3 Tools from Overseas

Better sanding, another animal glue and 2 dang-good erasers.

One of the many benefits of going overseas to teach woodworking is getting exposed to different ways of working and unfamiliar tools. This entry covers three tools that I’ve embraced thanks to my trips to Germany and the U.K.

Abranet ACE HD

Chairmaker Chris Williams in Wales turned me onto this stuff. We’ve been using Mirka Abranet for years, basically since the company released it. Since releasing Abranet, which is an aluminum oxide abrasive embedded in a net, the company has released two more advanced versions of the abrasive that uses ceramic abrasive.

Abranet ACE is the next step up from vanilla Abranet. I’ll be honest – I haven’t tested this stuff. I will at some point, I’m sure. Instead, we went straight for the Abranet ACE HD. This is a ceramic abrasive embedded in a thick woven mesh. It looks a bit like wire if you stare it too closely.

The ACE HD stuff is intended for stripping paint and shaping chores. So I was most interested in how it would hold up when used to saddle seats in red elm and oak – very tough customers. With the regular Abranet, I use a fresh disc of #80 grit for every saddle. After one seat, the abrasive doesn’t cut fast enough for my taste. (These do not get thrown out. Each #80-grit disc lasts more than a month for hand sanding and shaping operations.)

The ACE HD is another animal. It’s much stiffer than the regular Abranet. But for working concave and convex surfaces, I found that to be a big plus. The stiffness translated to more consistent curves. The stiff abrasive wouldn’t allow me to dig into small defects. It forced me to sand properly and resulted in a nicer saddle.

After I finished up a saddle, the disc still had tons of life left in it. I don’t think you can really say it lasts 2X or 3X as long – that all depends on the work. But this stuff is tough.

It is more expensive. I pay about $1 for a disc of #80-grit Abranet (5" disc). For the ACE HD, it’s about $1.21 per disc (though I have found it for lower). It’s totally worth the extra money.

Mono Eraser

Peter Lanz at Dictum turned me onto this Japanese eraser from Tombow. It really is excellent for removing pencil marks from wood – much better than the other art supply erasers we have been using here for years.

Here’s the bonus content: While you are at the Tombow store, pick up a pack of their Mono Sand Erasers. These are intended to remove ink, and they do that OK. But where they really excel is in getting rid of pencil marks that other erasers can’t touch. You know, the ones in the bottom of pores in the wood.

The eraser has an abrasive quality to it, but it doesn’t seem to mark the wood.

Fischleim (Fish Glue)

During the last couple years while teaching in Germany, we’ve been using fish glue to assemble everything. The brand that Dictum carries, Fischleim, is excellent. And if you are in the European Union, that’s the stuff to get.