denver told me to just use my jointer and a card scraper for the finish pass. I sold the sander for $150 and honestly the scraper work looks cleaner. Anyone else ditched a big machine for a hand tool and saved money?

2 comments

2 Comments

the_zara21d ago

Burning edges on cedar sounds familiar, I've done that with a belt sander and my own knuckles.

emmaj3321d ago

Laughing at myself here because I bought the same style sander and returned it within a week after sanding through a whole oak tabletop, @the_zara totally gets the struggle with those things. Now I'm all about the card scraper too, it's like the tool that never burns you, just your patience when you mess up the burr. My wallet definitely prefers the scraper route, even if my forearms don't lol.