Power grinder vs. power wet sharpening

[kooshball]

I am in the early stages of assembling my sharpening equipment beyond the Arkansas stones that I already have for my bench chisels. I have recently acquired two newish hand planes and intend to keep them properly sharpened.

I have done quite a bit online reading last night and feel that I am up to speed on the popular techniques but need some advice on implementation.

I like the idea of the hollow grind which should (with practice) allow me to do my final honing free hand. I do not have a bench grinder and so I am in the market for one. I do understand that heat is the enemy and ideally the wet sharpeners (like Tormek and its copies) should do the best to keep the heat down. So, is the wet sharpening type system designed to do the hollow grinding and put a final hone on the blade or is it just a more user friendly way to get the hollow grind without burning up the tip? Will a Tormek type system still need to have the tool finished on a fine stone or will it be finished on the leather wheel?

If both systems simply leave a hollow grind that needs to be cleaned up on stones or sandpaper it seems much more economical to buy a variable speed dry grinder and put the money saved into good wet stones.

Please help me understand the applications differences between a dry bench grinder and a wet sharpener for the purpose of sharpening and maintaining plane irons and chisels.

Thanks

 

[Mike Davis]

I don't have a Tormek system, but it is my understanding that the Tormek wheel is capable of being dressed at different levels of fineness. So, dress at coarse level- rough grind, dress with fine stone - finish grind, hone on leather wheel, done.

With a dry grinder you rough grind, some are set up with two wheels so one could be finer or could have either leather wheel or felt buffer.

I like a belt sander. I can use anything from 36 grit to 2000 grit. Flat grind or hollow grind or even convex grind. Belts are quick and easy to change and last a long time.

 

[Tarhead]

If you are serious about using a regular grinder this FWW article is very good:
http://www.finewoodworking.com/SkillsAndTechniques/SkillsAndTechniquesPDF.aspx?id=30590
I use(d) this technique for initial bevel and big chip repairs and then progress through wet-dry sandpaper on glass or stones.

Keep your eyes open for a used Tormek. They last forever and pop up regularly on Craigslist with accessories for cheap. I just last week grabbed an older model with updated universal support, straight tool guide, scizzors guide, long and short knife guide, truing tool, brand new grading stone and brand new tube of honing polish. All for the asking price of $150.00. The stone had never been graded so the owner hated it. I don't think it had an hour of use.

After playing with the Tormek yesterday, I still need to use my fine stones for flattening the backs and for removing the burr. The grading stone works very well for smoothing and roughing up the wet stone.

 

[CDPeters]

David -

Me being a cheapskate and all :gar-Bi, I followed an article I found on the web to modify one of these HF 8" Wet / 6" Dry grinders to be a Tormek clone. I've tried to find a link to the article, but so far am unsucessful. If I find it, I'll repost. The unit is basically useless as is, but with an added index bar and a better table for the 6" dry grinder - it works acceptably well.

So my current sharpening modus operandi is to wack nicks and square up (i.e. coarse grinding) on the 6" dry wheel - being careful not to overheat. Then I go to the 8" wet wheel using some shop-made jigs to flatten the back (side of the wheel) and hollow grind the edge. This puts a pretty decent edge on, but to really tweek it up, I take a few passes either on a diamond hone plate or on a very fine whet stone by hand. I have found I can do all my chisels and plane irons this way (up to 2 or 3" wide). The planer and jointer knives still go to a shop for the time being.

Is it the best? No. But it gives me acceptably sharp edges and did not cost me a small fortune to do.

C.

 

[CDPeters]

Found it! Click on the picture to go to the web page describing the mods. The HF unit is currently $62.49. I picked up mine for around $55 with a coupon.

 

[eyekode]

I can't answer your question because I have never used a Tormek but I will give you a data point:
I have the woodcraft 8" slow speed grinder. After building a tool rest I am happy with this solution to make a hollow grind on my chisels. I then take it to an Arkansas stone and really there is very little material that needs to be removed to polish the edge. After that I go to a strop. I can go back to the strop for a razor sharp edge a number of times before I have to go back to the stone(s).

The strop definitely gives me a better edge. It is sharp enough to pare end grain pine with my 1" chisel with very little pressure and zero tear out. My chisels do beautiful things on rock hard oak end grain too .

Now for the negatives:
* I am not impressed with the edge straight off the hard arkansas stone.
* My use of the strop must create a slight convex edge because after using the strop to touch up the blade a couple times it takes too much effort to raise a wire edge from my hard arkansas stone. I end up taking 1-2 swipes on the india stone first and then moving back to the arkansas stone.
* I think oil stones cut too slowly (the fine ones that is).

My next move will be a sypderco stone due to some great reviews on sawmillcreek.

I used to use a jig (Veritas Mk II) on sandpaper. The only thing I miss is how fast the sandpaper cuts. I also think I can make a more flawless edge using jig + sandpaper. But when I was using sandpaper I would have one blistering sharp plane/chisel at a time and all my other ones needed to be sharpened. Now without a jig I have slightly less sharp tools but I keep them all sharp all the time. I don't miss the jig so I don't think I would appreciate a tormek.

Salem

 

[merrill77]

I spent many hours trying to get all my various chisels and plane blades in good working order using only stones and scary sharp. I never did achieve the level of sharpness I desired.

Then I got a Worksharp 3000 for xmas. Within a few minutes of setting it up I had my first chisel sharpened and honed to perfection. With the addition of some rough-grit wheels, I had every plane blade in my shop re-ground to the angles I wanted. Everything in my shop stays very sharp now. I couldn't be happier. Even after adding the wide-blade attachment, it still cost much less than the base Tormek...and easier to use, I'd say. With a little hand-made jig, I can do my 15" planer blades on it, too :> I'm hoping to get the new scissor/knife attachment this year :>

 

[Ken Massingale]

I spent many hours trying to get all my various chisels and plane blades in good working order using only stones and scary sharp. I never did achieve the level of sharpness I desired.

Then I got a Worksharp 3000 for xmas. Within a few minutes of setting it up I had my first chisel sharpened and honed to perfection. With the addition of some rough-grit wheels, I had every plane blade in my shop re-ground to the angles I wanted. Everything in my shop stays very sharp now. I couldn't be happier. Even after adding the wide-blade attachment, it still cost much less than the base Tormek...and easier to use, I'd say. With a little hand-made jig, I can do my 15" planer blades on it, too :> I'm hoping to get the new scissor/knife attachment this year :>

Yep, I can't say enough good about the Worksharp. :icon_thum

 

[BrianInChatham]

I recently picked up a 2nd hand Tormek from another forum member and all I can say is wow! You need to be sure to true the grinding wheel properly (eg. take your time about it) but once that's done it does an amazing job remarkably quickly. What Mike said above is correct- you can dress the stone to 600 grit or 1000 (IIRC), takes about a minute or so.

 

[kooshball]

As luck would have it, a friend of mine has a worksharp 3000 that I was able to pick up this evening and borrow and this really changed my whole game plane (at least for blades 2" and less). I spend 1.5 hours this evening and brought all my bench chisels up to perfect mirror sharp condition at exactly the intended bevel. I also brought a 40-year old, beat up #5 jack plane iron back from the dead and got it to make some silky thin shavings.

The only question I have is how well will this work for long blades due to the differences in velocity across the diameter of the sand paper?

This is only one first-hand data point but this machine more than met my expectations and as quick and easy as it is to use, it would be used often enough to keep everything sharp, all the time.

 

[merrill77]

The only question I have is how well will this work for long blades due to the differences in velocity across the diameter of the sand paper?

Works just fine, far as I can tell :> I picked up the wide-blade accessory, which allows you to work from the top and you can move the blade all around.

 

[PND]

Grizzley sells two sizes of the Tormek clone for around $100. I have the smaller and am happy with it although it probably takes less to make me happy than it does some folks (who consequently do better work). I believe the Griz-mek is on sale.

Phil