Hi everybody,
I had posted a few days ago about sharpening chisels with sandpaper and
having trouble with the sandpaper loosing it's grit too quickly.
Yesterday, I recieved my order from Lee Valley for their sharpening
combo ($35) that has a white grinding wheel, a felt wheel and a stick
of green compound.
After using the white wheel to establish an angle, I was able to move
from 220 to 2000 grit paper with only 8 - 10 stokes per paper. I think
that my problem before was that I was using the sandpaper to try to
establish the angle.
After running through the sandpaper grits, I moved back to the grinder
and used the felt wheel/green compound. I was very impressed with the
results - I've never used a chisel that was so sharp.
I was able to take a really beat up 1" chisel, put a razor sharp edge
on it in under 10 minutes. I can now get shavings that you can almost
see through from cross grain cuts in ash.
Anyway, for anyone that wants to get started in sharpening, I've spent
about $45 on the LV kit, a can of spray adhesive and a few packs of
sandpaper - WELL worth the money to get such great results.
Mike
Also, after hollow grinding on the wheel, you only need to sharpen the
"outsides" of the hollow. Meaning: Don't worry about getting the whole
face of the chisel flat, but just the leading edge and tail. Even
quicker. Tom
Mike wrote:
> Hi everybody,
>
> I had posted a few days ago about sharpening chisels with sandpaper and
> having trouble with the sandpaper loosing it's grit too quickly.
> Yesterday, I recieved my order from Lee Valley for their sharpening
> combo ($35) that has a white grinding wheel, a felt wheel and a stick
> of green compound.
>
> After using the white wheel to establish an angle, I was able to move
> from 220 to 2000 grit paper with only 8 - 10 stokes per paper. I think
> that my problem before was that I was using the sandpaper to try to
> establish the angle.
>
> After running through the sandpaper grits, I moved back to the grinder
> and used the felt wheel/green compound. I was very impressed with the
> results - I've never used a chisel that was so sharp.
>
> I was able to take a really beat up 1" chisel, put a razor sharp edge
> on it in under 10 minutes. I can now get shavings that you can almost
> see through from cross grain cuts in ash.
>
> Anyway, for anyone that wants to get started in sharpening, I've spent
> about $45 on the LV kit, a can of spray adhesive and a few packs of
> sandpaper - WELL worth the money to get such great results.
>
> Mike
"Mike" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> Hi everybody,
>
> I had posted a few days ago about sharpening chisels with sandpaper and
> having trouble with the sandpaper loosing it's grit too quickly.
> Yesterday, I recieved my order from Lee Valley for their sharpening
> combo ($35) that has a white grinding wheel, a felt wheel and a stick
> of green compound.
>
> After using the white wheel to establish an angle, I was able to move
> from 220 to 2000 grit paper with only 8 - 10 stokes per paper. I think
> that my problem before was that I was using the sandpaper to try to
> establish the angle.
>
> After running through the sandpaper grits, I moved back to the grinder
> and used the felt wheel/green compound. I was very impressed with the
> results - I've never used a chisel that was so sharp.
>
> I was able to take a really beat up 1" chisel, put a razor sharp edge
> on it in under 10 minutes. I can now get shavings that you can almost
> see through from cross grain cuts in ash.
>
> Anyway, for anyone that wants to get started in sharpening, I've spent
> about $45 on the LV kit, a can of spray adhesive and a few packs of
> sandpaper - WELL worth the money to get such great results.
>
That's great. Everybody has their own quirky method of sharpening.
Personally I like to use a cheapy diamond faced 'stone' . The set of three
grits is very cheap, then I have an extra fine for when I want an extra fine
edge. I couldn't be doing with a lot of sheets of paper and glass and
adhesive.
What I miss is that in the old days my oilstones were always slightly
hollowed out so I could always easily put a slightly convex edge on a plane
blade so that there were never corners to make visible marks on a face.
Tim w
"Mike" <[email protected]> wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
> Hi everybody,
>
> I had posted a few days ago about sharpening chisels with sandpaper and
> having trouble with the sandpaper loosing it's grit too quickly.
> Yesterday, I recieved my order from Lee Valley for their sharpening
> combo ($35) that has a white grinding wheel, a felt wheel and a stick
> of green compound.
>
> After using the white wheel to establish an angle, I was able to move
> from 220 to 2000 grit paper with only 8 - 10 stokes per paper. I think
> that my problem before was that I was using the sandpaper to try to
> establish the angle.
>
> After running through the sandpaper grits, I moved back to the grinder
> and used the felt wheel/green compound. I was very impressed with the
> results - I've never used a chisel that was so sharp.
>
> I was able to take a really beat up 1" chisel, put a razor sharp edge
> on it in under 10 minutes. I can now get shavings that you can almost
> see through from cross grain cuts in ash.
>
> Anyway, for anyone that wants to get started in sharpening, I've spent
> about $45 on the LV kit, a can of spray adhesive and a few packs of
> sandpaper - WELL worth the money to get such great results.
>
> Mike
>
As a side note, woodmagazine.com has a short video on how to sharpen chisels
using a grinder, sandpaper and a buffing wheel.