Flattening methods

[Rick Dohm]

For those of you who are always looking for a better/faster way to flatten planes, irons, chisels, etc., I hope some have tried diamond paste on a Kanaban steel plate. I was just trying mine out for the first time, and I wondered how often the paste should be replenished on the steel, whether there are any techniques that work better than others, whether you think it really is any faster that scrubbing on 80 grit sandpaper, and any other suggestions/thoughts you may have based on your experience.

Thanks in advance,
Rick Dohm

[Mark Stutz]

Rick,
Sorry I can' answer your question...I have looked at that system on the TFWW website several times but just haven't pulled the trigger. From the description, Joel makes it sound pretty fast. I would give them a call or an email and find out what thy recommend.

Mark

[Dan Racette]

PM sent to you for your reading pleasure!

[Bob Noles]

PM sent to you for your reading pleasure!

Dan,

Any chance you would cc me on that PM? I have been looking at that method and wondering.

Thanks!

[Tim Put]

I too am interested. Why not post your experience instead of PMing?

[Jim Koepke]

I too am interested. Why not post your experience instead of PMing?

I will third that motion!

jim

[Rick Dohm]

OK, gang. As it turns out, Dan and I are "neighbors" and his PM has nothing to do with advancing this topic. I'm still looking for the group's thoughts on my question. We're not leaving anyone out. :)

Rick

[Dan Racette]

I use the following flattening methods. na na boo boo. Just kidding. No secrets, I was just inviting a newly found creeker, neighbor over!


I have used waterstones for some applications, but have found that PSA sandpaper on granite surface plate to be the most successful for me.

Dan

[Albert Wagner]

I haven't used the diamond paste, but rather standard scary sharp on a granite block. Somewhat unrelated to your question, I find the whole operation is a lot easier with a 2x4 block stuck to the plane blade front with carpet tape.

[Barry Vabeach]

Rick, since no one has jumped in I will offer my 2 cents. I have used diamond paste on Kanaban and have 4 plates and 1 piece of laminate ( for the 1/2 micron because I ran out of plates) - IIRC 1/2 micron, 1 micron, 3 micron and 15 micron and 30 micron. I have the oil based paste. The expert in diamond sharpening is Bill Tindall and he reported that he starts with a blob the size of a small pea and found that it lasts longer than you think because the grit gets stuck to the plate. The major problem he had was that some paste invariably carried over from one plate to the next no matter how well he cleaned the plane iron. I have dabbled with the plates and the paste but I am not a true believer. I have the bad habit of checking the blade frequently during the sharpening and while that isn't too bad using stones or sandpaper, to check it when using the diamond paste you have to wipe a fair amount of paste off the blade. As it is I probably refresh the plate every 3 uses or so, though again it is a small pea sized amount is enough to get some cutting. The paste I use came with a small bottle of oil, and sometimes all I need is a drop or 2 of that and the kanaban gets back to cutting. Due to contamination, I would think you would want at least 3 plates. While in theory you can use both sides, in practice, I think you would have even more contamination issues in that whenever you turn the plate over, whatever was on the bottom will stick to the board that you mount the plate to. Again. I am not a real judge because I didn't stick to it enough to give it a fair trial. Barry

[Tim Put]

I tried it out. I tried a few different substrates:

First I tried maple, it cut but was slow and it sucked up a lot of the paste, meaning it needed more to charge and needed recharging more often.

Next I tried plate glass, it cut still slower than the maple, but of course needed very little to charge it, embedding the grit took forever.

Then I tried plastic film glued to plate glass, it cut nicely, but bubbles and subsequent tears were bothersome (half the reason I wanted to try diamond paste was to get away from the tears associated with scary-sharp).

Next I tried using a piece of steel, in this case a card scraper. This cut the fastest of anything I tried, it made a screeching sound of metal being removed with every swipe.
The only thing I don't like about this one is the expense/trouble of buying sheet metal in my area.

Lastly, I had read about the plates used to lap gems and seen mention of acrylic, not having any acrylic I decided to try polycarbonate. Where do you go to find a perfectly smooth, flat, inexpensive piece of polycarbonate? Why old unneeded CDs of course.
The finest pastes seem to embed too deeply and so cut too slowly, but the coarser grits (>14 micron from the few I tried) work beautifully. Be sure to trim/scrape of the raised rim near the center of the disk before charging, and make sure to charge the shiny data carrying side, not the label side.

I'm considering motorizing it (or making a drill press powered jig) to make myself a poor-man's diamond paste based platter sharpener.

P.S. I tried the finer pastes only on the CDs, on the other substrates I didn't go finer than 14 micron before deciding it could be better. On the steel I only tried 40 micron paste, not wanting to waste too many scrapers.

The mylar backed 0.5 micron CrO paper lee valley sells is still my favorite final abrasive, it's faster than diamond on polycarbonate (though I imagine diamond on steel would be faster) and much more durable than any other sheet abrasive I've used (before this I used scary-sharp).

[Tim Put]

While we're on the subject of flattening tools: I've given up on (at least unpowered) abrasives for flattening plane soles, I did a block plane with loose silicon carbide, with great final results I might add, but it was way too much work, and way too messy. I want to try scraping. Rather than make my own out of a file (not really an option until I give in and buy a grinder), would a carbide tipped paint scraper work?