Tormek equivalent wet sharpening for wood turning tools

[Klaus Waldeck]

I was wondering if there were any word turners out there that are or have used the Tormek wet grinder sharpening system (or equivalent, I'm actually looking at the Grizzly version for a small fraction of the price). What are your thoughts about using this to keep your wood turning tools sharp?

What jigs do you need to grind the proper angle? I see that there is one for gouges which rotates to present all of the cutting surface at the proper angle. What about non-gouge shaped tools like skew chisels, paring chisels, and that other chisel that is flat, but with a round end? Especially that last one, how would you sharpen it on the Tormek?

Grizzly has a deal of $160 for their 10" wet grinder, and I'm about to pull the trigger, but I would like to know what else I need to make a complete set.

Alternatively, I could purchase a slow-speed bench grinder and the jigs for that. Or I could try to purchase the proper jigs for my Work Sharp 3000. I'm not sure what to go with.

[Roger Chandler]

A wet sharpening system is good for turning tools, but they are very slow, and you have to have the proper jigs......tormek has some, and I have not looked at the Grizzly system, so don't know much about them.

If you have to put a heavy grind or change a grind, the wet system is very slow, but can be done. Klaus......there is a reason that probably over 90% if turners have the Wolverine jig [about $90 and of course a grinder]

You can do it with a wet system, and some have great success with them, but usually have the Wolverine system also to do shaping of the grind and heavy renewal of the gouge end in case of chipping if dropped, etc.

[Matt Schrum]

I eyeballed a wet grinding system and darn near pulled the trigger on a Tormek-- but the idea of having to fill/empty the water every time seemed annoying given the overall price tag of the system. If you're using it to sharpen every blade in your house, then maybe it's worth it, but I though it sounded like a hassle to pick up just for my wood turning tools. I also researched competing wet sharpening systems, but the satisfaction with them seemed to be all over the place.

I ended up buying 80 and 180 grit CBN wheels for my grinder and I'm very happy I did. They are quick, no maintenance (truing the stone/wheel or changing water or, well, anything) and they do a great job on my wood turning tools. Will they sharpen your kitchen paring knife? I wouldn't suggest it, but that's not why I bought them.

Currently I just free hand sharpen (which isn't too bad with a steady hand, light touch and some practice), but I imagine a Wolverine jig will be on my Christmas list.

[Kyle Iwamoto]

I've been using the Tormek for years. I really think it's a great system, but it is slow. IF you also get the dry grinder attachment, and a dry grinder, preferably with a CBN wheel, you could have the best of 3 worlds, although you will be out some serious money for all the systems. Someday, after I wear down my dry grinder wheel, I'll get a CBN. But I use the dry grinder only to reshape, and I hardly do that. Once set, I don't change the grinds.

This months AAW magazine has an article about wet sharpening. The wet vs dry is a huge debate, with dry winning, as mentioned, 90% of the time.

My $0.02. I sharpen less. There is less tool steel ground away with a wet jig. Tools last longer. Some say the wet grinder is messy, but I disagree. Maybe some water splashes out, but a dry grinder spews metal and wheel dust all over the place. The metal and wheel dust is trapped in the water trough on the Tormek. The Tormek is quiet. I bring mine into the house and sharpen and watch TV. It's pretty much mindless sharpening. CAN'T screw anything up since it's so slow. If you have flat work planes and chisels, there is no way to burn the blades with a wet sharpener. Given the proper jig you can sharpen everything in your house and keep the wife happy with sharp knives and scissors.

[Geoff Whaling]

I'm with Kyle. I have both the Tormek T7 and the Tormek jigs and a dry grinder setup with the Tormek BGM100 mount. Definitely the best of 3 worlds if you have a "half speed" dry grinder as well. The preference wet vs dry largely depends upon your style of turning. I use both systems & particularly like the Tormek jigs except for my favourite Australian Heligrind profile for spindle / detail gouges.

The Tormek is way to slow for production bowl turners hence the lack of take up in that area.

If you are a fine spindle turner then practically there is nothing better than an edge produced by a Tormek with the jigs set up correctly unless you are into some serious sharpening systems. A Tormek also has a few other fringe benefits if you purchase the knife & scissor jigs just to keep your better half happy :-) and if you like to keep the carving tools razor sharp.

One factor to seriously consider is the potential hazards associated with both grinder styles. Dry grinders have potential hazards from the higher speed, wheel construction, susceptibility to wheel cracks, wheel disintegration, flying fragments, hot work (sparks), friction burns/cuts from wheel contact, wheel material & metal dusts etc. Wet grinders have none of those potential hazards.

note - the images were taken "dry" purely for clarity of the images to show another turner how to set up the Heligrind on a Tormek T7.

[David Walser]

Geoff -- What kind of jig is that? I'm not familiar with it.

[Geoff Whaling]

Geoff -- What kind of jig is that? I'm not familiar with it.

David its an Australian made Heligrind jig - no longer available but produces an excellent fingernail profile.

[Dok Yager]

Klaus, I have the grizzly wet grinding system and yes you have to be patient. It does do a very good job of sharpening and the best part is the Tormek guides fit on the grizzly. My neighbor has a Tormek and we found his guides fit the grizzly so I got a couple of the guides for my grizzly and they work well. However I do also have the "wolverine" system and use it to re-shape and for Heavy grinding.

[Bill Boehme]

I've been using a Tormek for over 15 years and do virtually all of my sharpening on it. I also have the big Delta 23-725 dry grinder with Norton 3X ceramic wheels. The dry grinder is used for tool shaping where lots of steel needs to be removed. I also use it to sharpen my hollowing tips. Many people say that the Tormek is too slow, but the time difference is only a few seconds for me. Maybe it's from using the Tormek for 15 years. In the long run, I spend less time sharpening because the tools stay sharp longer when they start out much sharper than those "sharpened" on a dry grinder. Tormek has an ample assortment of jigs for turning tools, but you really only need four of the jigs to sharpen every turning tool. The one tool that is really slooooooow to sharpen on the Tormek is the skew, but that is the only way to get a skew properly sharpened ... a dry grinder can't properly sharpen a skew ...unless it has a 400 grit CBN wheel.

The quality of the Grizzly system is poor and the stone is inferior to that on the Tormek. When I bought my Tormek, the price was much more reasonable. Looking at the current price, I would go with a dry grinder and CBN wheels unless you are doing a lot of sharpening of other things like planer and jointer blades, plane irons, hand chisels, carving tools, etc.

[Paul Gilbert]

I have both a T7 Tormek and a Wolverine system with CBN wheels. I have found the Tormek to be excellent for bench chisels, planer blades and plane irons, but not worth the effort for turning tools. I have all of the Tormek jigs, but have found NO WAY to grind my skews with an Allen Lacer grind. That was one of the reasons I bought the T7. I do occasionally strop the skew on the leather wheel of the T7, but can't really say that it really improves a well honed edge. The Tormek gouge jig mounted on the slow speed grinder with CBN wheels would probably work, but the complete setup probably costs more than the Wolverine system.

I consider the T7 to be money wasted, but I would never let SWMBO know.

[Jack Mincey]

I have used a tormek to sharpen my bowl and spindle gouges for the last 8 years and love the edge it gives me. It does take some time to put the first edge on the tools, but takes only seconds to touch up the edge from then on. It removes a very small amount of steel which leads to longer tool life. Once one learns how to use the Tormek on gouges it is about as easy as one can make it. While I use the Tormek exclusively for my gouges I don't use it for skews and scrapers. It take to long to grind a skew on it and I like the edge one gets on a scraper using a low speed grinder. I do use the leather wheel to take a hand honed skew to a crazy sharp that is hard to believe, it also will put and edge on a knife that is hard to believe.
Jack

[Paul Gilbert]

Bill -
"The one tool that is really slooooooow to sharpen on the Tormek is the skew" --- I assume that you are using a straight edged skew, rather than the Laser grind. The skew jig that I have is best suited to an oval skew with a straight cutting edge.

If you can sharpen a Laser 1 3/8" skew on your Tormek I will bring my Tormek to SWAT for a lesson or travel a good distance (North Texas is a pretty big area) for one.

[robert baccus]

Please correct me---I was under the impression that wet sharpening was a standard for sharpening in the days of carbon steel tools. I remember it being so easy to burn the temper off--as in blue. I can't imagine a use for it with the HSS tools used today. You want to talk about sharp on your wet stone--try a slow grinder with a dry 180 wheel. Now just barely touch it to a 6", 600 grit diamond disc which can be re honed when necessary in 2 seconds with no metal loss.

[Jeff Ford]

I went a slightly different route, I am currently using the Sorby Proedge and so far its easy to use, quick, and gives repeatable results.

[David Walser]

Klaus -- I have used a Tormek for my sharpening my turning tools for years. I highly recommend it. For touching up an edge, it's just as fast as using a dry grinder with a jig (which I have and used for years before buying the Tormek). For shaping a tool, a dry grinder is much faster -- which is why I purchased the dry grinder set up from Tormek when it first came out. The nice thing is that you can go directly from the dry grinder to the Tormek. By using the same settings, the bevel angle will be exactly the same (with slight difference due to the different size of the wheels), meaning you can quickly go from the fairly rough dry grind surface to the polished Tormek surface.

You asked about which jigs you'd need: For skews, parting tools, and spindle roughing gouges, you'll need Tormek's multi jig (SVS-50). For spindle and bowl gouges, you'll need the gouge jig (SVD-185) and the turning tool setter (TTS-100). For scrapers, you'll want the tool rest (SVD-110). The thing I like about the Tormek jigs is that they are more accurate without taking more time to set up. In fact, setting up to sharpen bowl gouges is quicker on a Tormek than it is using the Wolverine system. Tormek's turning tool setter, combined with its micro-adjust, makes dialing in the correct bevel very quick and very accurate. With the Wolverine, you get it close by eye and then bump the arm in and out a few times to get the correct angle. If you're lucky, your first couple of bumps will get the angle right. If not, after a few more bumps, you'll decide that it's close enough and grind a slightly new bevel angle onto your tool.

I don't know anything about Grizzly's wet grinder. I do know that Tormek makes a quality sharpening system.

[David Walser]

Please correct me---I was under the impression that wet sharpening was a standard for sharpening in the days of carbon steel tools. I remember it being so easy to burn the temper off--as in blue. I can't imagine a use for it with the HSS tools used today. ...

This just shows a lack of imagination on your part. :)

Alan Lacer did a series of articles in AAW's journal that compared the edges produced by dry grinding (with and without honing) with the edge from a Tormek (with and without honing). Bottom line: A tool sharpened on a Tormek is sharper than one off of a dry grinder -- with or without honing. There are two reasons for this: First, the Tormek's stone is 1,000 grit, which produces a finer edge than does a 600 grit hone. Second, and more importantly, the burr produced by dry grinding HSS is very durable. On a skew, it typically folds over on contact with the wood (or a hone), more than doubling the thickness of the edge. It takes a lot of honing to remove the burr!

One last comment on a topic that is not free from controversy: It is true that HSS holds its temper better than high carbon steel. You have to get the HSS much, much hotter before it loses its temper, but it will still lose its temper if you get it hot enough. Can you produce that kind of heat with dry grinding? Most say no. Some say yes. This is the point of controversy. At the very edge, where the metal is at its thinnest, would a heavy hand on the grinder produce enough heat to take the temper out? I think so. At least, that seems to be what was happening when I was first learning to sharpen my bowl gouges on a high speed grinder. I blued the end of the tool and, at the very edge, I got the metal a bright red. (Note: the tool was fine just a 1/16th of an inch away from the edge.) As I learned to use a lighter touch, my bowl gouges stayed sharper longer, so I think I took the temper out of the tool at the very edge. My son, who's Masters thesis analyzed the properties of various high speed steels agrees with my hypothesis. It's possible to draw the temper of HSS with too heavy a hand on the grinder. This isn't an issue with a Tormek.

[David Walser]

Jeff -- The Sorby system is very good. (It uses copies of the Tormek jigs.) Had it been available when I bought my Tormek, I might have gotten the Sorby instead. One difference is that the Sorby produces a flat bevel rather than the hollow ground bevel most of us are used to. In some cases, a flat bevel is preferable. In other cases, its not.

[Kyle Iwamoto]

I dunno, This is my 1-1/2" Sorby skew Lacer style. You can do it on a Tormek....

Yes, it took a long time, but it can be done.

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[paul cottingham]

I have gotten (is that even a word?) very good results from the viel grinder used with the trizact belts. Would rather have a wet grinder, but the small viel does a nice job. I do follow up on a 10000 Japanese stone.

[Paul Gilbert]

I dunno, This is my 1-1/2" Sorby skew Lacer style. You can do it on a Tormek....

Yes, it took a long time, but it can be done.

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How do you do it, on the platform on the bottom support, or on top with the skew facing down? If I try it in the normal lower position, it sucks the skew right out of my hand.

[robert baccus]

My low imagination has trouble thinking that very few cuts on a lathe needs a surgical sharp edge. I use 4 different grits (diamond) for different situations but most cutting is done right off the 180 stone. I'd rather be cutting wood than sharpening any day. When a difficult or precise cut is needed a super sharp edge is priceless but even a dull axe will split wood.

[William C Rogers]

I have the Jet clone and the wolverine jig. I have the tormek jigs for the jet, but I have never taken the time to master it fully. I will at some point. For the wolverine I had used the white wheels for a couple of years. I recently bought a CBN wheel and put that on one side. I keep a white wheel on the other side as I do have some home configured non HSS tools and you are only suppose to sharpen HSS tools on a CBN wheel. All will work, but the wolverine/CBN does a very good and fast job. It is my go to system.

[john taliaferro]

I got 5 3/8 gouges from Packard wood works , when all are laying by the Tormek i stop fill the water and sharpen . I also eat a cookie or to shovel chips ,and take puppy for a walk .

[Geoff Whaling]

My low imagination has trouble thinking that very few cuts on a lathe needs a surgical sharp edge. I use 4 different grits (diamond) for different situations but most cutting is done right off the 180 stone. I'd rather be cutting wood than sharpening any day. When a difficult or precise cut is needed a super sharp edge is priceless but even a dull axe will split wood.

Depends upon what you turn. I like to make spin tops and also like fine spindle turning. Very sharp skews, spindle/detail gouge & an original Sorby spindle master are my favourite tools. I can definitely tell when they are loosing their keen edges. Its a bit like chalk & cheese, comparing a very sharp edge to a dull edge on fine spindle work. Dull edges create many issues on fine spindle work. As I said earlier, I use the dry grinder for maintaining bowl gouges when roughing out. Horses for courses.

[Richard Casey]

Klaus,
I have the original Tormek grinder with the upgraded Supergrind wheel and i use it all the time. Yes it is slow to set the initial profile, and I use the aftermarket toolrest on my spark grinder to set the profile, then finish on the wet grinder. It is the best finish for a skew and has the bonus of having the rotating leather strop to hone the edge.
What are the advantages,
1 very quick repeatable touchup of blunt gouges,
2 only removes thousandths of an inch each touchup,
3 no hot sparks near the wood shavings,
4 all the grindings are captured in the water tray, so no microscopic metalic dust particles floating around the shop like the CBN's produce.
Just my deflated Aussie $0.20 worth,
rgds,
Richard.

[Klaus Waldeck]

Wow guys, thanks for all of the info. I should have known that this thread would spark quite a lot of debate. I'm glad that it has been kept friendly. Here are my thoughts.

I think I'm going to go with a new slow-speed bench grinder to start with, and either buy or make a Wolverine jig. I've also seen some videos on semi-freehand sharpening that I may try. Perhaps with a well-trued stone of a finer grit with a good grinder, I may have a chance at learning the freehand technique.

Also, it seems with the Grizzly option, I can get into the Tormek-style wet grinding solution for not an absurd amount of money. Even if the Tormek wheel is far superior, I could buy one of those for the Grizzly and still save a few hundred off of the full Tormek.

Finally, I have been reading this web page which has some very good information about sharpening technique:

http://woodturninglearn.net/articles/sharpen1.htm

[Kyle Iwamoto]

How do you do it, on the platform on the bottom support, or on top with the skew facing down? If I try it in the normal lower position, it sucks the skew right out of my hand.

Platform on the upper mount. I found what really helps is I put a Sharpie line on the rest vertically down the center. Using the line, I have a mark to make that really useful "flat" grind on the tip of the skew. Once I roughed out the shape, it then becomes pretty easy (still very slow) to touch up. I do hone between sharpenings, so I really don't mind taking time to sharpen.

I did have trouble until I used the upper mount. Took me a long time to get it.