# Festool Ras 115 Review



## doctors11 (May 17, 2010)

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I bought this tool about a week ago knowing I had a number of jobs coming up requiring removal of many layers of old paint/solid stain/primer, both oil based and acrylic. 

The trial was my Dad's deck handrail, about 100 feet long, and about 25 years old. It probably has about 10 layers of who knows what on it, and the top is a 2x10 pressure treated with some cupping. I thought about buying an electric planer but the more I researched the more I realized it was the wrong tool for the job. (Lots of reviews said the old paint melts and sticks to the blades dulling them quickly, and with the cupping I'd be leaving ridges on the wood).

So I called Festool and their guy recommended the 115 with 50 and 36 grit Saphir paper. Started with the 50 and was working hard and it was gumming up a bit. So I changed to the 36 and smiled for the next 2 hours. This thing really works! I got down to bare wood on the whole thing only using 6 sanding discs. 

I then followed up with belt sanding in the direction of the grain with 36 and 50 grit. Finished up with a random orbit with 50, 80 and 100. I now consider it ready for primer. 

The only problem I had was dust collection. I don't own a Festool collecter (yet...). So I bought a Bosch hose that fits the port on the Festool and fits into the opening on my Shopvac. After about 10 minutes I was losing dust collection. I stopped and opened up the vac. I always use a bag but the Bosch hose doesn't protrude deep enough into the bag opening so all the dust collected outside the bag and clogged the filter. I removed the bag, banged out the filter and continued bagless, occasionally stopping to bang out the filter. I need to figure this out better.

All in all I'm very impressed with this tool. To be able to remove multiple layers of old product without chemicals is nice.

Any of you used this? What kind of results have you had?


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## vermontpainter (Dec 24, 2007)

Similar reaction here, Dan. It is a beast. The dust shroud helps to keep dust from going all airborne, but it really challenges the vac.


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## Damon T (Nov 22, 2008)

I'm guessing using the festool vac would have helped a lot. I'm looking at this tool as well. While I keep telling myself I'm not going to work on anymore lead homes, they keep coming up and it's getting harder to turn the work down. Having a cleaner safer way to work would improve my attitude about them immensely.


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## vermontpainter (Dec 24, 2007)

Damon T said:


> I'm guessing using the festool vac would have helped a lot. I'm looking at this tool as well. While I keep telling myself I'm not going to work on anymore lead homes, they keep coming up and it's getting harder to turn the work down. Having a cleaner safer way to work would improve my attitude about them immensely.


DT

Can't remember if we had the ras out much in St Louis, but its a little different from the rest of the sanders. It has more like grinder DNA. Its ability to do material removal fast is kind of beyond an extractors ability to even really keep up. But its one of those "who cares" situations given the heavy work it is doing. We have done some absurd deck restos with the ras. You know, like those failed latex stain ones that are near impossible to chemically strip? Ras eats them for lunch.


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## MikeCalifornia (Aug 26, 2012)

Damon T said:


> I'm guessing using the festool vac would have helped a lot. I'm looking at this tool as well. While I keep telling myself I'm not going to work on anymore lead homes, they keep coming up and it's getting harder to turn the work down. Having a cleaner safer way to work would improve my attitude about them immensely.


I am considering this as my first festool purchase with a vac. I think it would be great for fascia boards that would normally need a good scrape then sand and still not look that great.


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## Damon T (Nov 22, 2008)

vermontpainter said:


> DT
> 
> Can't remember if we had the ras out much in St Louis, but its a little different from the rest of the sanders. It has more like grinder DNA. Its ability to do material removal fast is kind of beyond an extractors ability to even really keep up. But its one of those "who cares" situations given the heavy work it is doing. We have done some absurd deck restos with the ras. You know, like those failed latex stain ones that are near impossible to chemically strip? Ras eats them for lunch.


Thanks Scott!
I understand about it not capturing the dust and debris as well. I was using my maikita gv5000 disk sander with shroud today, using the 3M CRD disks, coupled with the Midi vac, and it worked pretty well, so I'm thinking the RAS would probably capture the stuff better. I got the shroud for the Makita from the same company that sells the Paint Shaver. I actually found a great article online which I remember when it originally came out in JLC http://www.eco-strip.com/TomObrienEvaluation.pdf comparing the RAS, Paint shaver, Metabo and Speed Heater. It's probably been referenced on this site before, as its very well done.


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## thinkpainting/nick (Dec 25, 2012)

Damon T said:


> Thanks Scott!
> I understand about it not capturing the dust and debris as well. I was using my maikita gv5000 disk sander with shroud today, using the 3M CRD disks, coupled with the Midi vac, and it worked pretty well, so I'm thinking the RAS would probably capture the stuff better. I got the shroud for the Makita from the same company that sells the Paint Shaver. I actually found a great article online which I remember when it originally came out in JLC http://www.eco-strip.com/TomObrienEvaluation.pdf comparing the RAS, Paint shaver, Metabo and Speed Heater. It's probably been referenced on this site before, as its very well done.


Going to my Festool dealer later today ...again. Was there last week like kid in a candy store...lol. Now a RO 125 or 150. Like that 5 inch is lighter but hat 6 inch pad and the power of the 150 for all around exterior painting and decks is a big plus...


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## Painter-Aaron (Jan 17, 2013)

thinkpainting/nick said:


> Going to my Festool dealer later today ...again. Was there last week like kid in a candy store...lol. Now a RO 125 or 150. Like that 5 inch is lighter but hat 6 inch pad and the power of the 150 for all around exterior painting and decks is a big plus...


I am about to order the RO150. The 125 probably would have suited my needs, but I am already going to be in it big, might as well one up and get something that can do all around sanding. Except those tight areas of course! 

I also noticed that the vacuum hoses are not long enough to be sanding up ladders and what not. So I have to buy an adapter to attach a couple hoses together.


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## doctors11 (May 17, 2010)

I spent a few hours today with the 115 sanding old Arborcoat semi and clearcoat off a good size deck. I'm doing the perimiter and under the handrail with this and the 90 with the extended delta, and the bulk of the deck boards with the Onfloor 16 with the gold diamond plates followed by 50 grit sanding. I got most of the hand sanding done today. It was a breeze except the boards were a little wet from the weekend rain. Whenever I hit a wet spot it clogged up the grit. Where it was dry it was cake! 

Love this tool!


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## IHATE_HOMEDEPOT (May 27, 2008)

The nice thing about the Festool vac is that it has a variable speed and from what I was told it is best to dial it down for proper dust management with a sander. Using a vac w/o a bag is no good, the second you have to bang the filter you are literally faced with something you should not be breathing. Do whatever you have to do to stick a bag inside the vac. I see a roll of duct tape in your future.
The length of the hose might be on purpose as far as the vacs ability to suck the dust properly.


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## Damon T (Nov 22, 2008)

doctors11 said:


> I spent a few hours today with the 115 sanding old Arborcoat semi and clearcoat off a good size deck. I'm doing the perimiter and under the handrail with this and the 90 with the extended delta, and the bulk of the deck boards with the Onfloor 16 with the gold diamond plates followed by 50 grit sanding. I got most of the hand sanding done today. It was a breeze except the boards were a little wet from the weekend rain. Whenever I hit a wet spot it clogged up the grit. Where it was dry it was cake!
> 
> Love this tool!


Have you tried sanding any old siding with it yet? 
Why sanding off the Arborcoat? Failing? 
I've talked to a couple friends who've had it fail, or maybe they didn't prep it well enough. Hard to know.


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## doctors11 (May 17, 2010)

Damon T said:


> Have you tried sanding any old siding with it yet?
> Why sanding off the Arborcoat? Failing?
> I've talked to a couple friends who've had it fail, or maybe they didn't prep it well enough. Hard to know.


I rarely do house exteriors so, no I've not used it on siding.

A few years ago right after Arborcoat came out I (foolishly) jumped on the bandwagon and prepped and applied it to 4 decks. I wanted to get away from the fumes and mineral spirit clean ups with oils. It sounded like BM did their homework with this product. 

Other than some lapping during application, I was fairly happy with the results. I explained to the customers that it was important to have it cleaned the following year and re-clearcoated. Well...none of them had it cleaned the next year. 

Two years later they all called saying their decks looked awlful. I bleached and pressure washed one and after drying it appeared that the semi stain had faded/failed under the clearcoat. I tried touching up the stain but there was still enough clearcoat to not allow the stain to blend, it mostly beaded up. 

I had previously tested a sample board to see if I could chemically strip this stuff. The stain stripped OK but the clearcoat wouldn't budge. So now I'm in the process of mechanically removing this product from all the decks and moving on to Armstrong Clark...live and learn.


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## thinkpainting/nick (Dec 25, 2012)

doctors11 said:


> I rarely do house exteriors so, no I've not used it on siding.
> 
> A few years ago right after Arborcoat came out I (foolishly) jumped on the bandwagon and prepped and applied it to 4 decks. I wanted to get away from the fumes and mineral spirit clean ups with oils. It sounded like BM did their homework with this product.
> 
> ...


There's lots of guys same boat and homeowners as well who tried that system and it failed. Even the waterborne alone looks like crap after 2 years or les plus lap marks everywhere . We to have been sanding them instead of stripping I'm sure the RO 125-150 will do the job!


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## Damon T (Nov 22, 2008)

I've had good luck so far with the arborcoat solid on decks and siding. Only did one semi & clear coat, last year. So far owner is happy with it. It's a smallish deck so if things go south not too bad. 
I used the oil/acrylic Translucent finish on a couple projects. That's the one from BM you don't clear coat over. I have more confidence in that one, though I'll probably just keep using TWP for semi trans decks.


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## doctors11 (May 17, 2010)

thinkpainting/nick said:


> There's lots of guys same boat and homeowners as well who tried that system and it failed. Even the waterborne alone looks like crap after 2 years or les plus lap marks everywhere . We to have been sanding them instead of stripping I'm sure the RO 125-150 will do the job!


I tried the ro90 on it. It wasn't as aggressive as the 115 in removing the old coating and I hate that it dances around so much...wears me out. The 115 is like Buttah!:thumbup:


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## doctors11 (May 17, 2010)

Damon T said:


> I've had good luck so far with the arborcoat solid on decks and siding. Only did one semi & clear coat, last year. So far owner is happy with it. It's a smallish deck so if things go south not too bad.
> I used the oil/acrylic Translucent finish on a couple projects. That's the one from BM you don't clear coat over. I have more confidence in that one, though I'll probably just keep using TWP for semi trans decks.


I tried the Translucent on one deck. It came out OK but no matter how often I stirred it the pigment would settle so fast I could hardly keep up with it. That house has since sold so I doubt I'll be hearing back from them.


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