sharpening ?

[mike elmore]

Have been using scary sharp and getting good results except when I have chisels and plane irons with nicks in them. It seems to take way to long to get them back into shape grinding away on the paper.
Was looking for a faster way to do the rougher material removal.
Looking at Grizzly wet grinder or slow speed bench grinder.
any ideas?

thx
Mike

[John Keeton]

Mike, what is your starting grit? I have 7 grits on my board - starting at 150 up to 2000. The 150 cuts pretty quick. I thought about getting a wheel of some sort, but this seems to be working OK.

[mike elmore]

John,

I think I'm either using 80 or 100 grit

mike

[John Keeton]

What kind of paper? Maybe it is loading up on you.

[mike elmore]

norton wet/dry
I figured with the hollow grind of the wheel I would have to take off a lot less metal when using the sandpaper.
Was wondering peoples thoughts on whether the wet grizzly wheel was more of a final honing wheel or if it would grind out chips/regrind a
bevel angle significantly faster than the sandpaper.

thx,
Mike

[Tony Zaffuto]

Just get yourself a piece of 60 or 80 grit zirconia paper (I think Norton may call their paper borizon or something similar). Then workyour way up through your regular grits.

T.Z.

[Johnny Kleso]

WC has a Slow Speed 8" grinder for about $70 and all you need is to make or buy a good tool rest..

I have a slow wet 10" Jet and for removing chips even that is slow compared to a standard bench grinder..

[Gary Herrmann]

Just get yourself a piece of 60 or 80 grit zirconia paper T.Z.

Yep, you can get 60 grit at Lowes. It will definitely accelerate the process of removing nicks. 36 grit would be even faster.

[Tony Zaffuto]

Gary,

I tried the 36 ONCE! I will definitely remove knicks and quickly, but the brand I used was an import brand and although the grit may have been consistent, I don't believe the application (thickness) was! Problem was I made scratches that were deeper than the knicks I was removing. If you use such a heavy grit, make sure you purchase a premium paper of known vintage:cool:

I also experimented with the heavier grit a bit, because of the rapidness with which heat was generated on the tool being sharpened. On these synthetic papers, using a sharpening jig and moving the tool back and forth, you can actually generate a spark or two! I've got to add, however, that I very rarely use a sharpening jig anymore and only when I want a blade as square as I can get it, such as for my shoulder plane.

You all have a safe New Year's Eve and Day and I hope all had the merriest Christmas and/or holiday season!

T.Z.

[Tony Zaffuto]

Johnny (Rarebear),

I was fortunate to have purchased the WC slowspeed grinder this past summer on sale, on one of their 10% off days. Sale price was $99.00 INCLUDING the Wolverine sharpening system. This is my set-up for lathe tools and it is well worth it. The white wheels that come with the grinder are decent too.

T.Z.

[mike elmore]

Tony,

Thanks for the info. I think I'll try a sheet zirconium before investing in a wheel sharpener. The wc grinder isn't currently on sale hopefully won't need one.

regards,
Mike

[Phillip Pattee]

Mike,

Funny you should ask. I spent about two hours last night removing a chip out of the end of a 1" paring chisel I bought off the 'bay a while back. I sarted with 60 grit sand paper. I had to take a lot of metal off to get it back in shape. If you don't have a hollow grind on your chisel, then removing a nick can be cumbersome with scary sharp, waterstones, diamond stones, or what have you. The reason is that you have to remove the face of the entire bevel to get the nick out, or put a new micro bevel on the blade. I wanted to preserve a 25 degree bevel and decided to go for it. Use sand paper like someone else was buying it -- the grit dulls and wears off. It doesn't renew itself like on stones or friable wheels. I only had one sheet of 60 grit, and used it up, then went to 150 grit so it took longer than it should have. Once I had the nick out and the bevel flat, it sharpened up in a couple of minutes.

I read Zahid's thread on a sharpening system sub $250 and have been considering moving to waterstones. I had decided to spend my Christmas gift money on a 1000 and an 8000 stone, but then I thought to myself, when you need to remove a nick from a tool, you really need the course grit. if I had a 220 grit water stone, it wouldn't run out. So earlier today I ordered some Norton water stones.:)

[philip marcou]

Mike,

Funny you should ask. I spent about two hours last night removing a chip out of the end of a 1" paring chisel I bought off the 'bay a while back. I sarted with 60 grit sand paper. I had to take a lot of metal off to get it back in shape. If you don't have a hollow grind on your chisel, then removing a nick can be cumbersome with scary sharp, waterstones, diamond stones, or what have you. The reason is that you have to remove the face of the entire bevel to get the nick out, or put a new micro bevel on the blade. I wanted to preserve a 25 degree bevel and decided to go for it. Use sand paper like someone else was buying it -- the grit dulls and wears off. It doesn't renew itself like on stones or friable wheels. I only had one sheet of 60 grit, and used it up, then went to 150 grit so it took longer than it should have. Once I had the nick out and the bevel flat, it sharpened up in a couple of minutes.

I read Zahid's thread on a sharpening system sub $250 and have been considering moving to waterstones. I had decided to spend my Christmas gift money on a 1000 and an 8000 stone, but then I thought to myself, when you need to remove a nick from a tool, you really need the course grit. if I had a 220 grit water stone, it wouldn't run out. So earlier today I ordered some Norton water stones.:)

If you distinguish between Grinding and Sharpening/ honing you can save time and bother.
Removal of nicks, chips , re-shaping bevels requires far more metal removal than honing and is best done by either a bench grinder, powered grinder or belt grinder, although a hand cranked grinder can do quite well sometimes. (I can't understand why folk get all these chips , nicks etc but that is another question).
Honing or sharpening requires minimal metal removal at all times as well as minimal time spent and stones, diamond plates, powered honing machines and suitably equipped belt grinders do this efficiently. Honing with abrasive papers is accepted by some but I think is not a good substitute for stones etc-and it costs a lot in the long run.

[Phillip Pattee]

I've not got a grinder set up at this time, but will have one soon. I'm not sure where all the nicks come from either--probably from dropped tools. Anyway, the chisel came that way--as is from eBay.

[Eddie Darby]

The Tormek type water wheels are fairly slow at removing large amounts of metal, so Tormek has come out with a new stone that is suppose to help with this.

I use a belt sander to remove large amount of metal, and a Trizac belt helps to keep things cool, along with a pail of cold water for dipping.

The water wheel sharpeners shine when it comes to honing a very delicate edge, that heat would easily destroy, and so Tormek have also come out with a fine grit wheel as well.

http://www.tormek.com/en/accessories/grindstones/

[Bill White]

The old tried-and-true Makita waterstone horizontal sharpener. Plane irons, planer blades, chisels, axes, kitchen knives. Never hear anyone talkin' about this machine. What am I missing?
Bill

[Wilbur Pan]

The Tormek type water wheels are fairly slow at removing large amounts of metal

There's an easy way to speed up this process if you need to take care of a nick on a Tormek.

First, dress the wheel with the diamond tip jig. This not only flattens the wheel, but it will also really rough up the surface of the wheel, which makes it more aggressive.

Second, whatever jig you're using, put the guide bar in the top set of holes so that the wheel is turning toward the tool. This also really speeds up the rate of metal removal.

Third, if you feel that the wheel is slowing down, redress the wheel with the diamond tip jig.

I can work out a nick in a tool made with powdered metal technology in just a few minutes using this method. Still not as fast as a dry wheel grinder, but it's a lot faster than what many people think.

[Jeff Farris]

I would like to add just a couple of comments to Wilbur's post.

Using the vertical mount, with the wheel turning into the edge, is recommended for most tools when trying to change a profile or repair damage. However, I personally don't use this method when shaping gouges. It cuts very fast and wears the stone aggressively. I feel I have more control of the shape and better stone life if I do gouge shaping in the horizontal position.

Wilbur is exactly right that the stone surface can be refreshed when you think it's cutting action has slowed. However, the diamond truing tool isn't the best way to do it. It will remove much more stone than is necessary to refresh the cutting surface. Use the coarse side of the SP-650 Stone Grader, with firm pressure. If the grindstone surface is heavily glazed, angle the Stone Grader so that only the corner is on the grindstone. It will cut the surface very quickly.

[Ryan Baker]

Using the vertical mount, with the wheel turning into the edge, is recommended for most tools when trying to change a profile or repair damage. However, I personally don't use this method when shaping gouges. It cuts very fast and wears the stone aggressively. I feel I have more control of the shape and better stone life if I do gouge shaping in the horizontal position.


That's an interesting comment, Jeff (which seems obvious to me in hindsight). I have recently been doing a lot of gouge reshaping on my Tormek and was quite suprised at the rate of wear to the wheel. I'll have to try the horizontal position again.

[Jeff Farris]

Ryan, if its a once in a blue moon thing, I wouldn't get too concerned. However, if you do a lot of reshaping on your tools, consider the new SB-250 Blackstone. It cuts HSS and exotic alloys faster than the SG-250 and wears better, too.