THE 800 lb gorilla
Let me step in here for a minute.
I use Abranet screen and LOVE it. There is no sand paper on the market that can beat the effects of abranet, reasons include: DUST, heat build up, less paper needed, less clogage, less surface areas of screen needed to do the job and SPEED.
I started off with the small sample packs you can get with the various grit then I moved up to the rolls.
Box = 50x 80 grit 3" round disc.
top left = 2 3/4" x 10 yard roll 180 grit.
top right = 2 3/4" x 10 yard roll 240 grit.
bottom right = 3 2/3" x 25 yard roll 500 grit.
I bought these from
Mirka Abranet Mesh Abrasive Roll
Also Woodcraft sells a variety pack in the boxes which is a step in the right direction for small small projects but you will find you tend to use 2-3 sizes. They also sell mini rolls of what I displayed above. Craftsupply USA also has the small packs but not the rolls.
Also note the screen being more aggressive than normal paper you will need less grades (grit ranges) to do the same job. Even on the hardest bowls I have worked with it is 80, 120, 240, 400 and 600 is my favorite for hand sanding and you will get the baby ass smooth with that grit.
Do yourself a favor, get the 3" round disc, get the 3" backer and the 3" pad with drill arbor, slap that joker into a hand drill and goto town, you can do the full sanding on a non-round block to final size in seconds with 80 grit screen. Also keep in mind that the hand drill is REVERSIBLE so that means angle of impact and sanding angle can play a HUGE role, tho granted this is more a factor in bowl making than pen making.
I can not stress enough how effective screen is over paper, with sandpaper the goal is to remove material, on paper it clogs up very easy, on screen it falls through the holes and you can use the screen until it's exhausted (you can do that with paper but you will have to stop and clean it very often)
3" Interface Backing Pads at Woodcraft
and
3" Hook and Loop Pad with 1 4 Shank at Woodcraft
The backing pad is expendable and comes in various hardness. That is for use by the grade paper you are using but there is no hard pressed law that says you have to use one hardness. You can also hand hold the backing pad with the screen on.
Some say that abranet screen last 3x to 5x longer than classic paper based sandpaper, generally from what I have seen yes that is somewhat mostly true. Being a student of water stones I can tell you this much it depends on what you are sanding and the structure of the material.
Some of the higher grade papers out there use a harder abrasive which makes that to last longer.
