Mrs. Tech and I have been busy, trying to get our house into shape before the next round of house guests fly in Wednesday. It’s tiring, but we’ve been meaning to get some things done around here. We decided to sand the ceiling to remove the textured look. We tarped off the kitchen, and had been taking turns sanding yesterday when our Black & Decker MS500 Mouse Sander just wouldn’t come on again. Figuring it may have overheated, we stopped for the night and threw in a DVD. I snapped a photo for you guys in case you need something to laugh at.

This morning, the MS500 still wouldn’t work so we decided to do a combined techie project for you (and to try an recover our sander). Michelle took it all apart and cleaned it out and I checked the connectors and put it back together. This was all done outside, this time, due to the large amounts of ceiling/paint dust in the sander.

Take it apart
Did you unplug it first? I hope you always unplug anything before you start taking it apart. It’s a rule to literally live by.

	Remove the bottom screw…. Or not. It’s there, wanting you to remove it, and we did, but it appears it’s better to leave it there. We removed it just in case. All you really need for this project is a single screw driver.
	Those four holes there… They each have a screw you need to remove. User a slotted (”flat-head”) screw driver. Get all four and then pull the two halves apart.
	There it is all opened up.

Clean it out
We decided to try cleaning it out really well, first because we thought dust and dirt in the wrong place could be a problem, but you should be in the habit of cleaning your power tools regularly, anyway.

	If you don’t have any compressed air, go get some. This stuff is handy very often around my house.
	Get in there and blow the dust out of all the crevices.

Check plugs and connections
Often, when a piece of electronics stops working out of the blue, it can be something as simple as a loose connection. This possibility increases exponentially when the use of your toy or tool involves a lot of jarring or other movement. The very nature of a sander’s operation breeds possibility for loose connections. Black & Decker designed it pretty well so that this would not be a problem, but someone has to be that one percent and I think we just got lucky. Check your connections before throwing something away.

	Start with the power switch. Make sure there’s not any room for it to be any tighter than it is. It should be nice and tight and completely plugged in. If not, plug it in the rest of the way.
	Next, check the power to the motor. It’s the same deal here. Check that both connectors are snug. In my case, the bottom looked a little loose, so I tightened it up and that did the trick.

If none of the above gets your sander back into working shape, you should weigh the cost and effort of buying a new motor and trying to put it in against simply buying a new sander. We were happy to not have to make that choice, and were able to finish sanding (and painting) our kitchen ceiling. Next up is the track lighting. I’ll document the process and probably share it tomorrow.