Going cheap is expensive

Discussion in 'Renovation & Home Improvement' started by SatayKing, 30th Apr, 2019.

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  1. SatayKing

    SatayKing Well-Known Member

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    Extended Sabatical
    and not only in the amount of money you fork out.

    This aged fella is very sore as it is many years since I've been on the tools. Over the last few days I've been helping a friend restore the deck he has. Not a big one at approximately 40 sqm.

    A few years ago he foolishly used a "fly by night" person to re-oil the thing while he was absent for a few days. Paid the bloke upfront which wasn't very wise as he now knows.

    On his return he initially thought all was OK. However, it soon became apparent it wasn't a good job. Patchy and some parts seem to remain sticky. He put up with it until now.

    I am no expert but it seemed to me the deck wasn't cleaned before re-oiling and it wasn't buffed to remove and spread any excess oil. In some parts I could lift lumps off with a putty knife.

    Only solution we could think of was to get the deck back to bare timber. He was going to hire a drum sander. No, no, no. Unless you know how to use those carefully lovely gouges will be the result. Plus timber always wants to be a tree again and isn't totally flat so he'd have to do additional sanding anyway.

    So it was belt sanders to the fore. What I found amusing is my friend had the attitude you have to be gentle with wood and only use 120 grit. Get real. It's hardwood and outdoors not bespoke hallway furniture. If I'm going to spend time on my knees and cause my back to ache I'm loading up the sander with 40 grit to get the rubbish off as fast as possible.

    It worked and the deck looks pretty good with two coats of Intergrain but doing that stuff is definitely not my calling in life.
     
    TMNT, paulF, Propagate and 1 other person like this.