A sharpening system letdown

[Gene Michael]

For my birthday, the LOML bought me the combo sharpening system from Woodcraft that includes their slow speed 8" grinder and a Wolverine jig. Right out of the box, the grinder wheels are out of round and have lateral wobble. I'll call their customer service tomorrow, but would like to know ahead of time if this has happened to others and how responsive Woodcraft has been. Also, if I'm being unreasonable - the wobble is about 1/64th inch and the out of round about the same. IMHO, this is too far out of alignment to sharpen gouges, etc. Is this a correct assumption? Any and all comments will be appreciated. :(

[Gordon Seto]

Don't worry, Woodcraft customer service is first class. They have 90 days satisfaction guarantee.

The $80 slow speed grinder is no Baldor; but good value for the price. The quality control is not that great. There is no sense wasting gas for exchange. It is not uncommon to have a bad batch. Open the box and plug the grinder in, if it wobbles try another one.
Expect a little vibration, but not wobble. If you want to improve the steadiness, you can replace the stamped washers with precision ground washers. Or rotate the wheel 1/8 of a turn at a time and re-install, hopefully you will find a location where it balances out. True up the out of round wheels.
Or invest into a Oneway wheel balancer system.
Or replace with better wheels. One of the Norton SG ceramic wheel would cost more than the whole grinder with 2 white wheels.

[Ken Fitzgerald]

Gene,

For the money, the WC slow speed grinder is a good deal. When I got mine I had a problem. One of the nuts that holds one of the grinding wheels on had a problem. The hole drilled and tapped through the nut was not perpendicular to the surface of the nut. You could look at the nut and only about 20% of it's surface was making contact with the washer that goes against the grinding wheel. I was able to locate a replacement at my local Ace hardware. After replacing the nut, the surface of the replacement nut made complete contact with the washer and the wobble/vibration from the grinding wheel was resolved/gone.

Since then I have had no more problems with my grinder.

Good luck!

[robert hainstock]

FOR THE MONEY. There have been several posts of problems out of the box with these machines, but Woodcraft has been excellant, (IMHO) in thier response to thier customer complaints. My grinder has not displayed any of the symptoms I have read on this forum. Maybe someday rhe Chinese will put quality control into thier Mfg. process.:eek::eek::eek:
Bob

[Wilbur Pan]

FWIW, it's not the Chinese that are not implementing quality control. It's Woodcraft's decision to sell a slow speed grinder at the price that they do. You can easily get better quality control on a Chinese made grinder. Just make the decision to pay for the increased quality control, which would then drive up the price that you pass on to the consumer.

[Reed Gray]

1/64 of an inch isn't bad. Turn the grinder on and see how much wobble there is when it is running. Getting better wheels can help, but generally they will need touch up work to run smoothly. This can be done with a diamond dresser, or the Wolvering wheel dressing system. This doesn't take care of the side ways wobble. If you have a platform in front of the wheel, slide your dresser up to the side of the wheel until it just barely touches the wheel. If you have wobble, it will be ticking. Ease the dresser into the wheel, but don't ride the wobble (go in and out with it keeping contact as the wheel turns), gently dress it away. Do this to both side of the wheel. You can also do this to the face of the wheel. After some use, the face of the wheel will need to be dressed again. For some reason, they always seem to go excentric.
robo hippy

[Gene Michael]

Thanks, guys. This is what I love about SMC. No matter what the topic, there are folks who have ready answers and are willing to share them! :D

I called the service number on the manual (the distributor?? it wasn't Woodcraft). Absolutely no help, so I called Woodcraft. BIG help. We're going to swap out grinders for one they'll check before shipping. For my part, I ordered the one way dressing attachment along with a felt buffing wheel and some compound. Anticipation and waiting will be the toughest part of the process.

Thanks again for the excellent advice.