Grinder

[Mike Olson]

So i decided i'm going to get a grinder for the initial sharpening of my plane irons "nick removing" and some other stuff. i'll still finish up all the edges using scary sharp but i'm wondering if someone can suggest which one of these is better. i'm sure neither is great but i'm limited on funds for my little hobby.

Wet/Dry grinder: http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/Displayitem.taf?itemnumber=35098

Generic grinder: http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/Displayitem.taf?itemnumber=37822

I've already printed out the 20% off coupon, but i'm just not sure which is better, or if there is another one at the same price or cheaper that i should get.

Thanks,
Mike

[John McClanahan]

I would get the wet/dry grinder. Often the hi-speed dry wheels on these China made grinders are hard to get balanced. The wet wheel doesn't spin fast enough to shake.

John

[Brian Kent]

Absolutely don't try to use the wheels on the regular grinder on fine woodworking tools. Go for something like this:
http://www.leevalley.com/wood/page.aspx?c=1&p=32981&cat=1,43072,43080
that will not burn the steel.

I don't know about that wet and dry. If you try it and it works, what a deal. If not, use their good return policy.

[Dale Sautter]

... or if there is another one at the same price or cheaper that i should get.


Hi Mike,

I would invite you to consider another option... a belt grinder. Recently I was in the same boat as you... how to grind/regrind my tools without burning them (heard many horror stories about using a grinder), and how to do that:

1) repeatably (this is something that you'll be doing more than once)
2) consistantly (you want to be able to depend on your results every time)
3) inexpensivley (budget constraints/fill in the blank...)
4) easily

I hit Craigslist looking for a used treadmill to use it's motor, found one within a week for $20. Built a frame out of aluminum and made some wheels out of plywood and now it's powered by a variable speed motor that can go "scary sharp" slow or blazingly fast if I want. There is no reason you couldn't power a simple two wheel belt grinder with a shop built treadle or even a hand crank. Here are a couple places that I've purchased belts from:

http://www.trugrit.com/belts-manufacturer-3m.htm
TruGrit has some very nice "Trizact Gator" aluminum oxide belts which leave a very nice finish for a grinding belt. In fact I think they go up to like 2000 grit with the finishing belts.

http://www.usaknifemaker.com/store/abrasives-abrasive-belts-c-94_42.html
Picked up a few "Blaze" and some others that I forgot atm.

hth...

[Rick Erickson]

Grinders are pretty hit-n-miss. Your investment won't be in the grinder but in the wheel(s) - as others have said. Chuck the wheels that come with it and buy Norton wheels (or the like). Either way I've found them difficult to balance and ended up buying the OneWay balancing system. Even after that they aren't perfect. It could be my experience only but I thought I could get away with a cheap grinder and still ended up spending about $250 after all was said and done.

[Josh Bowman]

I built this. Used a mandral I had laying around, I had bought cheap at an old hardware store going out of business. Mounted a cheap motor and hung it off the side of my drill press stand. It runs at about 500 rpm with the big pulley. It takes alot of effort to burn a tool. Much better than the high speed one you see in the back ground. It will burn one in a heart beat!

[Jonathan McCullough]

I'm interested in getting the HF wet/dry grinder. If you get it, definitely post your experiences. I saw a review of an earlier version of this--it went out of their product line and came back in, whether it's different or not I don't know. But the reviewer--just a guy on the internet--said that it did what it was supposed to and that he didn't have any problems with it, as I recall.

[Mike Olson]

Ii'm going to pick up the wet/dry grinder from HF. the custom ones while are very interesting i just don't have the parts or the time to put something together. and replacement wheels cost about as much as the entire wet/dry grinder after the 20% off. yes yes i know there is a reason for that.

I'll try to post how it works out for me as soon as i have used it a couple times.

[Tony Shea]

Problem being is that I don't see a tool rest on the wet side of the grinder. Maybe I'm missing something though. Without a tool rest that can be set at different angles then you'll never get the grind right. A good tool rest on the grinder is very important.

[Tom Henderson2]

Is there a tool rest on the wet side of the W&D grinder? I don't see one in the photo. Perhaps you just use the edge of the water trough?

Be sure you understand how all that will work before you take the plunge... or have something in mind. Freehanding probably works for knives, but I'm not so well for woodworking tools.

[David Keller NC]

If you have to order this model sight unseen, I'd reconsider. You'd be far better off getting a 1/2 speed dry grinder from a local Woodcraft store that you can test-spin. The investment will still be under $100, and you're likely to get a lot better set of wheels.

The woodcrafts are still made-in-china, but some of them are quite good, while others are so out of balance they're unusable. The way I see it, a single iron out or a Lie-Nielsen plane, or a replacement Hock in one of my Stanleys runs enough money that I don't want to take a chance on burning it.

[Josh Bowman]

Got some advice. I've spent a lot of money over the years buying grinders, and shapening stuff. I pulled the trigger on a decked out Tormek here at SMC classifieds a few months ago. It's expensive, but I think it would have been cheaper if I had bought it initially. It does a great job and cannot and will not burn the blades.

[tyler mckee]

About twice as much, but does anyone have this one from grizzly? But i would much pay a little more for something that will work better and actually last.
http://www.grizzly.com/products/T10097

[Bob Jones]

$20 alternative.
http://www3.telus.net/BrentBeach/Sharpen/benchstone.html

I have used it a few times and I like it. No risk of damage to me or the tool.

[Jon Knauft]

Mike,

You might want to check out the following link. He has an interesting modification to the Wet/Dry grinder you're looking at.

http://www.davidreedsmith.com/Articles/lanham/RayLanham.htm


-Jon

[Mike Olson]

Mike,

You might want to check out the following link. He has an interesting modification to the Wet/Dry grinder you're looking at.

http://www.davidreedsmith.com/Articles/lanham/RayLanham.htm


-Jon

Wow thanks for the link.

[Bob Easton]

Do you really need a state of the art grinder that kills electrons?

Hand cranked grinders pop up almost daily on eBay. A little patience in watching will result in finding a good one, maybe even one with a useful wheel. Even is you have to replace the wheel, they are smaller and less costly. Since they operate at less than 3 million rpm, there's no balance problems and no burning problems. You also have control that's hard to achieve when the whirring thing whirs too fast. Oooops, dang!

My $10 grinder (http://www.bob-easton.com/blog/?p=854) works great and saved me a huge lot of money to use for other projects.

After all, this is Neander Haven ... no tailed demons here.

[Tom Henderson2]

About twice as much, but does anyone have this one from grizzly? But i would much pay a little more for something that will work better and actually last.
http://www.grizzly.com/products/T10097

I have the HF equivalent.

My beef with my HF is that the bar that the tool fixtures slide on isn't square to the wheel, so things tend to get skewed. I futzed with it a bit but gave up and bought the Jet fixed tool rest. This is a flat plate that you fix to the rod, essentially providing a traditional tool rest. I set the angle, then just manually move the blade across the wheel. It works fairly well.

It does ship a LOT of water if the blade is wider than the wheel. So I put it in a large tin pan that they sell for cooking turkeys. Cheap, and it catches all the water.

The other gripe was that the wheel had a lot of runnout when I brought it home; I ended up buying the Tormek diamond dressing tool. Once I got it squared up, it has worked pretty well.

I don't think I'd buy it again; by the time you add up the expense for the fixed tool rest and diamond dresser, it was pretty pricey.

A dry grinder with a decent tool rest seems like a better way to go; I'm getting that set up now so can't comment. Fortunately, I have some cheap chisels to practice on!

-TH

[Jules Martin]

Mike, if you're going to scary sharpen then why not just grind your initial bevels that way too? If you are already using a jig then you will be amazed at how fast a piece of 120 grit paper will prepare an edge.

Here's what I do: I tape two 3" wide pieces of 120 grit end to end with scotch tape, which is very thin. Then I clip the strip to a piece of thin masonite or whatever's handy, smooth, and flattish. Put the blade in the jig, and if you only push away from the clip you don't even have to glue the paper down. One strip of paper will do several blades.

I can regrind a bevel like this in less time than I can eyeball a grinder rest into position, fill a container with water, put on a face mask, dress the wheel, and slowly slowly grind.

I venture to say that no matter how cheap, conventional electric grinders are a waste of money for woodworkers. For lathe tools etc I use the 1" belt sander from Lee Valley. It's really the bees knees.

[george wilson]

PLEASE READ THIS!!! If you buy ANY wet wheel,variable speed grinder,especially like the Jet,you may have a problem with the grinder suddenly stopping running. I had that happen.

After listening to the repair person at Jet tell me how proud they were of their products,I got a new printed circuit board for it. it had press on wire connectors that are as thin as an aluminum beer can,REALLY TRUE!!! I found out that the real problem was a cracked connector. I just soldered it,and all was well.

I had several dealers tell me about these grinders breaking down,or just not working right out of the box. Maybe after Jet has enough of their grinders sent back,they will improve their fine product. This little crack can be hard to see,though. They might just be putting in a whole new circuit board(with potentially the same problem connectors!!)

If you check out your broken grinder,this advice can be very beneficial. I cannot see how they manage to even assemble these incredibly flimsy circuit board connecters.

[Brian Dormer]

If you want a "BIC Lighter" tool (ie Use it up - throw it away) by all means, go with a HF brand.

Personal preference - go dry - wet is messy no matter what you do. You'll still need a small container to dip the tools into - but once you get them sharp - you'll only be touching up the edge - which only takes seconds anyway (no cooling required).

NO matter what brand you get (unless you spend some really big money) - the tool rests will probably be less than adequate - so right off the bat - you'll be spending some money (~ $50) for a decent tool rest (personal preference - Veritas or One-Way)

I sharpen chisels, carving and turning tools on a 6" Craftsman Bench Grinder (made by Delta/Orion at the time I bought it).

Where you really spend the $$ (as others have said) is in decent grinding wheels AND in balancing kits for the wheels (almost nobody thinks about balancing). If you don't balance the wheels - you will have vibration that makes getting a consistent fine edge difficult.

I use wheels and balancing kits from One-Way (they make the Wolverine jig, which I also use). There are some demo videos on their site that are well worth a look.

BTW - with the stock wheels, my grinder would stop spinning maybe 5-10 seconds after turning off the power - and ther was noticeable vibration when running. With balanced wheels - it spins for 45-60 seconds and almost no vibration. Balancing makes all the difference in the world.

I probably got my grinder ON SALE + Craftsman Club Discount for $40 bucks or so. I probably spent 3 times that on wheels and balancing kits.

[Tri Hoang]

I had all kinds of gadgets before settling on just an 8" grinder at 1725 RPM. With a 40 grit Norton 3X blue wheel, it's pretty quick. It will burn the edge if you let it but more difficult than the black oxide. The wet/dry machines are messy. I much rather clamp a DC hose below the grinding wheel than dealing with splashing/running water in my shop.

[Bill Houghton]

I can't speak to the Horrible Fright grinders, but you should know that wet grinders, though they're truly fine at not scorching the steel and will leave a lovely, polished grind, are slow. This is not necessarily bad - just be aware of it.

Do NOT buy anything electrical from Horrible Fright without running and observing the particular tool you'll be buying. I bought a generic bench grinder from them years ago, and it vibrated so much that it was unusable - if I turned it on when it wasn't bolted down, it was ready to walk to Kansas, if I just gave it enough cord; and I couldn't hold the tools on the chintzy little rests, it shook so much. Made an old Harley or Triumph motorcycle at idle look positively stationary.

[Ruperto Mendiones]

I agree with Josh. The wet-wheel slow grinders [Tormek, Jet] are best from a long-term cost perspective. You can't burn the tool.

You could consider turning a replacement grindstone from these makers with your own mechanism but I doubt you would be much money ahead.

Before I went wet-wheel I used a belt sander clamped upside down in a vise . It works quite well with ordinary sandpaper. A trizact belt or two in the finest grits would produce awesome results.

I have been using trizact disks to flatten chisel backs and I am very impressed.