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- Verified Buyer
As someone who bought a fixer-upper 12 years ago, and has now remodeled my house head to toe, I can weigh in heavily on this product. After reading almost all the reviews on here, I can say most people's complaints are not valid. Most people on here have never done any drywall sanding before and are complaining about drywall sanding in general, not this product. People thought this was going to make sanding easier than normal. It's not! This is actually makes it harder than normal. The point of this product is your extra effort in using this it, is justified by having less dust to deal with - which is does. The product works as advertised.Here's the deal: If you have never done drywall sanding before, don't use this. You have to already have good technique with a flat handheld sander. This cannot be your first time. Good technique means you CANNOT sand (by moving any drywall sander) left to right, or rather against the long-side of the sander. The paper with crease, instantly. You only sand up and down, or rather on the short side. Actually it should be on an angle, like the sander is pointing like an arrow. Watch some videos if you don't what I mean. IF YOU ALREADY CAN DO THAT, then buy this. Here's what this product does:Because of the suction, this will grab the wall and not roll smoothly over your mud. It takes more hand and arm effort than the easy gliding regular sander. If you have a large room to do, you will get tired and sore. Because of your loud vacuum, you also lose some audible clue of how hard you are pressing into your mud, so over sanding can be an issue. However, it is still worth it because on a wall, 99% of dust is gone. On a ceiling... not so much, maybe 50%. Also on a ceiling you have to go past your mud and pull towards yourself, rather than try to sand back and forth. Well, at least if you're using the extension wand/stick like I was.Now, you will probably be returning this, as I am, because it breaks after a few hours. The sander itself is heavy duty, with almost all metal parts. Impressive really. However, the hose and extension wand/stick are the cheapest plastics I've ever used. Any pulling, like moving your vacuum with them, or any twisting, like switch walls or angles, or getting up to the top of a wall, and they break, snap, or rip open. The wand wants to snap at the connection points and the hose wants to rip open where there's is the lightest torsion. You can duct tape pieces together to get finished, but don't plan on keeping this. It's sad really, because the idea is perfect, the sander is perfect, the sand screens are made by a well-known brand, but the company just had to save money on the plastic parts. Hoses can be built strong. My shop vac has been pulled by the hose over bricks, wood, and other junk. One time I pulled so hard that it broke the wheels off... but never the hose! This thing, uh it's just sad they couldn't spend a few more dollars, because it's otherwise perfect product. I guess if you want something to keep, get the electric type that uses circular sand pads and a vacuum.
