Sanding in Painting

Sanding in painting is a process of preparing surfaces removing the imperfection by rubbing sandpaper making it smoother for the surface to absorb paint properly. It is also used to roughen surfaces too glossy for paint or filling compound to adhere easily. 

Sanding is often a crucial step for ensuring that your surface is ready for painting. One does not have to be #pro to sand, sanding to smoothen or roughen surfaces would do the magic. While sanding is not required for every painting project, rough spots on walls, whether they have been previously painted or not, need to be sanded before they are painted to ensure the paint goes on smoothly. Sanding is a must for repainting previously surfaces painted with gloss or high-gloss paints. 

Sanding in between coats of paint on any surface removes imperfections caused by the roller, dust or anything that may have stuck to the wall after it was applied. It also lightens the overall paint sheen making the area brighter.

How to sand? Well, we are giving you here a simple tested logic of sanding. If it's for wood scribble a light pencil line across wood before you start. Once the line is gone, as to your need move up to the next grit and repeat. And for the cement walls, if you could, pressure wash the wall before sanding. By sanding the cement surface, you are doing it to remove all the loose sand gravels that may affect the painting results.

Sandpapers that we found in our market are commonly graded as coarse (40 to 60 grit), Medium (80 to 120), Fine (150 to 180), Very Fine (220 to 240), Extra Fine (280 to 320) and Super Fine (360 and above). Sanding with progressively finer grits removes the scratches left by the previous paper and eventually leaves a smooth finish. So greater the grit numbers, the finner the finish and look.

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Cleaning after sanding is bet painters do not ignore. The most effective way to clean wood after sanding is to brush off all the dust and then wipe the surface with a rag and in some cases use mineral spirits. The mineral spirits clean any stain or grease off of the surface making it ready for painting. For the cement wall, use dry and wet rags in turn to clean.