Help Me Evolve My Sharpening: Scary Sharpish to Sharpton + Naniwa Snow White

[Matt Bainton]

I am still new to woodworking and have been sharpening my few chisels and plane blades via a granite slab and various grits of Norton paper (400 - 100 grit) and Veritas MK II, followed by a leather strop with green compound. Clearly not the sharpest edges, but I've been able to get some arm-hair removed with them.

After reading about the various methods available for sharpening I'm setting my sights on a Shapton Pro 1000 (~$37 Japan version) and then the jump to a Naniwa Snow White ($87 at ChefKnivesToGo). With a little Christmas money I pulled the trigger on the Snow White which just arrived yesterday.

For now the Shapton Pro 1000 will have to wait for more funds. The plan is to do the equivalent sharpening stage on the granite + paper, as well as flattening the SW via the same method.

Questions for you guys: What wet/dry paper grit is equivalent to ceramic 1000? What grit would you use to keep the Snow White flat?



(Dumb autocorrect keeps overriding Shapton to Sharpton. Can't fix the thread title now :( )

[Nicholas Lawrence]

If you use the search box in the upper right hand corner, you should be able to find some threads on this. Try flattening and Naniwa or Shapton. Like most things sharpening I think you will find opinions vary. I do not own either of those stones.

[Patrick Chase]

I am still new to woodworking and have been sharpening my few chisels and plane blades via a granite slab and various grits of Norton paper (400 - 100 grit) and Veritas MK II, followed by a leather strop with green compound. Clearly not the sharpest edges, but I've been able to get some arm-hair removed with them.

After reading about the various methods available for sharpening I'm setting my sights on a Shapton Pro 1000 (~$37 Japan version) and then the jump to a Naniwa Snow White ($87 at ChefKnivesToGo). With a little Christmas money I pulled the trigger on the Snow White which just arrived yesterday.

For now the Shapton Pro 1000 will have to wait for more funds. The plan is to do the equivalent sharpening stage on the granite + paper, as well as flattening the SW via the same method.

Questions for you guys: What wet/dry paper grit is equivalent to ceramic 1000? What grit would you use to keep the Snow White flat?

(Dumb autocorrect keeps overriding Shapton to Sharpton. Can't fix the thread title now :( )

I have both of those stones. The main reservation I have is that the Shapton Pro stones are best suited to high-carbon low-alloy steels, and slow down on more abrasion-resistant alloys like A2. What sorts of tools are you sharpening?

The Shapton Pro 1K uses 14.7 micron abrasive particles, which would make it about 1000 grit on the FEPA scale that Norton uses for most of their papers. You should be able to "plug the gap" for the time being with some 1500-grit SiC paper (http://www.amazon.com/3M-32023-Imperial-Wetordry-Sheet/dp/B0002MSY7C).

IIRC the Snow White is about 1.8 microns, which is actually on the high side for an "8K" stone (for comparison the Imanishi 8K uses 1.2 um particles, and the Sigma 10K is sub-micron).

If I were budget constrained I'd look really hard at the $55 "Takeshi Kuroda 10K mystery stone special" from metalmaster. I recently got one more or less for kicks, and it's actually a very good resin-based polishing stone. It's unbeatable for the price. It sounds like you're locked into the Snow White though.

EDIT: Buying grey-market Shaptons as you describe is a no brainer. Those stones aren't remotely worth what Shapton's distributor wants for them in the US.

[Tom M King]

You can get 3 or 6 flattenings out of the 100 grit wet-or-dry sandpaper on your granite plate for your 8k stone. I'd do it under running water, and just keep it on 1/3 of the paper each session. Just rinse the paper off when done, and set it aside to dry for next time. It won't work so good for a 1,000 grit stone when you get one. Paper will flatten a coarser stone, but it eats up paper too fast to be worth it, especially on one as hard as the Shapton. I did that when I first started with waterstones. I sharpen in a sink, and have a 9x12 granite surface plate in one side all the time with an Atoma 400 sheet on it these days for flattening. Since you are not in a hurry, it seems, check out the lineup at Tools from Japan. I usually have something on a slow boat coming this way from Stu there. It takes a while to get something, but the prices are very hard to beat. I'm currently enjoying Sigma stones (some Select II, and some Power), and like them a lot. Some of us are real Stone Ho's. The Snow White is a good stone, and as good as anything in the 8k range. It should serve you well for a Long time.

[Matt Bainton]

Patrick, I've got vintage Stanley plane blades and a 750 chisel, as well as a Lie Nielsen A2 chisel. I assume that in the future I will have some additional modern steel but at this point its too early to tell if it will be a majority or minority.

I searched the SMC forums and found people using granite + wet/dry paper to level their waterstones – BUT then I found this post by Stu (http://Patrick, I've got vintage Stanley plane blades and a 750 chisel, as well as a Lie Nielsen A2 chisel. I assume that in the future I will have some additional modern steel but at this point its too early to tell if it will be a majority or minority. I searched the SMC forums and found people using granite + wet/dry paper to level their waterstones – BUT then I found this post by Stu from Tools From Japan where he adamantly) from Tools From Japan where he adamantly advises against using sandpaper on waterstones. Looks like I'll have to get a diamond stone for leveling?

[Curt Putnam]

The 400 grit Atoma works beautifully for stone flattening.

[Patrick Chase]

Patrick, I've got vintage Stanley plane blades and a 750 chisel, as well as a Lie Nielsen A2 chisel. I assume that in the future I will have some additional modern steel but at this point its too early to tell if it will be a majority or minority.

I searched the SMC forums and found people using granite + wet/dry paper to level their waterstones – BUT then I found this post by Stu (http://Patrick, I've got vintage Stanley plane blades and a 750 chisel, as well as a Lie Nielsen A2 chisel. I assume that in the future I will have some additional modern steel but at this point its too early to tell if it will be a majority or minority.I searched the SMC forums and found people using granite + wet/dry paper to level their waterstones – BUT then I found this post by Stu from Tools From Japan where he adamantly) from Tools From Japan where he adamantly advises against using sandpaper on waterstones. Looks like I'll have to get a diamond stone for leveling?

The usual low budget option is loose silicon carbide grit on glass, either with or without a plastic laminating sheet to "hold" the grit. Stu himself recommends this approach for stones that are so coarse that they would destroy a diamond plate (and that's why he includes loose 36- and 120-grit SiC with every Sigma Power 120 he sells :-). You can literally get the stuff by the 10-pound bucket from Amazon, or you can pay several times as much per unit weight at woodworking suppliers. 90# powder will work fine for your 1K stone, and maybe 400# for the polisher.

The Shapton Pro will be a little slow on the L-N A2 chisel, but in its sweet spot with the Stanley blades and the 750. I'd personally go with the Sigma Select II 1200 or the Sigma Power 1000 hard instead. They work better with hard steels and they're reasonably priced.

[Matt Bainton]

Patrick, thanks for the suggestion of the Sigma Select II and Power. One thing that I liked about the Shapton and Snow White is that they can be used as splash and go instead of soakers. Not sure if I would prefer convenience or the performance of the SS II.

Curt, the Atoma 400 looks nice. Sad that its the price of a good stone when I had assumed I could use paper for that job. Guess I'll have to wait a bit to be able to flatten the Naniwa and use it.

Also, Patrick, I've heard about the loose grit + metal or glass surface, but didn't know people really use it. I remember reading Derek and some Aussie guys experimenting with diamond pastes and then abandoning it. That was for sharpening though, so I suppose it works more practically for leveling stones???

[Matthew N. Masail]

The Atoma 400 is worth every penny. it will keep your stones flat with as little mess as possible and will keep doing it for a lifetime if you don't use it for metal as well. sand paper sucks for keeping stones flat, but to each his own...

[Kees Heiden]

Loose Silicone grit works very well for flattening stones, but it is also very messy. Very.

[Matt Bainton]

Kees, I guess it makes sense for me to go for a legit diamond leveling stone if I'm trying to keep the complication/mess down. I hadn't thought about that aspect of loose media.

Is the Atoma 400 the best value/performance offering?

[Patrick Chase]

Patrick, thanks for the suggestion of the Sigma Select II and Power. One thing that I liked about the Shapton and Snow White is that they can be used as splash and go instead of soakers. Not sure if I would prefer convenience or the performance of the SS II.

Curt, the Atoma 400 looks nice. Sad that its the price of a good stone when I had assumed I could use paper for that job. Guess I'll have to wait a bit to be able to flatten the Naniwa and use it.

Also, Patrick, I've heard about the loose grit + metal or glass surface, but didn't know people really use it. I remember reading Derek and some Aussie guys experimenting with diamond pastes and then abandoning it. That was for sharpening though, so I suppose it works more practically for leveling stones???

Everybody who owns really coarse grinding stones uses loose grit on glass. As noted above such stones can/will destroy diamond plates in short order, so there's really no alternative. I know plenty of people who are on a budget and use grit for everything, and it's not that much of a hassle. Also loose grit is the preferred (fastest, cheapest) approach for honing plane soles and the like.

Diamond pastes aren't useful for stone flattening. For starters most of them are oil-based and would ruin your stones. The water-based ones (for example Norton's water based line) would be compatible, but are too fine to be very useful for the most part and also extremely expensive. Diamond pastes are useful if you're lapping something that's too hard or abrasion resistant for your stones (some HSS variants for example), if you're in a hurry (diamond paste is fast), or if you want to get to a super-fine grit. For example 0.25 um diamond corresponds to about #60000. There are also diamond lapping films, which are probably best thought of a disposable fine-grit plates. Don't use those to flatten stones either.

Please keep in mind that some folks on this forum, including Derek, appear to have one or two of just about everything (and frankly I fall into this category as well). You probably shouldn't try to follow that example unless you have a bottomless wallet or want to go broke in short order. From where you appear to be right now there are probably a lot of better things to spend your money on than an Atoma plate. If you're really determined to go the diamond route then take a look at Stu's iWood plates as well (and if you do buy an Atoma get that from him, too - they're a lot cheaper that way).

[Patrick Chase]

Kees, I guess it makes sense for me to go for a legit diamond leveling stone if I'm trying to keep the complication/mess down. I hadn't thought about that aspect of loose media.

Is the Atoma 400 the best value/performance offering?

It's not THAT messy. Just use a big enough glass sheet that it doesn't slop over the sides (mine are 9x13x3/8), and wash it all down the sink when you're done. It's pretty straightforward.

The Atoma 400 is hard to beat for flatness and performance. The iWood 300 is maybe 80% of the way there and a lot cheaper. The only diamond plate that I know of that beats it for flatness is the Shapton glass plate (http://www.japanwoodworker.com/Product/833886/Shapton-DGLP-Lap-Plate.aspx?gclid=CL7MgOLVi8oCFQVbfgodL30Bww), but you REALLY don't want to go there (I did of course - I own both).

[Matthew N. Masail]

Kees, I guess it makes sense for me to go for a legit diamond leveling stone if I'm trying to keep the complication/mess down. I hadn't thought about that aspect of loose media.

Is the Atoma 400 the best value/performance offering?

The Iwood 300 is not bad, and about half the price. but the Atoma is worth the extra IMO, I have both. the Atoma is aluminium and stainless steel, it's light and comfortable and doesn't rust. I can't say the same for the Iwood. basically if you have an Atoma your set for life for keeping stones flat. just don't use it on something harsh like a sigma 400, you'd need an Atoma 140 to handle that without hurting the plate, which is why I don't own that stone.

as Kees pointed out, this is all largely a mess issue, I wouldn't worry too much about loose grit if your using good quality stuff but the sandpaper cost will add up over time.

[Patrick Chase]

The Iwood 300 is not bad, and about half the price. but the Atoma is worth the extra IMO, I have both. the Atoma is aluminium and stainless steel, it's light and comfortable and doesn't rust. I can't say the same for the Iwood. basically if you have an Atoma your set for life for keeping stones flat. just don't use it on something harsh like a sigma 400, you'd need an Atoma 140 to handle that without hurting the plate, which is why I don't own that stone.

Funny story: Long ago I once stripped most of the diamonds off of a DMT DiaFlat (this is before I knew about the Atomas and thought that you *needed* a 10x4 plate to flatten 8x3 stones) by trying to flatten a Sigma Select II 240. That was a $180 learning experience, the moral of which was that there's something to be said for learning on cheap tools when you're a noob.

The Sigma 400 and the Cerax 320 are the coarsest stones I'll flatten with the Atoma 140 (did I mention that I have one of those, too?). Everything more coarse than that (Shapton Pro 120, Sigma Power 120, Sigma Select II 240, Bester 220) gets the loose grit treatment.

[Matthew N. Masail]

Yeah I wouldn't touch the sigma 120 with anything diamond! I don't really know what I'd do the flatten such stones, good thing I don't need em'. I do want a sigma 400 or maybe the Gokomyo ryu 300 dual density stone, I have a butt load of old stanley planes and chisel sets to flatten soon.

[Tom M King]

The Sigma 400 is a fast stone, and the 1,000 takes its scratches out as easy as any other step between stones. I wish I had bought it years ago. The only "stone" I have that's coarser is a diamond plate x-coarse, but it rarely gets used. If the 400 is not enough, it goes to the CBN wheel. The 400 really speeds things up when 1,000 is not quite enough for flattening the back of a chisel or plane iron. For flattening the finer stones I have one of the Atoma 400 replacement sheets on one half of a 9x12 granite surface plate that stays in one sink. There is another 200 sheet on its way for the other half for coarser stones. I probably would have ordered 140 if I had seen Patrick's post before I put in that order.

[Reinis Kanders]

For grinding of japanese chisels I make slurry on a Norton crystolon with DMT xxcoarse plastic backed honeycomb stone that can be had for about $35. I spray with non aerosol WD40 for slurry part, but use honing oil for actual grinding. Seems to work ok, and is not too messy or expensive. Kind of like waterstone, but works on a cold porch.

[Matthew N. Masail]

The Sigma 400 is a fast stone, and the 1,000 takes its scratches out as easy as any other step between stones. I wish I had bought it years ago. The only "stone" I have that's coarser is a diamond plate x-coarse, but it rarely gets used. If the 400 is not enough, it goes to the CBN wheel. The 400 really speeds things up when 1,000 is not quite enough for flattening the back of a chisel or plane iron. For flattening the finer stones I have one of the Atoma 400 replacement sheets on one half of a 9x12 granite surface plate that stays in one sink. There is another 200 sheet on its way for the other half for coarser stones. I probably would have ordered 140 if I had seen Patrick's post before I put in that order.

Hi Tom,

What do you use to flatten the Sigma 400? I use the sigma 1.2k to flatten backs and it works well enough, but when you have a lot of work to do it takes too long.

Thanks,
Matthew

[Tom M King]

I have some SC grit left from when I built telescope mirrors when I was a teenager (1960s). To use the grit on, I just lay a float glass window pane on top of the granite plate in the sink, on top of a piece of that rubbery drawer liner screen stuff. That's what I ordered the 200 Atoma sheet for-to avoid having to mess with the grit and window pane, but we'll see how that goes.

I wouldn't recommend using a window pane normally, but we have a bunch of float glass panes out of windows in the house we're working on now-lots of sash work, and we're replacing the float glass with cylinder glass.

[Patrick Chase]

The Sigma 400 is a fast stone, and the 1,000 takes its scratches out as easy as any other step between stones. I wish I had bought it years ago. The only "stone" I have that's coarser is a diamond plate x-coarse, but it rarely gets used. If the 400 is not enough, it goes to the CBN wheel. The 400 really speeds things up when 1,000 is not quite enough for flattening the back of a chisel or plane iron. For flattening the finer stones I have one of the Atoma 400 replacement sheets on one half of a 9x12 granite surface plate that stays in one sink. There is another 200 sheet on its way for the other half for coarser stones. I probably would have ordered 140 if I had seen Patrick's post before I put in that order.

It's probably worth noting that I'm conservative about such things (now :-). I don't view loose SiC as much of a hassle and I'd rather not blow through [m]any more diamond plates.

I know of people who use the #140 Atoma to flatten the Select II #240, and flattening the #400 on a #200 sheet should be less abusive than that. Just use a light touch.

[Matthew N. Masail]

Thanks. I used glass with SC power early on in my woodworking to flatten an old block plane, it cuts very fast but I didn't like it much, and felt like it cut the glass too so not as "flat" for as long. I'd be curious to hear how the 200 Atoma sheet works out for this, as I think I'll have no choice but to get one of those stones soon, that is if I value my time and energy. I also work the field, not houses but woodworking related, and will need to flatted a lot of blade backs very soon.

[Patrick Chase]

Thanks. I used glass with SC power early on in my woodworking to flatten an old block plane, it cuts very fast but I didn't like it much, and felt like it cut the glass too so not as "flat" for as long.

Use a sacrificial plastic laminating sheet on top of the glass. It makes the lapping go a lot faster (the sheet is relatively soft and tends to "trap" the abrasive particles) and prevents the grit from scratching the glass.

[Tom M King]

That sounds like a good idea. Plastic laminating sheet? I just toss the pane in the trash when done, but we have a big stack of them to toss right now anyway. I said Silicon Carbide, but on the outside of the cans it says Carborundum, which is the same thing.

[Matt Bainton]

I realize I was equating loose grit with diamond paste. Oops. Any idea if local big box stores or specialty shops would Cary loose grit?

[Patrick Chase]

I realize I was equating loose grit with diamond paste. Oops. Any idea if local big box stores or specialty shops would Cary loose grit?

Not sure about the big boxes. Woodcraft would have it if there's one near you.

Here's the boutique version: http://www.leevalley.com/US/wood/page.aspx?p=33017&cat=1,43072

And here's basically the same thing (the particle size may be a bit less controlled, but definitely close enough for flattening) in bulk (http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=panadyne+silicon+carbide). There are several suppliers, I just chose Panadyne because that's what I've most recently purchased.

The difference between diamond paste and SiC is approximately the difference between $5/gram and $5/pound.

[Tom M King]

I don't know how the stuff is graded at other places, but this is pretty good in this form: http://www.willbell.com/atmsupplies/atm_supplies.htm

[Gene Davis]

You need to watch this video, by a guy that makes wooden hand planes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=byDNeehIfmw

[Patrick Chase]

You need to watch this video, by a guy that makes wooden hand planes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=byDNeehIfmw

His technique is a little sloppy (if you look at the sparks you can see that he's doing a significant fraction if not a majority of his work on the left corner of the wheel, which is bad for both the workpiece and the wheel), but otherwise a good demonstration of how to do gross material removal using a $200 CBN wheel on a $200 grinder.

Not at all relevant to the OP's request or budget, though.

Also, some of us use coarse-grit grinding stones because we like to...

[Tom M King]

I use the same CBN wheel that David does in that video, but this discussion has been more about stones for not only final honing, but for flattening the backs of chisels and plane irons. I believe Brian here has one of David's planes, but ask him if he goes farther than David on sharpening other things. David has been as big a stone Ho as any of us, but likes that way for what he does. What we all do, and want from our edges, varies. Most of my iron and chisel edges have not touched the grinder in a Long time.

[Patrick Chase]

I use the same CBN wheel that David does in that video, but this discussion has been more about stones for not only final honing, but for flattening the backs of chisels and plane irons. I believe Brian here has one of David's planes, but ask him if he goes farther than David on sharpening other things. David has been as big a stone Ho as any of us, but likes that way for what he does. What we all do, and want from our edges, varies. Most of my iron and chisel edges have not touched the grinder in a Long time.

Hah! I didn't look closely and failed to notice that was DW's video. I stand by my contention that he's not doing a very good job of distributing the grinding across the wheel, but obviously the guy knows his sh*t. His work with cap irons in particular has helped a lot of people, me included.

The reason I was flippant about that post is because it was so obviously irrelevant to the OP's situation. The only reason I even brought up coarse stones in this thread was to explain why people with diamond plates have to break out the loose SiC every so often.

I too am an epic, irremediable sharpening ho. To wit:

80, 180, and 600 grit CBN wheels
Sigma Power 120, 400, 700 3F Carbon, 1000 hard, 2K, 6K, 13K (the 13K was rebranded an S-II)
Sigma Select II 240, 1000, 1200, 3K, 6K, 10K
Shapton Pro 120, 220, 320, 1000, 1500, 2K, 5K, 8K, 15K
Shapton Glass 500 "2X" (the one with 10 mm of stone)
Suehiro Cerax 320 (the 50 mm thick one. Better than any of the coarse Shaptons...)
Bester 220, 400, 700, 1200, 2000
Imanishi 4K, 8K
Naniwa Snow White 8K
Takeshi Kuroda 10K mystery resin stone (a VERY good stone for the money, as DW himself pointed out)
Tormek T7
Delta variable-speed 8" grinder (with Norton 3X AlOx wheels)
Rikon half-speed grinder (with CBN wheels)
Norton translucent Arkansas (the 3/4" thick one that Joel peddles)
Norton combo India stone
Dan's soft and hard-black Arkansas
Atoma #140, #400, #600, and #1200 plates, including duplicates of the #140 and #400 so that I can dedicate one of each for flattening and metal
Assorted DMT and Eze-Lap plates, though I've been giving those away to friends now that I'm using Atomas
Shapton glass diamond plate
A large assortment of diamond, AlOx, and chromium dioxide lapping films, both PSA and plain
A large assortment of diamond pastes and mild steel plates
An assortment of SiC and AlOx grits for lapping

I know I'm missing some stuff, but you get the idea. Some of the stones listed above have been mostly worn down and then converted to slips.

[Tom M King]

What, no 1x42 belt sander!? :) I have one, but only use it working on golf clubs.

Just as another "what I do", whether it matters to anyone or not, but in reference to the way David grinds almost everything with the rest at the same angle: I do grind various angles, but use the Veritas rest, which is easy to change, and set it quickly using a Stuart Batty gauge: http://www.woodworkersemporium.com/Stuart_Batty_Woodturning_MFR/AG_SET

Since I evolved to honing the whole bevel with no micro-bevels, allowed with a progression of fast cutting stones, these edges rarely touch the grinder unless an edge gets damaged.

[Pat Barry]

You need to watch this video, by a guy that makes wooden hand planes.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=byDNeehIfmw
This video is made by someone, I think, who professes to setting his chip breaker within just a few thou of the plane edge in order to get minimized tearout, yet he totally freehands the grinding and honing process. I find that to be almost comical. There is no way I can reconcile those two things. At least he could have demonstrated the manner in which he is able to get the precision of the edge squareness required to result in the ability to use the closely set chip breaker effectively. It would also have been interesting to see how he would freehand the convex radius on the plane edge. It is funny at the end with the obligatory, albeit invisible, hair shaving demo.

[Patrick Chase]

What, no 1x42 belt sander!? :) I have one, but only use it working on golf clubs.

Just as another "what I do", whether it matters to anyone or not, but in reference to the way David grinds almost everything with the rest at the same angle: I do grind various angles, but use the Veritas rest, which is easy to change, and set it quickly using a Stuart Batty gauge: http://www.woodworkersemporium.com/Stuart_Batty_Woodturning_MFR/AG_SET

Since I evolved to honing the whole bevel with no micro-bevels, allowed with a progression of fast cutting stones, these edges rarely touch the grinder unless an edge gets damaged.

1x30 cheapo Harbor Freight special, with an assortment of belts. Like you I don't use that so much for tool-grinding. 3M makes CBN belts, though I've never tried them...

I use a combination of Veritas tool rests and the Tormek grinding HW. I basically use Chalesworth's "triple-bevel" strategy (primary from grinder, secondary from coarse stone, tertiary from polisher).

[Patrick Chase]

This video is made by someone, I think, who professes to setting his chip breaker within just a few thou of the plane edge in order to get minimized tearout, yet he totally freehands the grinding and honing process. I find that to be almost comical. There is no way I can reconcile those two things. At least he could have demonstrated the manner in which he is able to get the precision of the edge squareness required to result in the ability to use the closely set chip breaker effectively. It would also have been interesting to see how he would freehand the convex radius on the plane edge. It is funny at the end with the obligatory, albeit invisible, hair shaving demo.

He sets back by a couple tenths of an mm, which is ~8 mils.

It's possible to do that using his method. The key thing, and he says this in the video, is that the edge profile is entirely established by hand-grinding. He only uses the grinder for material removal in the bevel and never lets it reach the edge. I actually do the same thing with my smoother and jointer blades (jacks, fores, and Scrubs with radiused blades are another matter). I then use my bevel guide with a straight roller to establish the edge, and then swap in a cambered roller to polish and ease the corners by a couple/few mils. There is no reason why a sufficiently skilled sharpener couldn't do the last 2 steps freehand and still get the edge within a couple mils of straight.

Now we're REALLY off-topic relative to what the OP asked...

[Patrick Chase]

Loose Silicone grit works very well for flattening stones, but it is also very messy. Very.

Is "silicone grit" what you get by chopping up cured RTV? :-)

Sorry, I finally noticed this and couldn't resist.

[Reinis Kanders]

I agree, its not that hard. Its mostly a body control thing or proprioception, especially in the beginning, sort of like it is hard for little kids to hop on one leg and then finally they do it easily once brain-leg connection is properly established. So in the beginning it has to be trained, like anything else.
I find that small hammer taps help for precisely getting breaker close enough.
Little taps should not be underestimated, e.g. they are as effective to adjust marking gauge as fancy microadjust nuts and usually quicker.


He sets back by a couple tenths of an mm, which is ~8 mils.

It's possible to do that using his method. The key thing, and he says this in the video, is that the edge profile is entirely established by hand-grinding. He only uses the grinder for material removal in the bevel and never lets it reach the edge. I actually do the same thing with my smoother and jointer blades (jacks, fores, and Scrubs with radiused blades are another matter). I then use my bevel guide with a straight roller to establish the edge, and then swap in a cambered roller to polish and ease the corners by a couple/few mils. There is no reason why a sufficiently skilled sharpener couldn't do the last 2 steps freehand and still get the edge within a couple mils of straight.

Now we're REALLY off-topic relative to what the OP asked...

[Matthew N. Masail]

Hah! I didn't look closely and failed to notice that was DW's video. I stand by my contention that he's not doing a very good job of distributing the grinding across the wheel, but obviously the guy knows his sh*t. His work with cap irons in particular has helped a lot of people, me included.

The reason I was flippant about that post is because it was so obviously irrelevant to the OP's situation. The only reason I even brought up coarse stones in this thread was to explain why people with diamond plates have to break out the loose SiC every so often.

I too am an epic, irremediable sharpening ho. To wit:

80, 180, and 600 grit CBN wheels
Sigma Power 120, 400, 700 3F Carbon, 1000 hard, 2K, 6K, 13K (the 13K was rebranded an S-II)
Sigma Select II 240, 1000, 1200, 3K, 6K, 10K
Shapton Pro 120, 220, 320, 1000, 1500, 2K, 5K, 8K, 15K
Shapton Glass 500 "2X" (the one with 10 mm of stone)
Suehiro Cerax 320 (the 50 mm thick one. Better than any of the coarse Shaptons...)
Bester 220, 400, 700, 1200, 2000
Imanishi 4K, 8K
Naniwa Snow White 8K
Takeshi Kuroda 10K mystery resin stone (a VERY good stone for the money, as DW himself pointed out)
Tormek T7
Delta variable-speed 8" grinder (with Norton 3X AlOx wheels)
Rikon half-speed grinder (with CBN wheels)
Norton translucent Arkansas (the 3/4" thick one that Joel peddles)
Norton combo India stone
Dan's soft and hard-black Arkansas
Atoma #140, #400, #600, and #1200 plates, including duplicates of the #140 and #400 so that I can dedicate one of each for flattening and metal
Assorted DMT and Eze-Lap plates, though I've been giving those away to friends now that I'm using Atomas
Shapton glass diamond plate
A large assortment of diamond, AlOx, and chromium dioxide lapping films, both PSA and plain
A large assortment of diamond pastes and mild steel plates
An assortment of SiC and AlOx grits for lapping

I know I'm missing some stuff, but you get the idea. Some of the stones listed above have been mostly worn down and then converted to slips.

No dual stones? no Choseras?? you obviously can't get a edge truly sharp with the stuff you have....

[Patrick Chase]

No dual stones? no Choseras?? you obviously can't get a edge truly sharp with the stuff you have....

Yeah, you're right, and that's what I tell my wife: "Honey, clearly this piece didn't come out perfectly because we haven't allocated enough of our community property for tools and/or sharpening media".

For some reason she doesn't buy it.

Seriously, one has to draw the line somewhere. Choseras, Suehiro Gokumyos, Shapton Glass, the 30K Shapton Pro, and natural waterstones all fall under my "value threshold". Of course you could argue that some of the other stuff I listed is equally questionable. Humans are irrational beasts...

[Matthew N. Masail]

I've tried maybe as much stones as you have, spent maybe 1\4 because I didn't go mad with diamond stuff and arkensas (not that that's bad at all). I sold off what I don't consider to be "user" stones, because in all honestly getting good with the stones you use has much more value than what the stone actually is, which is why I choose my stones based on things that aren't "performance" - like the dual stones are about as messy as oil stones but no oil, and stay flat about like an India stone too! the Sigma select II is the only 10K stone I've used that feels nice and hardly loads at all (create a tad of slurry) . I have 5 water stones left, in the end, I'll have maybe 8. how many do I need.... two? I'm happy to pay 300$ for those two stones, not so happy to pay 300$ for stones that leave me Wishing for something else. problem is putting down the cash to find out what you prefer... I do consider Fine India slips to be a fine investment, as well as a India combo, jury is still out on the black Arkensas.

Here's a challenge - choose a couple of stones that you want to be your main users, and use nothing else for 3 months.

I got stuck with a dual stone 500 diamond plate and a dual stone 1000 grit stone (will polish) at work for over 6 months... no sink and needed something portable. they are all I use in that studio, and you know what, I've become very proficient and getting a razor edge quickly on everything I need, including A2 blades which at first gave me a little trouble. no grinder either, so I freehand the primary bevel on a large belt sander, making it a convex bevel. I've learnt a lot about practicality thanks to this.

[Tom M King]

I think Stu knows Patrick and Matthew by their first names.

[Pat Barry]

I agree, its not that hard. Its mostly a body control thing or proprioception.
Are you saying its not hard to freehand grind the edge of a 2 inch wide plane blade to with a few thou of being perfectly square across? I disagree with that. If you notice he just went at it and never even checked the squareness of the finished edge. Basically just a load of hooey with a whole lot of inconsequential talk thrown in. He must get paid by the minute to make these video's.

[Patrick Chase]

Are you saying its not hard to freehand grind the edge of a 2 inch wide plane blade to with a few thou of being perfectly square across? I disagree with that. If you notice he just went at it and never even checked the squareness of the finished edge. Basically just a load of hooey with a whole lot of inconsequential talk thrown in. He must get paid by the minute to make these video's.

As he said in the video and as I already wrote above, he doesn't let the grinder remove material from or otherwise shape the cutting edge. He does that by hand on a bench stone, as do I. The purpose of the grinder in such a workflow is to relieve the bevel and make hand-honing of the edge go faster. Given that process it's entirely feasible to keep the edge within a couple mils of straight, provided your bench stones are flat.

It really isn't hard to understand if you actually take a second to listen to what others are saying instead of compulsively spurting your own "hooey".

EDIT: Even if he did grind to the edge, he could still get a straight edge by hand-honing afterwards. It doesn't need to be "perfectly square" - cap irons are somewhat adjustable in rotation, as any idiot can plainly see. There's a reason they were designed that way...

[Patrick Chase]

He must get paid by the minute to make these video's.

By the way, PM me if you want to know how YouTube monetization actually works.

[Pat Barry]

As he said in the video and as I already wrote above, he doesn't let the grinder remove material from or otherwise shape the cutting edge. He does that by hand on a bench stone, as do I. The purpose of the grinder in such a workflow is to relieve the bevel and make hand-honing of the edge go faster. Given that process it's entirely feasible to keep the edge within a couple mils of straight, provided your bench stones are flat.

It really isn't hard to understand if you actually take a second to listen to what others are saying instead of compulsively spurting your own "hooey".

EDIT: Even if he did grind to the edge, he could still get a straight edge by hand-honing afterwards. It doesn't need to be "perfectly square" - cap irons are somewhat adjustable in rotation, as any idiot can plainly see. There's a reason they were designed that way...
Thanks so much for your brilliant observations.

[Trevor Goodwin]

Patrick, you have so many stones and so many overlap. I know most woodworkers have a lot more stuff than they need, but that's a whole new level, your wife must be very tolerant!

Something I didn't get from that vid is how he gets his irons square in the first place? He hones freehand so how does that make things square if they aren't already.

I'm just getting into power sharpening with my Tormek clone and have been hollow-grinding all my tools, getting rid of the ugly convex bevels Paul Sellers advocates. My trick to getting squareness is to not rely on the jigs or the wheel, when using the "square"-edge jig I micro-adjust adjust chisels/irons with a hammer or hand pressure until I'm getting a square grind. This eliminates sloppy tolerances in the support arm and jig, account for deflection of the arm, and account for the wheel being out of true. Sometimes I get high/low spots on the edge of a tool, but this disappears when I start honing on water stones which are maintained flat. Even after all the care I take I sometimes end up with a plane iron or chisel that isn't quite square, but it's never enough to worry about and for planes as long as you can get the edge of the chip-breaker parallel to the blade edge it doesn't matter.

[Patrick Chase]

Patrick, you have so many stones and so many overlap. I know most woodworkers have a lot more stuff than they need, but that's a whole new level, your wife must be very tolerant!

Something I didn't get from that vid is how he gets his irons square in the first place? He hones freehand so how does that make things square if they aren't already.

I'm just getting into power sharpening with my Tormek clone and have been hollow-grinding all my tools, getting rid of the ugly convex bevels Paul Sellers advocates. My trick to getting squareness is to not rely on the jigs or the wheel, when using the "square"-edge jig I micro-adjust adjust chisels/irons with a hammer or hand pressure until I'm getting a square grind. This eliminates sloppy tolerances in the support arm and jig, account for deflection of the arm, and account for the wheel being out of true. Sometimes I get high/low spots on the edge of a tool, but this disappears when I start honing on water stones which are maintained flat. Even after all the care I take I sometimes end up with a plane iron or chisel that isn't quite square, but it's never enough to worry about and for planes as long as you can get the edge of the chip-breaker parallel to the blade edge it doesn't matter.

As I said I'm an irremediable stone ho, and frankly I started accumulating them before I knew what I was doing (see bit on first page about killing a DMT DiaFlat by sheer ignorance. Not my proudest moment).

I can't speak for DW, and I usually use a honing guide to establish my starting straight/square edges, but I know of a couple ways he could have done it that would get him close enough (within tenths of a degree) for the chipbreaker's rotational play:

- Break out the combo-square or engineer's square and iterate, sharpening one side more than the other as needed. In other words, conceptually the same approach you would take to joint the corners of a rectangular workpiece to square with a plane.

- Paint the back of the blade with marking fluid, scribe a perpendicular line with a square, and grind away. You can use this approach to get a decently straight and square edge (close enough to easily true up on a stone) on a bench grinder.

Note that having a hand-honed straight/flat bevel on the leading edge makes it easier to grind square from there on out, since you can gauge your grinding work based on the thickness of that bevel. You know you're straight and square to within pretty decent tolerances when it's uniform all across (the human visual system is good at judging straightness and relative thickness...). I believe that was one of the points of DW's video.

It's probably worth noting that a nontrivial number of cap irons ship noticeably out-of-square (even the oldfangled-but-now-newfangled solid ones). The rotational play in the cap iron to blade interface is there to accommodate grinding tolerances in both parts. It's not like honing guides or hyper-accurate combination squares were cheaply available in Leonard Bailey's day, but they still set their cap irons close back then (per Warren), so it's unsurprising that the basic tool design accommodates enough slop to allow for hand-preparation.

Finally there's nothing wrong with starting "square obsessive" and then loosening up as you go. That's frankly what most people do, including DW (go look at some of his old posts and compare them to what he's doing now). I'm less obsessive than that or that what you describe but still pretty OCD. At some point everybody starts to figure out what does and doesn't matter in woodworking and we optimize our processes accordingly. IMO the ability to close-set the cap iron *does* matter, but there are a lot of ways you can get there - it doesn't require high precision in all of the relevant parts.

[Mel Fulks]

Some of the old books mention the technique on the video ,. especially in regard to working out on a job site with no grinder. That is why so much emphasis was on coarser stones like the Washita. And the method saves a little steel in that no length was lost. We forget how frugal people had to be.

[Warren Mickley]

This video is made by someone, I think, who professes to setting his chip breaker within just a few thou of the plane edge in order to get minimized tearout, yet he totally freehands the grinding and honing process. I find that to be almost comical. There is no way I can reconcile those two things. At least he could have demonstrated the manner in which he is able to get the precision of the edge squareness required to result in the ability to use the closely set chip breaker effectively. It would also have been interesting to see how he would freehand the convex radius on the plane edge. It is funny at the end with the obligatory, albeit invisible, hair shaving demo.

This post makes me think of a 5 year old who thinks it is just too hard to play two notes at once on the piano. Or one who thinks it is just too hard to learn to read. If you don't just throw up your hands and fret you will eventually learn.

I learned to control tear out with a double iron forty years ago, and have never used any honing guide. And the truth is that a plane iron does not need to be perfectly square; it is surprising how many people cannot figure that out. In the 18th century plane irons tapered somewhat in width from the bevel to the back end. You could not just place a square along the edge to check for squareness. But who needed to? The precision is made by skill, not gadgets.

[Stewie Simpson]

The precision is made by skill, not gadgets.

Well stated Warren. Throw those honing guides into the bottom draw and allocate some time refining your freehand skills.

Stewie;

[Matthew N. Masail]

I grind only free hand and use the close chip breaker setting all the time. Never had an issue. A couple practical thoughts:

1. Never grind to achieve a burr, stop about 1/32 mm or even more from the edge. That is easy to do with a light touch, just practice.
2. The stone is flat, it will grind the edge flat, of course a bit of cumber is almost always introduced with plane irons.
3. If you ate a bit out if square, you attach the chip breaker to match, no big deal. Sharpen it to square by altering pressure on the stones, a little each time you sharpen, don't waste steel by grinding it all of.
4. If it is so out of square that you must correct it ( as in you ran out of lateral adjustment or a shoulder plane iron, it's best to grind the edge at 90 degrees to get a square flat bevel, remove as little as needed, the grind the primary back to square using the flat on the edge as a guide. Alternatively just bias your grinding and your stone work which I imagine that what DW was doing.

It's not rocket science. Often I'll use the grinder free hand with no rest and get it good enough, but I do a convex cumber when I do that .

[Stewie Simpson]

Good advice Matthew.

[Pat Barry]

I have to say that with the new year here at Sawmill Creek I am so grateful for the condescending attitudes and name calling that we can all participate in. It makes me sick to think that the so called experts can partake in this type of personal assault. It really hows that they know their craft and can educate as well as pontificate. I cannot state my response with more name calling in return as that is not the way I was raised. I'm so happy that you all with your 40 years of experience and book learning have the capacity to attempt to understand a point of view other than your own. Maybe one of you (P___, W___, ...), folks that do a lot of talking but never show anything substantive, could put together a clean demonstration of the methods to get a square and sharp[ plane blade instead of just remarking how simple it is for you. I'd really like to see you attempt to do something to document your process for the world to see and learn from. I challenge you to do this in the new year instead of being judgmental from your high and mighty self appointed thrones. Honestly, if it were all that simple there would not be the myriad of methods and tools and gadgets to do the job - there would be one method and that would be all that is needed.

Oh yes, I forgot one thing I really wanted to say. It would be great if some of these so called experts who can so easily put forth the verbal attacks and put downs could actually show us their real skills and expertise by showcasing some of their recent, fine woodworking skills to real wow us with action rather than the wordstream. Doing that might actually be productive and inspiring to the rest of us here on this forum. I don't recall EVER seeing anything produced by some of you that are so willing to put forth advice and negative comments.

[Tom M King]

I can't remember ever checking a plane iron for square. I do flatten my stones.

[Stewie Simpson]

It would be great if some of these so called experts who can so easily put forth the verbal attacks and put downs could actually show us their real skills and expertise by showcasing some of their recent, fine woodworking skills to real wow us with action rather than the wordstream. Doing that might actually be productive and inspiring to the rest of us here on this forum. I don't recall EVER seeing anything produced by some of you that are so willing to put forth advice and negative comments.

Pat. Your raising a valid point.

[Matt Bainton]

Gentlemen and ladies, I would LOVE it if we could all be respectful of each other, and NOT use personally insulting language. Even better, if we could have attitudes towards our fellow man that reflect who's image we bear, the equality that we are created in, and in humility NOT have to position ourselves over one another? Differences of skill, technique, or approaches to the same problem don't have to turn ugly or into competition.

---

BACK ON TOPIC: It seems like Atoma 400 or similar will be good to get eventually to make quick work of stone flattening. For now, would 400x loose Silicon Carbide be the correct grit for flattening? How far will 2oz go?

As far as 1k stones go: Shapton Pro 1k is a splash and go contender (but less effective for A2, etc), and though Sigma Power 1.2k might perform better it requires a soak. Chosera 800 seems like it might be better at hard steels AND might match the Snow White in being short soak/splash and go worthy.

Patrick linked to the 1500 grit paper I can use to supplement the Snow White until I can get a 1k range stone.

[Steve Voigt]

For now, would 400x loose Silicon Carbide be the correct grit for flattening? How far will 2oz go?



I use loose grit to flatten oil stones, not water stones, but with that caveat, I think that 400 is nowhere near coarse enough. I use 60-90 grit, and it works very well. Silicon carbide is not like diamond--it breaks down very quickly. Also, don't waste money buying a couple ounces. Go to eBay and type in "60 90 tumbling grit silicon carbide". A pound will cost you $5 plus shipping and last a long time.

[Matt Bainton]

Thanks for the clarification Steve! It makes sense about the difference in media type vs particle size.

[Kees Heiden]

I really don't want to come over "condesending", allthough I'm afraid I am not always succesfull. That said I have to agree that getting a straight enough edge to use the capiron close to the edge, using grinder and honing stones freehand isn't that difficult. I compare the edge to the capiron and I judge the camber in the plane while working. When things are a bit off I correct in that direction freehand on the stones. Here is an older video from me showing the proces with a wooden plane. I don't use squares or jigs when sharpening.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ehSrX1Dx78

[Andrew Pitonyak]

What wet/dry paper grit is equivalent to ceramic 1000?

1000 is roughly 600 to maybe 800 grit on sandpaper in the USA. I have numerous internal documents that I have created, here are some excerpts:

Thereare many different ways to measure abrasives. Wood workers areusually concerned with abrasives related to finishing wood (such assandpaper) and for sharpening tools. Tools are sharpened by rubbingthe tool edge against something (stone, sandpaper, etc) that wearsthe edge to a sharp point.
Sandpaperis labeled with a number. The number provides information about thesize of the abrasive particles on the sandpaper. There are a fewitems of interest that can cause confusion:


There are multiple methods commonly used to identify size of the abrasive particles. Paper labeled 1000 in the USA is roughly the same as paper labeled P2000 in Europe.

There are different standards for coated versus bonded particles.

Most items have a range of acceptable particle sizes so it is common to see conflicting micron sizes in charts.

Micron to micron comparisons are really only relevant with similar types of stones and/or medium. Comparing a 6 micron hard black to a 6 micron diamond is not sufficient because they leave an edge in much different condition.

Eachstandard specifies how the particle size is determined and how manyof the particles may differ in size. I assume that this is why I finddifferent sizes commonly listed for 1000 grit sandpaper. ANSI Bonded 1000 particles has an allowable range from less than 4microns to almost 14 microns, with the majority of the particlesoccurring around 9 microns.


Sandpaper

Sandpaperis referenced by “grit”. Sandpaper is usually graded using one offour scales, a North American scale by the Coated AbrasivesManufacturers Institute(CAMI), a European scale by the Federation ofEuropean Producers Association (FEPA), the Finishing Scale, and theMicron Scale.Table1: Micro-Mesh, CAMI grit, and Micron comparisons.


Method

Identifier



CAMI

No identifier used.



FEPA

Prefixed with the letter P before the grit number.



Finishing Scale

Prefixed with the letter A before the grit number.



Micron Scale

May be followed by the lower case Greek letter Mu (μ).






Inthe USA, they use the CAMI grit designation, and in Europe, the ISA /FEPA Grit designation. While looking for sandpaper with very smallparticle sizes, I almost purchased a bunch of paper labeled using theFEPA designation, but P2500 has a larger grit size than CAMI 1200.
TheFEPA standard has stricter requirements on allowable particle sizes –the particles are more uniform in size and closer to the specifiedaverage size for the FEPA scale. I expect more uniform performance,therefore, for sandpaper graded using this standard.




Table2: Common sandpaper abrasives.


Abrasive

Moh

Comment



Aluminum Oxide

9

Most common woodworking sandpaper. Typically stays sharp until the crystal breaks, leaving another sharp surface. Performance is based on creation and manufacturing technique, so, if one does not work well, try a different one.



Silicon Carbide

9.4

Harder and sharper than aluminum. Better for finishes, paint, metal, and plastics (think auto-parts stores). Not good for wood because the wood is not hard enough to break the crystals so cutting starts fast, the edges become dull, and then cutting is slow.



Ceramics




Dulls slowly, excels at quickly removing large amounts of wood. May find it with names such as Norzon, Dynakut, Regalite, Cubitron, Cubicut, and Aluminum Zirconia.



Garnet

6.5 – 7.5

Dulls quickly and does not break. This produces a very smooth surface, it just takes a long time to do it. This is great for final sanding before finishing, end grain, blotch-prone wood. Has a tenancy to close off pores (burnish) in wood, so stains (especially pigmented stain) penetrate evenly.




<remove a bunch of stuff>


Stones, Waterstones, and JIS R6001 TheJapan Industrial Standards (JIS) Committee established JIS R6001 toset particle sizes, which are used for Japanese water-stones. It ismy understanding that the actual standard does not have a definitionfor values smaller than 1 micron (8000). The average micron size andthe 3M micron size match until sizes are less than 1 micron.


Table6: JIS size comparison.



JIS

AVG μ

3M μ

CAMI



10000

0.6

0.5





9000

0.8







8000

1

1





6000

2

2





4000

3

3





3000

4

4





2500

5

5





2000

6.5



1200



1500

9

9

1000



1200

12

12

800



1000

15

15





800

16



600



600

18







500

24



400



400

30

30

360



360

41

40





320

44



280



280

53

50

240



240

66



220





328559


I attached a grit comparison chart as an XLS document. Sadly, it would not allow me to attach the ODS version (just another file format, but it is the original).

[Derek Cohen]

Gentlemen and ladies, I would LOVE it if we could all be respectful of each other, and NOT use personally insulting language. Even better, if we could have attitudes towards our fellow man that reflect who's image we bear, the equality that we are created in, and in humility NOT have to position ourselves over one another? Differences of skill, technique, or approaches to the same problem don't have to turn ugly or into competition.

---

BACK ON TOPIC: It seems like Atoma 400 or similar will be good to get eventually to make quick work of stone flattening. For now, would 400x loose Silicon Carbide be the correct grit for flattening? How far will 2oz go?

As far as 1k stones go: Shapton Pro 1k is a splash and go contender (but less effective for A2, etc), and though Sigma Power 1.2k might perform better it requires a soak. Chosera 800 seems like it might be better at hard steels AND might match the Snow White in being short soak/splash and go worthy.

Patrick linked to the 1500 grit paper I can use to supplement the Snow White until I can get a 1k range stone.

Hi Matt

As far as a "1000" stone goes, I much prefer the Pro Shapton 1000 to the Sigma Power 1200 on any steel (I have used it on M4). The 1000 is the best stone made by Shapton (I own but have not used the 5000/12000 for some years).
I use two sharpening systems. In these, the alternative to the 1000 is a well worn (10 year old) Eze-lap Fine (600 grit) diamond stone.

The other systems are either Sigma 6000/13000 or Spyderco Medium/Ultra Fine. I use the latter more often as they require the least upkeep, which was the reasoning for purchasing them in the first place.

I hollow grind to 1/64" of the edge (sometimes closer!). I have never experienced a weakened adge as a result of this. Some do not like hollow grinds. That is their choice. For myself, my sharpening method is built around a hollow, which I freehand on. The less the amount of steel at the microbevel end, the faster and easier the honing. This is also important since, when the amount of steel is minimised, the honing media becomes less critical. This became apparent when I began using the Tormek about 10 years ago, and was the reason I switched to the cbn wheels.

Regards from Perth

Derek

[Mike Holbrook]

I skimmed a good deal of this thread but my suggestion to the OP would be to buy a grinder. I have many of the stones mentioned, quite a few of the diamond plates....but since I found a way to hollow grind by hand I do not use them very often, I struggled with a Tormek and stones for years, not getting the results I was looking for. A good grinder and stone or CBN wheel can do the job in much less time than trying to do it by hand against a stone or plate. The better stones and CBN wheels can also do the job with very little risk of heat issues, none with a little practice. I have found it very frustrating to sharpen hand tools on stones, simply I believe, because the work goes too slow.

I would encourage the OP to go to Derek Cohen's Blog and read some of his written material on sharpening pertaining to grinders and CBN wheels. Another frequent poster here, for many years, was David Weaver who kept telling me to just do it on a grinder. Finally I saw the light. A hollow ground edge is much easier to maintain. I now do most of my maintenance, day to day, sharpening on a couple waterless very hard "polishing" stones. The edges I am maintaining only touch the stones along a paper thin line on each side of the edge which means I only have to remove the barest minimum amount of steel to get things sharp. The two polishing stones do not require water/oil or constant flattening which reduces the work even more. I think guys new to sharpening hand tools would save themselves a great deal of grief by starting out developing grinder hand skills. Wood Turners do considerably more sharpening of even harder steels than "flat" woodworkers do, so do green woodworkers and chair makers. All the guys who have to sharpen that much and often do it with grinders for a reason, it's just much easier. I wish I had figured that out sooner. Joel at Tools For Working Wood wrote an article, June 2008, for Fine Woodworking which also explains this concept.

Dang Derek is always heading me off at the pass!

[Brian Holcombe]

As I said I'm an irremediable stone ho, and frankly I started accumulating them before I knew what I was doing (see bit on first page about killing a DMT DiaFlat by sheer ignorance. Not my proudest moment).

I can't speak for DW, and I usually use a honing guide to establish my starting straight/square edges, but I know of a couple ways he could have done it that would get him close enough (within tenths of a degree) for the chipbreaker's rotational play:

- Break out the combo-square or engineer's square and iterate, sharpening one side more than the other as needed. In other words, conceptually the same approach you would take to joint the corners of a rectangular workpiece to square with a plane.

- Paint the back of the blade with marking fluid, scribe a perpendicular line with a square, and grind away. You can use this approach to get a decently straight and square edge (close enough to easily true up on a stone) on a bench grinder.

Note that having a hand-honed straight/flat bevel on the leading edge makes it easier to grind square from there on out, since you can gauge your grinding work based on the thickness of that bevel. You know you're straight and square to within pretty decent tolerances when it's uniform all across (the human visual system is good at judging straightness and relative thickness...). I believe that was one of the points of DW's video.

It's probably worth noting that a nontrivial number of cap irons ship noticeably out-of-square (even the oldfangled-but-now-newfangled solid ones). The rotational play in the cap iron to blade interface is there to accommodate grinding tolerances in both parts. It's not like honing guides or hyper-accurate combination squares were cheaply available in Leonard Bailey's day, but they still set their cap irons close back then (per Warren), so it's unsurprising that the basic tool design accommodates enough slop to allow for hand-preparation.

Finally there's nothing wrong with starting "square obsessive" and then loosening up as you go. That's frankly what most people do, including DW (go look at some of his old posts and compare them to what he's doing now). I'm less obsessive than that or that what you describe but still pretty OCD. At some point everybody starts to figure out what does and doesn't matter in woodworking and we optimize our processes accordingly. IMO the ability to close-set the cap iron *does* matter, but there are a lot of ways you can get there - it doesn't require high precision in all of the relevant parts.

The only thing I have learned from this thread is that you are in need of some Jnats!

Hehehehe.

[Patrick Chase]

I would encourage the OP to go to Derek Cohen's Blog and read some of his written material on sharpening pertaining to grinders and CBN wheels. Another frequent poster here, for many years, was David Weaver who kept telling me to just do it on a grinder. Finally I saw the light. A hollow ground edge is much easier to maintain. I now do most of my maintenance, day to day, sharpening on a couple waterless very hard "polishing" stones. The edges I am maintaining only touch the stones along a paper thin line on each side of the edge which means I only have to remove the barest minimum amount of steel to get things sharp. The two polishing stones do not require water/oil or constant flattening which reduces the work even more. I think guys new to sharpening hand tools would save themselves a great deal of grief by starting out developing grinder hand skills. Wood Turners do considerably more sharpening of even harder steels than "flat" woodworkers do, so do green woodworkers and chair makers. All the guys who have to sharpen that much and often do it with grinders for a reason, it's just much easier. I wish I had figured that out sooner. Joel at Tools For Working Wood wrote an article, June 2008, for Fine Woodworking which also explains this concept.

Dang Derek is always heading me off at the pass!

+1 to Derek's article about CBN wheels - That's what finally brought me to the light (though I still like to work with coarse stones when I have the time).

Also +1 to Joel's grinding article in FWW, though I personally don't bother with crowned wheels as he suggested since I don't grind to a burr. Also if you go the CBN route you don't have that option at all, but then again CBN wheels run cooler than even the 3X ones he recommended.

[Patrick Chase]

The only thing I have learned from this thread is that you are in need of some Jnats!

Hehehehe.

My wife would probably get them anyway in the resulting divorce...

[Kees Heiden]

Also +1 to Joel's grinding article in FWW, though I personally don't bother with crowned wheels as he suggested since I don't grind to a burr. Also if you go the CBN route you don't have that option at all, but then again CBN wheels run cooler than even the 3X ones he recommended.

I have never understood the recomendation to crown the grinding wheel. So I make my Norton 3X wheel flat and am happy with the result. Crowning the wheel seems a waste of good ginding material to me.

[Derek Cohen]

I have never understood the recomendation to crown the grinding wheel. So I make my Norton 3X wheel flat and am happy with the result. Crowning the wheel seems a waste of good ginding material to me.

Hi Kees

The crowned wheel works very well. I used this method when I had white wheels.

The point of the crown is to steer the bevel (freehand) and grind more precisely. It helps avoid unnecessary grinding at the sides of a wide blade, which is more likely to occur if the wheel is out-of-square or has been very coarsely surfaced. One is also vulnerable to dub the edges when freehanding an even hollow on a flat face.

The Tormek is ground flat, as is the CBN wheel (which comes this way). The Tormek must be perfectly flat because it uses a blade holding guide that runs parallel to the face of the wheel ... which is why the original CBN wheels (that were not perfectly flat) caused problems (freehanding on them would not be as big an issue).

Regards from Scotland

Derek

[Kees Heiden]

I'm afraid I still don't understand :D
I usually don't grind to the edge but look at the new hollow and how close (very close) it gets to the edge, adjusting as neccesary. I also move the iron left and right continuosly. Overall I don't have a problem with the flat wheel, as flat as it is of course.

[Patrick Chase]

I'm afraid I still don't understand :D
I usually don't grind to the edge but look at the new hollow and how close (very close) it gets to the edge, adjusting as neccesary. I also move the iron left and right continuosly. Overall I don't have a problem with the flat wheel, as flat as it is of course.

Moskowitz recommends a crowned wheel to avoid heat concentrations at the corners, not for control. This is explained in a sidebar on the second page of the article (I just went and looked at it).

It's a real issue. If you look at the DW video that somebody linked earlier in this thread you can see from his sparks that he's doing a lot of work along the left edge of the wheel. That's potentially flirting with disaster because if he tilts the tool too far it will lead to increased grinding pressure and therefore heat concentration, because all of the normal force will be concentrated on the wheel's corner instead of across the surface. You can get burning even with a relatively light touch that way if you're also working the corner/edge of the tool where effective thermal mass and conductivity are at their worst. Crowning the wheel makes it harder to get into that situation in the sense that you have a wider range of safe angles to work with.

[Mel Fulks]

All of these things can be helpful but there is a difference between the techniques that require acquired skill and the tecniques that are useful without much skill. Saw a guy carving some stuff the other day BY HAND! Guess he just can't afford a CNC machine.

[Pat Barry]

Moskowitz recommends a crowned wheel to avoid heat concentrations at the corners, not for control. This is explained in a sidebar on the second page of the article (I just went and looked at it).

It's a real issue. If you look at the DW video that somebody linked earlier in this thread you can see from his sparks that he's doing a lot of work along the left edge of the wheel. That's potentially flirting with disaster because if he tilts the tool too far it will lead to increased grinding pressure and therefore heat concentration, because all of the normal force will be concentrated on the wheel's corner instead of across the surface. You can get burning even with a relatively light touch that way if you're also working the corner/edge of the tool where effective thermal mass and conductivity are at their worst. Crowning the wheel makes it harder to get into that situation in the sense that you have a wider range of safe angles to work with.
Great feedback Patrick - maybe you could provide a link to your own video demonstrating the proper way to do this? I'm sure we will all be thoroughly engrossed by it and sincerely appreciative.

[Steve Voigt]

Pat, I'm all in favor of people posting their work, but this has to be the all-time record for the pot calling the kettle black. You constantly argue with people about the correct way to do things, what type of shooting board is best, and on and on. Have you ever posted a single photo of your work, here or anywhere?

Let's recap your contributions to this thread.

First, you referred to David's video (a very fine video, by the way; contra some here I cannot find anything to criticize) as "almost comical," "basically just a load of hooey," and that "he must get paid by the minute" (I can say for sure that David doesn't make a dime from them).
Then you lashed out at others for criticizing you, and demanded they produce videos, after you had just made fun of David's. Surely even you see the irony here? Kees actually took you seriously and posted his video; I notice you didn't bother to thank him or acknowledge him. Instead, you continue to hound others, demanding videos.

I think that's an accurate summary; did I miss anything? Is there anything substantive you've actually added to this or any other thread? If not, maybe you could just sit back and try to learn something, instead of insisting that elementary woodworking skills are impossible. If you had taken the time to read some of the responses, you would see that they actually answered all your questions, despite a (justifiably) sharp tone.

[Pat Barry]

Pat, I'm all in favor of people posting their work, but this has to be the all-time record for the pot calling the kettle black. You constantly argue with people about the correct way to do things, what type of shooting board is best, and on and on. Have you ever posted a single photo of your work, here or anywhere?

Let's recap your contributions to this thread.

First, you referred to David's video (a very fine video, by the way; contra some here I cannot find anything to criticize) as "almost comical," "basically just a load of hooey," and that "he must get paid by the minute" (I can say for sure that David doesn't make a dime from them).
Then you lashed out at others for criticizing you, and demanded they produce videos, after you had just made fun of David's. Surely even you see the irony here? Kees actually took you seriously and posted his video; I notice you didn't bother to thank him or acknowledge him. Instead, you continue to hound others, demanding videos.

I think that's an accurate summary; did I miss anything? Is there anything substantive you've actually added to this or any other thread? If not, maybe you could just sit back and try to learn something, instead of insisting that elementary woodworking skills are impossible. If you had taken the time to read some of the responses, you would see that they actually answered all your questions, despite a (justifiably) sharp tone.

You are absolutely correct about Kee's video. I watched it twice, thought it was well done, and am very grateful thhat he posted it and I do sincerely apologize to Kees for not saying so earlier, so good on you for bringing this to my attention.

As regards my point with respect to certain experts here - not calling you out on this because you have posted some of your own work - I stand behind my comments 100%. I'd like to see them put up or shut up.

As regards my own work - yes I have posted it in the Projects forum, just not in this forum because I felt it was not neander enough to satisfy the crowd here. My work consists of using all the the tools I have, whether corded or not, to do my work. Note recently a posted a Christmas gift project I completed recently titled "pizza peels for Christmas" in the Projects forum - feel free to view it and to critique it as you see fit. I suuppose I coud have posted it in the Neander forum but like I said i used more than just Neander techniques to build them. Previous to that I posted a an end grain cutting project that i made using cut-off scraps from my workbench project, and prior to that I posted my workbench project also on an SC forum, thanks for asking. I'm sure you can do a quick search and find them. In fact - feel free to let me know your critique on those projects as well.

I don't work all that quickly but I do actually do woodworking for a purpose so I apologize if the volume of my own work isn't on par with Brian's, or Derek's or Steven's for example.

I don't just sit on the fence and throw snide comments in peoples directions, in fact I sincerely believe that the overwhelming number of posts of I have done in my 5 + years as a member / contributor here at SC have been entirely positive - I'll leave it to you to search them all up and do the statistics. In fact go ahead and publish your findings when you do so.

I do perceive in your own response above maybe just a hint of condescending tone and frankly I've had it with that sort of thing from many responders (not all by the way, in fact its a very limited few), but that's precisely why I pointed out the lack of substantive woodworking from some of them.

Once again, my apologies to Kees - I hope you see this Kees and accept my gratitude and apology for not replying sooner.

[Kees Heiden]

Hey no need for apologies! I'm glad you liked it.