Norton Stones or Tormek?

[Dennis Collins]

I am undecided what type of chisel and plane iron sharpening system I want to invest in for my tools. I have always heard great things about the Tormek, (although $$$). Norton waterstones seems to be what the professional use, at least the ones I see on TV or "Thewoodworkingchannel".

I was curious what the pros and con's are for each. I would really hate to buy a Tormek and then realize that I need stones.

Also, are there any concerns with the concave curve the Tormek puts on chisels and plane irons, as compared to a flat surface with stones?

Also does anyone have any experience with sharpening jointer blades using the Tormek jig? Again, you get the concave curve on the blades.

Thanks for you input.

[Brad Olson]

Most guys I know with the Tormek also have a 8000 grit stone to finish with.

My opinion is this...

Unless your edges ever get really bad, the Tormek or Jet or poor sharpening system choices.

I personally go retouch an edge with just a seriet of 800, 4000 and 8000 grit stones in less than 5 minutes. More often, I can do it in 2 minutes or less.

Now if you plan to sharpen turning tools, handcarving tools, scissors, J&P knives, the Tormek or Jet might be a good investment as long as you realize that the edge you get right off the tormek is not good enough for smoothing.

Jeff Farris from STUSA will disaggree with this statement, but every WOODWORKER (and not saleman) usually ends up with a sharpening step after the Tormek for smooth planes and really fine work.

Another problem I have had with Tormek's planes is that edge retention is not as good as flat ground bevels. For example, I hand sharpen my Ashley isles chisels with a 20 degree bevel and have to sharpen the 2X as often with a Tormek/Jet grind vs. a regular flat grind. How do I know this? I know this because when I cut dovetails, I know that I can do a certain amount of joints with a particular chisel before re-honing it. With my 1/2" AI chisel, I do two corners before I get paranoid and re-hone it before it gets too dull. When I have had these same chisels sharpened on a Tormek/Jet, I get on corner done before the same chisel gets too dull for comfort.

Now you may not see this issue if you only dovetail relatively soft woods like Cherry, but this is a significant issue for me when I work with tougher woods and exotics (my primary wood of choice).

I would recommend doing some searches on WoodNet about this issue and I think you'll find that the true hand tool enthusiast adds a final honing step after the Tormek/Jet

[Steve Summers]

Dennis, here is my 2 cents worth of advice. Check out www.shaptonstones.com. These are the water stones I use. 1000 through 15,000 grit. You can start with just 1000-4000-8000 and add more later. Also get the "Side Sharpening" DVD from Harrelson Stanley. He teaches sharpening for both planes and chisles. The stones and techniques work for both Japanese and western tools. I sometimes use a Veritas sharpening jig with the stones.

Have fun!!!

[Zahid Naqvi]

Dennis, I can tell you that for handtools you will certainly need a setup for final honing after you get done with the Tormek. Dennis Peacock has a Tormek and suplements it with waterstones for plane irons and hand chisels. I have seen him sharpen his thickness planer blades on the Tormek to a final sharpness. I think he doesn't retouch his turning chisels after the Tormek either, but for handplanes and chisels he certainly has to hit the waterstones.

I have not used an MK-II but I have heard from some people that it can cover the whole spectrum of sharpening, including the final honing. Perhaps someone who owns one can chime in. I am sure if you search SMC you will find plenty of posts on the MK-II.

[Cliff Rohrabacher]

I use Norton oilstones & I'm a happy camper.

[Mike Henderson]

If you're a hobbyist, the Tormek is way too expensive for sharpening chisels and plane blades. You can sharpen them quite well and quickly with regular water stones and a honing guide like the LV MK II at a fraction of the cost of a powered sharpening device like the Tormek.

I find the Norton stones to be very good. The Shapton stones are good, also, but no better than the Nortons.

If you're going to do more than chisels and plane blades, such as turning tools, I can't give you any advice. I've never used a Tormek for those types of tools.

Mike

[Dan Forman]

In addition to waterstones, you will eventually want a slow speed bench grinder to do the dirtywork. Occasionally an edge will need to be reground, which will taake forever with just stones. The concave surface you mention is generally called hollow grind, the surface of a bevel fresh of the grinding wheel. This is not a weakness, but a benefit, unless too extreme from a small wheel. Most folks like an 8" wheel, which will give some hollow, but not too much.

Dan

[Richard Keller]

Unless you are dropping your chisels, or opening cans of paint with them, there should be no reason to own (theoretically) any grinder at all. That being said, accidents do happen. Myself, I use 220x - 8000x water stones. Very rarely do I break out the grinder. I have chisels that have never touched a machine. This would to me, be a last resort. While a 220x water stone is slower, on the plus side, it's slower. There's no accidental gouges, no "blueing" -- it's pretty fail-safe. I also can't say enough about the 8000x water stone. You will NEVER get an edge that sharp from a machine.

Richard.

[Brad Olson]

I also can't say enough about the 8000x water stone. You will NEVER get an edge that sharp from a machine.

Richard.

I strongly agree with this statement.

BTW, if you have a belt sand you can clamp the sander in a vice and use it to safely grind back damage from dropping a edge tool. I used a ROS to do this once since I don't have a belt sander and it worked suprisingly well.

The proceedure was...
220 grit ROS (or better, a belt sander) to remove damage
220 sandpaper on glass to make the edge consistent.
then onto normal waterstone progression.

[Andrew Homan]

I want to express an opinion different from those mentioned so far on this thread.

It is true that you do not _need_ a Tormek. It's also true that for some woodworking applications, you still need to go up to higher grits than the Tormek can offer.

One way to deal with this is to use Lee Valley green stuff on the Tormek honing wheel instead of the Tormek paste.

I've been using a Tormek since last winter and love it. It gives me a hollow grind that isn't as hollow as a grinder yet hollow enough to make freehand waterstone honing a breeze. I establish my bevels on the Tormek (which brings them up to 1000 grit), then move to a 6000 grit waterstone (freehand), then go to the Tormek honing wheel with LV green, freehand (about 8000 grit?). Then when I return for later honings, I can simply freehand on the 6000 stone and honing wheel, no jigs.

I like sharpening and honing this way. It gives me some speed (freehanding -- no setting up jigs for honing) and when I am establishing a new bevel (with a jog), it goes a lot faster than using a course waterstone by hand (especially with A2 blades). With a 6 month-old baby in the house, my shop time is precious and I appreciate the time saved so that I can put the blades to wood!

Is it necessary? Certainly not. In his sharpening book, Tom Lie-Nielsen recommends several sharpening set-ups and only puts the Tormek in the top-tier set-up. It is expensive.

Note that there are now some similar alternatives -- Jet and Scheppach (imported by Rikon).
-Andy

[Wilbur Pan]

I primarily use waterstones. I recently bought a Tormek, but for these three specific reasons:

1. Grinding out chips in my blades or in used tools I've bought by had was getting to be a drag.

2. I needed a way to reliably sharpen turning gouges (I know, wrong forum), and doing that by hand on waterstones wasn't feasible.

So why didn't I just go out and buy a slow speed grinder and a Wolverine jig? This leads to my last reason:

3. Since the Tormek runs in a waterbath, I don't have to worry about inhaling fine metal and grindstone particles. I also like not having to worry about sparks.

[Eddie Darby]

"Also, are there any concerns with the concave curve the Tormek puts on chisels and plane irons, as compared to a flat surface with stones?"

With the 10" diameter of the Tormek and Jet wheels, the amount of hollow grinding is in the area of 0.0015" or so on a plane blade. Not a whole lot. Some use this slight amount of hollow to control the tool during other sharpening and in controlling the angle of attack in cutting wood. The slight hollow also helps to reduce the amount of time at other sharpening stages, since very little metal needs to be removed.
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If tools are getting dull faster from the Tormek, I would suspect the leather honing wheel for this. If you use it, then use the least amount of pressure possible, to minimize the rounding of edges. This was the main criticism of the Tormek in the Fine WoodWorking article about sharpening.
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I would take into consideration your end goal in sharpening as a starting point for planning your purchases.

I have both the Tormek, and the Norton and Shapton stones. I have high demands on my sharpening, so I go the extra mile. I started out with stones first, then I got the Tormek about 4 years ago. My Shapton stone is the 15,000 x stone to finish the edge, what a stone, and a bit of a luxury item as well.

I stay away from the soft leather wheel approach that the Tormek and Jet offer, since it can lead to a rounded edge on the tool, and hone instead with the sheets of micro-abrasives sold in 15, 5, 1 and 0.5 micron sizes.

If I wanted to get started for very little money up-front I would look into the scary sharp approach, which uses wet/dry sandpaper and a plate glass surface or a granite surface plate. This will do chisels and plane irons very nicely.

I have a lot of gouges, so I got the Tormek to do these mainly, but like any tool I have ever gotten, once you own it, you find other uses for it. I am also happy with the edge I get for planes and chisels with it.

If you do get waterstones, you will need to flatten them. I started out using a sheet of plate glass with silicon carbide particles, then I got the surface plate with wet/dry paper, and now I use DMT diamond stones, x-coarse. A cheap approach to flattening, is to get a cinder block, the kind used in basement construction. They are very flat and do a good job at a low cost.

Here is a link that has a great review of the Jet and Tormek water wheel systems.

http://www.newwoodworker.com/reviews/jettormekcomparo.html

Each approach has it's pluses and minuses, and as you gain more experience you will demand more from your tools and hence your sharpening. See it as a journey.

I am now looking into the new GlassStones from Shapton, so that is my next stop, since I now use A2 steel mostly.

[Andrew Homan]

3. Since the Tormek runs in a waterbath, I don't have to worry about inhaling fine metal and grindstone particles. I also like not having to worry about sparks.

That's one of the reaons I like it, too. If I take a sharpening break, it's actually pleasant to use.
-Andy

[Andrew Homan]

If tools are getting dull faster from the Tormek, I would suspect the leather honing wheel for this. If you use it, then use the least amount of pressure possible, to minimize the rounding of edges. This was the main criticism[/FONT][/SIZE][SIZE=3][FONT=Times New Roman] of the Tormek in the Fine WoodWorking article about sharpening.
[...]
I stay away from the soft leather wheel approach that the Tormek and Jet offer, since it can lead to a rounded edge on the tool, and hone instead with the sheets of micro-abrasives sold in 15, 5, 1 and 0.5 micron sizes.


I find that by using minimal pressure on the honing wheel (like you said), none of the rounding over occurs. It never happened to me, not even when I was unfamiliar with the tool. If this really happens to people, I suspect that they are offering the tool to the wheel at an angle that is too steep in addition to pressing too hard.
-Andy

[Martin Shupe]

Dennis, here is my 2 cents worth of advice. Check out www.shaptonstones.com. These are the water stones I use. 1000 through 15,000 grit. You can start with just 1000-4000-8000 and add more later. Also get the "Side Sharpening" DVD from Harrelson Stanley. He teaches sharpening for both planes and chisles. The stones and techniques work for both Japanese and western tools. I sometimes use a Veritas sharpening jig with the stones.

Have fun!!!

Listen to Steve...

I have Shaptons...1000-4000-8000. I have not tried the "side sharpening", but they work great with the Veritas jig.

Steve, can you tell a difference between the 8000 and 12,000 or 15,000? Those high grit stones are pricey!

[Steve Summers]

" Steve, can you tell a difference between the 8000 and 12,000 or 15,000? Those high grit stones are pricey!"

Martin, depending on the wood and the size of the iron or chisle, yes I can tell the difference between 8000 and 15,000 as a final stone. Does it MAKE a difference at the end of the day, no it doesn't. But the mirror like shine the 15,000 stone puts on a 1" chisle is pretty!!

[Dennis McDonaugh]

My chisels and plane irons are more than sharp enough off the Tormek for most woodworking. Being somewhat anal, I give them a few swipes with an 8000 grit waterstone after sharpening with the Tormek. If you only use your tools and are careful with them you will probably never need a grinder. However, if you buy just one buggered up antique chisel or plane iron a grinder will be an invaluable tool for refurbishing old edge tools.

[Richard Niemiec]

Gee, call me silly, but like Cliff above, I use oilstones, specifically a set of 3 Norton oilstones that came in a plastic rotating case that holds the oil bath; corse, medium and fine (India) stones. Couldn't tell you what the grits are, but I just walk chisels thru the grits freehand, flatten the back, give it a whirl on a buffing wheel and a compound charged leather strop and they're good to go. Takes about 3 minutes or so. Every couple of years I'll re-set the angle with a jig scary sharp wise, but that's about it. I used to worry about mirror finishes, until I read what Tag Frid had to say about sharpening in his book; that's when I bought the oilstones.

Rn