New M-Power Sharpening System

[Dale Critchlow]

Woodworkers Supply has a new sharpening system in the Christmas 2005 catalog. It is called M-Power Precision Sharpening System, Catalog #142-637.

http://woodworker.com/cgi-bin/FULLPRES.exe?PARTNUM=142-637

The tool to be sharpened is held stationary in a cast aluminum jig. The diamond stones are mounted on a second jig. This second jig is moved back and forth along a guide (on the first jig) parallel to the end of the blade being sharpened. It can sharpen to angles of either 25 or 30 degrees.

It comes with diamond stones with grits of 180, 400 and 600. The stones are held in place magnetically so they can be easily changed.

Has anyone had any experience with this system?

The design makes sense to me. It might be particularly useful for touching up the edges. You would probably want to use scary-sharp or some other approach to flatten the back of the chisel/blade and to establish the basic shape of the cutting edge.

Dale Critchlow

[Steve Clardy]

Link doesn't show item.

[Frank Hagan]

I found it at http://woodworker.com/cgi-bin/FULLPRES.exe?PARTNUM=142-637&CARTID=200512173589009057--1


http://woodworker.com/images/ss/142-637.jpg

This is interesting to me ... seems like you would have less chance of rounding off the edges of chisels by sharpening across the face of the bevel rather than pushing the edge of the bevel back and forth on the sharpening surface (stone or sandpaper).

Do diamond stones last for quite a while? Nothing's "forever", but it seems to me they should last a long time.

[Dale Critchlow]

I edited my original note with the correct link.

http://woodworker.com/cgi-bin/FULLPRES.exe?PARTNUM=142-637

I see that Frank found the right address. Thanks Frank.

Dale Critchlow

[Dale Critchlow]

Frank: I have a diamond stone which I have been using for 10 or 15 years to sharpen router bits, etc. It has shown no sign of wear. I do have to clean it with a solvent once in a while.

Dale Critchlow

[Brett Baldwin]

This looks like a nice way to set a bevel quickly but I'm looking in the pictures for something that will keep the blade square to the stone and I don't see anything. The system would be great if it provides a means to keep it square but if you have to do that by hand, I think they need to do some more engineering. Overall a good idea though.

[Dale Critchlow]

Brett: My understanding is that the blade is up against a stop on the left side of the bottom jig. It is difficult to see since the jig is a casting with a coating of some sort so the corners are rounded. Note that his left thumb is pushing the blade to the left and the palm of his left hand is holding it down.

It seems to me that it would be very reproducible.

Dale

[Dale Critchlow]

The following link has a much more complete description of the sharpening system.

http://www.m-powertools.com/products/pss1/pss1.htm

The more I read about it the better it looks. It is a very logical approach. I am seriously considering giving it a try.


Dale

[Brian Jarnell]

Brett: My understanding is that the blade is up against a stop on the left side of the bottom jig. It is difficult to see since the jig is a casting with a coating of some sort so the corners are rounded. Note that his left thumb is pushing the blade to the left and the palm of his left hand is holding it down.

It seems to me that it would be very reproducible.

Dale
Also said it is held by magnet.I would give it a go if I didn't have a Tormek.;)

[Frank Hagan]

I decided to try it ... bought it from Hartville Tool (I've done business with them in the past, and like their stuff, so thought I would buy from them). I'll give a review of it when I get it.

I'm a failure at sharpening things, so keep that in mind in case I don't like it.

I didn't see it anywhere else besides woodworker.com and hartvilletool.com, and the price was the same at both places (although Hartville Tool does have the extra diamond hones at a dollar cheaper than Woodworker.com).

[Mike Circo]

I wonder if you could attach wet/dry sandpaper to a metal plate and replace the stock diamond stones? Then you could go all the way up to 2000 grit.

There has got to be a catch, it just seems to easy and logical.

Someone report please.

[Frank Hagan]

I wonder if you could attach wet/dry sandpaper to a metal plate and replace the stock diamond stones? Then you could go all the way up to 2000 grit.

There has got to be a catch, it just seems to easy and logical.

Someone report please.

I'll try that when I get it. I didn't see finer diamond stones; they do have a coarser grit. The tool is made in England, so perhaps there are other diamond stones that are designed for the thing.

[Jay Knoll]

Frank

I look forward to your thoughts/observations on the sharpening capabilities.

Jay

[Frank Hagan]

Frank

I look forward to your thoughts/observations on the sharpening capabilities.

Jay

I got word that it shipped today, so I should know in about 5 days!

[Frank Hagan]

Well, I'm disappointed with it, but it might be my mood. I'll take another look tomorrow.

First, I'll say that I can't sharpen a thing. I'm horrible at Scary Sharp, even with a $28 jig, $40 worth of sandpaper with 8 different grits, and some very expensive absolutely flat granite (well, OK, the granite was for the house, but at those prices, I kept all the offcuts!) I have never been able to make an edge sharp enough to cut hair off the back of my hands, as attested to by the hairy nature of my hands. Its the main reason I won't go to woodworking shows ... all those nice fellas in their plaid shirts with patches of hair shaved off their hands and arms.

The jig certainly looks nice, with the base, blue aluminum extrusion that gives you 25 and 30 degree angles, three diamond stones and a little instruction booklet. I suspect this would be great for someone tired of the excellent results they get from Scary Sharp, because it does have a few advantages.

The stones are held in by magnets, and it works surprisingly well. The jig fits by sliding in dovetail keyways. There is even a larger base of diamond grit that is intended for you to flatten the backs of the chisels or irons (see the next message for my take on this feature). The main advantage over a rolling jig and the Scary Sharp method is that you can quickly jam another chisel or plane iron in the jig, move the blue aluminum extrusion back and forth, and wear away some of that expensive tool steel. No fiddling with a rolling jig, and measuring how far the cutting edge protrudes.

There is a very small learning curve to keep the tool jammed up against the sliding aluminum extrusion holding the stone, and keeping that extrusion with slight tension toward the non-tool side of the dove tail keyway (there's a bit of slop they warn you about). And the diamond stones do grind away the steel faster than sandpaper.

For that reason, I'll probably keep it. Its at least as horrible as my rolling jig and sandpaper. But it fails at flattening the backs of things, so I'll keep my piece of granite handy. And I guess I will never reach the holy grail of being able to cut a hair off the back of my hand with a tool that I have sharpened.

[Frank Hagan]

The diamond stone built into the M.Power PSS1 base is really too fine to do any serious flattening of a chisel back or plane iron. The first picture shows an iron with magic marker on the back, and then, 30 minutes later, how the edge is still black along the right side. After working on this for a while, I noted a kind of swirl pattern and an uneven feeling in the diamond grit on the plate, so I don't know if there's a quality issue here, or if the base simply isn't flat enough to do the job. I ended up with my piece of granite and sandpaper to flatten the back of the iron.

Once that was done, the cutting edge on this hollow ground plane iron was quickly abraded away by the coarse stone, and then polished a bit by the medium stone, and then got almost nearly sharp with the fine stone. As I have said, there may be some operator error here, as I can't sharpen anything. But I can see that keeping an edge sharp with this system will be a bit faster than with Scary Sharp. But only a bit.

I can't really recommend this tool. If you are like me, and can't really get things sharp with a jig and the required assortment of sandpaper, then I don't think this jig will help you. If you can use Scary Sharp, I'm not sure there's a reason to change.

I think I'll save my pennies for a Tormek or, if I can find it, an industrial 5 HP 3 phase Mega Sharpener system with Turbo Boost. Or a sharpening service.

[Brian Jarnell]

Be careful Frank,you may do yourself some damage if you get the tormek.;)

[Vaughn McMillan]

...And I guess I will never reach the holy grail of being able to cut a hair off the back of my hand with a tool that I have sharpened.
Have you considered using hair conditioner on the backs of your hands? Leaves mine silky soft, springtime fresh, and I can shave it with a butter knife. My tools are still dull, but I feel much better about myelf. :D

Sorry to see you're still not getting things as sharp as you'd like. The main fault I see in this particular system is that the sharpening motion is going perpendicular to the direction the blade will go when cutting. I was always taught that a cutting edge should be honed parallel to the direction of the cut. I'm sure a bunch of Neander guys would know more than I do about this theory (and hopefully will set me straight if I'm wrong), but it was drilled into me by my dad as long as I can remember. Still, this system seems like a logical way to get the initial edge on an out-of-shape tool.

- Vaughn

- Vaughn

[Jay Knoll]

Frank

Thanks for the review, sorry it didn't work out (for you and for me!)

Jay

[Dale Critchlow]

I received my M-Power system last evening and tried sharpening a chisel and a blade from a hand plane. At this point, I am more optimistic than Frank about its viability.

The first thing I noticed is that it will take quite a bit of time to do the initial grinding of the profiles. Once this is accomplished it should be very easy to touch them up in subsequent sharpenings.

I had better luck than Frank with the flattening of the backs of the tools using the stone fastened to the base of the jig. As they suggest in the instructions, I used a marking pen to paint the surface so I could see clearly were material was being removed. Once I started grinding the backs, I could see that I had not gotten them very flat with scary sharp approach I have been using. The results with the M-Power system looked to be very good.

As Frank mentioned, there is a learning curve in grinding the front of the tool. You have to learn to hold the moving part of the jig against one edge of the dove tail guide as you move it. Again, I used the marking pen. It took quite a while to shape the tool to 25 degrees since it was off by a few degrees due to my scary sharp procedure.

The 30 degree grinding went more quickly. The techique they describe for removing the burr or wire from the back of the chisel seemed to work. You simply make swipe on two on the stone fastened to the base of the jig.

The resulting profile of the tool looked very square and uniform. However, my experience was the same as Frank's. It was not sharp enough to shave the hair from the back of my hand. The instructions recommend using a strop to achieve the "ultimate sharp edge". I need to buy a strop or a buffing wheel and some grinding polish to give this a try.

The only real downside I have seen so far is the uniformity of the diamond stones. I suspect that M-Power (which from their web site looks to be a small company) has a quality control problem with the vendor supplying the stones. This is a new product and I assume this problem can be solved. I sent M-Power a note telling them of my observations. I called Woodworkers Supply and they are sending me replacement stones today.

It will take a few weeks of use to really evaluate the system. At this point I am pretty optimistic that it will work well for my rather modest needs. I am building three pieces of bedroom furniture for my daughter-in-law and have quite a few dovetails to cut. I like the idea of being able to quickly touch up the chisels as I work.

Dale Critchlow

[Bill Lewis]

Thanks for the review Frank! I'd have to say were in the same boat, I am to sharpening what my wife is to house plants, she kills them.
I don't have a good sharpening system let alone a good technique. I bought the Veritas roller jig and angle setter may years ago. It's about the best I have, but I still have issues with it.
It'd be nice to own one of those fancy systems, but I don't use enough neander tools to justify the price just yet and whatever I buy has to also be able to do long blades as well. Fast, brainlessly easy, and liquid cooled.