How to Strip a Desk Top

Yesterday I posted about a mahogany desk that I planned to strip the top and paint the bottom. So today I started the make over. I've posted a few times on how I strip my furniture and I am always researching different ways to take off paint or finish. Today I decided to take my sander and sand the top and get as much of the finish off as I could. Actually this worked really well. I used 100 grit sand paper on my orbital sander(the lower the number, the coarser the sand paper). Below is a picture of how the desk looked as I was sanding.

After I sanded for about 30 minutes almost all of the finish was removed. I then took my favorite stripper and painted it on the top to remove what little was left. The edge of the desk needed to be stripped too so I painted some of the stripper on the edge and used a steel brush and steel wool. There was a deep scratch that I smoothed out with the sander and I'm hoping it will not show once I start to add my stain. It feels smooth to the touch so I think it will be okay.

Once I had all of the finish removed I took Mineral Spirits and a soft rag to remove any remnants of the stripper. I am going to let the wood dry over night before I add the stain. Here are the products I used today to strip the desk top. 

I removed the hardware from the drawer fronts and cleaned the fronts with Simple Green. After these dried I applied Modern Masters Silver Metallic paint. The Modern Masters Metallic paint is as smooth as butter and I love painting with it. I'll post pictures tomorrow on my progress of this mahogany desk make over.