power sharpening vs hand sharpening

[David Gendron]

For that price, i don't think you make a mistak! What is the adventages of the 8" over the 10" weels?

[Joel Moskowitz]

I think a power strop is more likely to destroy a scissors used for hair than sharpen it. The reason is that strops have give and when you sharpen scissors what you are trying to do is create very crisp edges on the blades. Professionals are very picky about their scissors and AFAIK professional scissor sharpening machines use hard abrasives and many barbers use special diamond stones (scissors are commonly surgical stainless which is tough to do with many traditional means.

Do some google searching before you commit to a power strop or talk to someone who sharpens scissors professionally. I could be wrong.

I personally think all consumer wet grinders are way too slow to merit consideration.

[David Gendron]

Joel, what are your suggestions on a power sharpening tool?

[Sam Takeuchi]

...temptation...rising...

[Joel Moskowitz]

Joel, what are your suggestions on a power sharpening tool?

I don't have one. If you read my FWW article on grinding I can easily put a hollow grind to a wire edge in a minute or two (including rest setting, wheel dressing, and turing hte machine on etc) then a minute or two honing. inital prep - flattening the tip of the back (more than that is not only a waste of time but potentially detrimental) takes under 5 minutes or the manufacturer gets yelled at. I use diamond stones for tough cases - 1000 grit freshly flattened waterstones for everything else.

The key of course is practice and good technique. The wet grinding machines are all way to slow for me, and while I used a $50 grinder for 20 years I got a Baldor last year. A top of the line Baldor with the right wheels and a dress costs less than a tormak and needed accessories by a lot.

[Justin Cavender]

Okay instead of mail ordering the super fine lapping film all the time what would be a reccomendation for a good water stone for final polishing?

[Wilbur Pan]

The problem I am having is that it takes forever to regrind on paper and the high grit paper isnt available locally and has to be mail ordered

Have you looked at an auto parts store? The local Pep Boys has wet/dry snadpaper up to 2000 grit.

Alternatively, make friends with a local body shop.

[Justin Cavender]

I have 2000 paper but I just ordered some 8000 1 micron and 18000 .3 micron and there is a world of difference escpecially when I plane rock maple wich I use very frequently sharpened on the 2000 grit maple is impossible to sharpen. So I want to repeat my edge without buying $4.00 sheets of paper all of the time.

[David Keller NC]

Justin - I've used King, Norton, and a few others in 6,000, 8,000, and 10,000 grits as a final polishing stone. All are good, adn I wouldn't sweat which brand all that much. Joel sells a number of choices at Tools for Working Wood. Since you already have the flat substrate for paper, you can use some 220 wet/dry paper to flatten the waterstone - it isn't necessary to get a diamond stone for this purpose.

Joel is quite right about the slowness of water grinders. I have a Tormek, and do use it, but if I was doing a lot of grinding (like if I was making tools or was doing a lot of turning), I would have a dry grinder. You can burn the edge on a dry grinder, but the open-grit wheels that Joel and others sell, together with a cup of water to cool the tool down frequently should keep you out of trouble.

[Tri Hoang]

http://grizzly.com/products/8-Grinder-Sharpener/T10097 this is the one I'm looking at and I can buy a scissor knife and axe jig for 55.00 and hopefully learn how to do scissors to pay for it

You need a truing tool for the wheel as well. Without one, you'll find that you don't have a straight edge when done grinding. The straight edge jig that comes with the machine is poorly built and won't align the blade square to the wheel. With add-ons, it may cost twice as much!

[David DeCristoforo]

Fascinating discussion! Using (gasp) power to sharpen you hand tools! For many years, I was one of those who would not "compromise" on this. With great devotion, I insisted on grinding out every little nick on a course water stone. Secretly I always wanted to at least try a power grinder for the initial work. Then, one day few years ago, a friend bought a Tormek grinder to replace the "cheapo" Delta wet grinder he had and I picked the Delta up for a song. I have to say that now I would be lost without it. It makes short work of the initial grinding/honing and from there it's a quick finish on the finer stones. And I have discovered (or have allowed myself to admit) that I much prefer spending my time cutting wood than sharpening!

[Greg Crawford]

I have a friend that uses the same grinder as David. I don't know if Delta still makes it, but Grizzly has one like it, the G1036 http://www.grizzly.com/products/g1036

I've used a Tormek to put a nice hollow grind on some tools, but wide plane blades can come off very crooked (maybe I'm just too uncoordinated), so I don't borrow it any more (showed 'em, huh). I use a 6" POS Ryobi bench grinder with the Lee Valley tool rest and guide http://www.leevalley.com/wood/page.a...=1,43072,45938 and use great care not to blue edges.

If I were to go to a wet stone setup (which I may soon), I would get the Grizzly grinder with the heavy duty tool rest http://www.grizzly.com/products/Opti...ool-Rest/G8987 and use my Veritas jig (an Accusharp is about the same). It would give a good hollow grind, then the final honing on a wet stone, oil stone, sandpaper, ceramic, etc. wouldn't be much work.

My friend uses his Delta for turning tools as well, just using the flat tool rest. And yes, a truing tool for the wheel is a must.

[Paul Grant]

For most hobbyist, a power sharpening system doesn't get a lot of use. Something like a Tormek will cost you quite a few hundred dollars by the time you figure in all the jigs.

Mike

The flip side of that is if you only have an evening or two plus a bit of time on the weekend to woodwork, do you want to spend it sharpening or building ??

[Bill Houghton]

I have a friend that uses the same grinder as David. I don't know if Delta still makes it, but Grizzly has one like it, the G1036 http://www.grizzly.com/products/g1036

I've used a Tormek to put a nice hollow grind on some tools, but wide plane blades can come off very crooked (maybe I'm just too uncoordinated), so I don't borrow it any more (showed 'em, huh). I use a 6" POS Ryobi bench grinder with the Lee Valley tool rest and guide http://www.leevalley.com/wood/page.a...=1,43072,45938 and use great care not to blue edges.

If I were to go to a wet stone setup (which I may soon), I would get the Grizzly grinder with the heavy duty tool rest http://www.grizzly.com/products/Opti...ool-Rest/G8987 and use my Veritas jig (an Accusharp is about the same). It would give a good hollow grind, then the final honing on a wet stone, oil stone, sandpaper, ceramic, etc. wouldn't be much work.

My friend uses his Delta for turning tools as well, just using the flat tool rest. And yes, a truing tool for the wheel is a must.

Delta doesn't list it anymore, so I assume they don't make it. Mine came with a tool rest similar to Grizzly's heavy duty rest. I have found that the wheel glazes up with great enthusiasm, so I have to deglaze it regularly. I've been using one of those carbide sticks, but recently got a Lee Valley diamond-crystals-on-a-stick and am looking forward to trying that out (I have a sharpening party coming up soon).

It's a good tool, but, as others have mentioned, wet grinding is VERY slow.

[Dave Cav]

I use the Lee Valley belt sander/grinder for initial bevel grinding, and a hard felt wheel and green compound for the final hone. It seems to get everything acceptably sharp and is pretty fast. It's also not messy, and didnt' cost a fortune to set up. I have the same setup at school, where the big advantages are (1) speed, and (2) I can show a student how to get an acceptable edge pretty quickly, and then HE can keep the chisels and lathe gouges sharp. The main disadvantage to this system is that it's not particularly portable.

I do use the scary sharp system when I get a "new" plane or chisel, mostly to flatten the back.

I have a couple of waterstones, but I'm not a big fan of them. They are messy, don't stay flat, and since my shop isn't heated, they can freeze. If I decide to go back to any kind of stones they will be oil stones.