Great Planes EZ-Touch Sanders

The Thrifty Rocketeer continues...

Our build thread for the Bunny Rabbit "Goonie" (Thank you, Peter Alway!) continues after this side message....

Several months or years ago, I sent a message to The Rocket N00b, Daniel, and urged him to investigate a handy tool I had stumbled upon.  He did, and wrote a wonderful blog entry about Great Planes hand sanders.  Now it's my turn.

The only problem is that the parent company for Great Planes went under...and while they were reorganizing or declaring bankruptcy or whatever, the supply and flow of these handy little sanders dried up.  Suddenly, they were going for good money on eBay, as the supply dwindled.

Now, any hand sander can be a favorite, but I found these extruded short 5.5" and 11" sanders to be the perfect length, easy to grip, lightweight, and most importantly, a straight edge.  There are many points in making a rocket where you are told to draw a straight line down the length of the tube, in order to attach the fins straight or the launch lugs.  While any straight edge could do, angle iron works well.  And these sanders have that ability in spades!

There is also a larger 22" hand sander size, which I am told is perfect  for airfoil shaping of an air-wing in RC Planes.  But I find them too long.  I have three.  This is because I snapped up an eBay offer for three 5.5", three 11" and three 22" hand sanders, each labeled with 80, 150 and 220 grits.  It was too good a value to ignore, as the supply of these things vanished.

And so I have quite a collection of them.  One of the appealing things is that you can buy replacement rolls of adhesive backed sandpaper in the various grits direct from Great Planes or through hobby shops.  The come in individual rolls, or in a variety pack.  If you select the combo pack, you can get two or three grits and a new 5.5" hand sander as well.

But some people have had problems with adhesive backed sandpaper adhering too well. So here's three possible solutions for you:

1. When changing out the sandpaper, you can use a hair drier or blower to soften the adhesive and peel it off more easily.
2. You could also plunge the whole 5.5" unit under hot water to do the same thing, but I suspect the bright decal with the logo will also come off.
3. Or, and this is my favorite... you could pre-line the sander with painter's tape, so that when the time comes to remove or change the  sandpaper, it has adhered to the  painters tape, which comes right off the aluminum bed of the sander.

If you look carefully in the photo, you can see some of the blue painter's tape peaking out from underneath.  I've only had to change two sheets so far, and it's worked very well for me... provided you use the right type of painter's tape that releases easily, and doesn't dry out or grab over time.

I almost forgot to mention that the sandpaper also comes in pre-cut squares with adhesive backing. They are pre-cut to fit the 5.5" sander, and I keep mine in a small snack-sized baggie so as not to dry out the adhesive. You can also see the roll of 150 grit paper that I have unfurled a bit. My original combo pack contained two rolls of 150 and 220 grit, but I found despite being shrink wrapped, the adhesive in the outer layers of the roll had dried  out. 

So, I strongly recommend that you pick up one or two of these Great Planes EZ-Touch hand sanders.  I leave the 80, 150 and 220 grit in place and have labeled each one on the topside so that I know what I have grabbed and work finer and finer when sanding.  Again, my choice is only to go with two 5.5" and  one 11" sizes.  But I suppose if you do a lot of this work, you may want more.  I lucked into an eBay deal.  You may find that they are now back in production, and they may be common.  But seek them out.

We'll return to our build thread next week.

In the meantime, keep your glue capped and save your balsa scraps...cause you never know when you'll need them!