Sandpaper, decorator’s mate, or if you prefer, hand sanding abrasive, they all do the same thing right? Wrong! With every sanding job there is an abrasive that is best suited to the task in hand.
Here we tackle some of the main hand sanding abrasives available and guide you through the pros and cons and the jobs they are best suited to in order to help you decide which you need.
How do abrasives work?
There are many different types of abrasives, with different grits and backing materials, but most are produced in the same way.
The abrasive grains or grit, is produced by heating or chemically treating minerals which produce a hard material that is particularly good for abrading surfaces, such as wood or metal.
Once treated, these minerals are crushed and sifted to create varying grit sizes with the finer grain sizes producing a finer finish.