davebray
Established Member
Thanks for the feedback Wizer.
I think I will get the DMT XXC.
Cheers
Dave
I think I will get the DMT XXC.
Cheers
Dave
Disaster with a trend diamond stone
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Peter Capon
Member
I bought a Eze-Lap 250/600 and it works perfectly but I needed something coarser to cut some poorly sharpened plane blades so I ordered a 150/400. This worked fine for a while but the 150 side stopped cutting metal it just polished it. I tried clean the stone with hot soapy water, kerosene, and even brake cleaner and it still won't cut metal hardly any swarf, whereas the 400 side cuts like a dream loads of swarf. Contacted the supplier and they said return it and they will give a full refund. They said this is unusual and had not had this problem before so it's probably a one off. Other than that diamond stone are definitely the way to go. I have a 1000/8000 whetstone that I use for the final edge.
Eric The Viking
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Apparently excessive pressure can "liberate" the diamond chips from the surface.
I think I was once told that the chips are spread on the surface, followed by an electroplating process to build up metal around them to keep them in place. Physical force can crack the plating surrounding the chips and let them break loose.
I buy the cheaper sets, as I don't really use them for sharpening woodworking tools, and I have found the coarsest plates have the shortest life. I assume loss of diamond is the reason.
The scruffy old pair I keep in the kitchen for the kitchen knives* seem to go on forever, despite being used wet, dry and with/without washing-up liquid. The constant factors are that I tend to use quite light pressure (as with all abrasives, let it do the work as much as possible, and clean the abrasive surface often), and that it's done by eye and feel rather than any sort of jig. But even so, the coarse plate has dulled-off compared to the fine one, which seems to go on forever.
See how you get on with your replacement, but try being as gentle as possible, with a lot of water lubrication (to carry swarf away). If you must make heavy strokes, do them when pulling the edge across the plate, rather than pushing it. Decades ago, when I first encountered a diamond plate, the friend who owned it told me he kept a container of water with Fernox central-heating corrosion proofer in it (usual dilution), so that his tools didn't rust. I've never done that, but it certainly worked for him. nowadays I wouldn't know which formulation to choose, anyway!
E.
*we don't have excellent knives, but I manage to usually keep a decent edge on one Richardson, which everyone else in the family is under strict instructions not to play with!
I think I was once told that the chips are spread on the surface, followed by an electroplating process to build up metal around them to keep them in place. Physical force can crack the plating surrounding the chips and let them break loose.
I buy the cheaper sets, as I don't really use them for sharpening woodworking tools, and I have found the coarsest plates have the shortest life. I assume loss of diamond is the reason.
The scruffy old pair I keep in the kitchen for the kitchen knives* seem to go on forever, despite being used wet, dry and with/without washing-up liquid. The constant factors are that I tend to use quite light pressure (as with all abrasives, let it do the work as much as possible, and clean the abrasive surface often), and that it's done by eye and feel rather than any sort of jig. But even so, the coarse plate has dulled-off compared to the fine one, which seems to go on forever.
See how you get on with your replacement, but try being as gentle as possible, with a lot of water lubrication (to carry swarf away). If you must make heavy strokes, do them when pulling the edge across the plate, rather than pushing it. Decades ago, when I first encountered a diamond plate, the friend who owned it told me he kept a container of water with Fernox central-heating corrosion proofer in it (usual dilution), so that his tools didn't rust. I've never done that, but it certainly worked for him. nowadays I wouldn't know which formulation to choose, anyway!
E.
*we don't have excellent knives, but I manage to usually keep a decent edge on one Richardson, which everyone else in the family is under strict instructions not to play with!
OK, what you're seeing is a matter of poor grading and monocrystalline diamonds (which at least a short while ago were the cheapest type - either type works fine, though -that's a discussion for another time).
What happens with electroplate hones is that the large diamonds in the group stick up and they don't wear off, they get pulled off. This is true for DMT and not just trend.
As far as I know, trend is a chinese-made hone and other than being slightly flatter than the $25 8x3 milled diamond hones on ebay, I'm not sure what advantage it might have as I'm using a chinese-made hone that's several years old.
No worries on your first one. WD-40 is no threat to electroplate - trend pushes their honing fluid - my opinion - because they want to take something cheap ( a mixture of mineral spirits and naptha) and make a gigantic margin on it. Sort of like their plates. If a plate loses a section of plate without having something that reacts with the plate itself, then it's defective.
Diamonds bedding in is a matter of what occurs when you use plain cast iron, they stick in the softer surface and skid across the harder (your tools), but they sit on nickel electroplate and don't dig in - the slowing down is them coming off. That will continue to occur over time and the diamond hone will become slower than an equivalent waterstone (like a shapton 1k). I you want to use one long term, the trick is to get one that's more coarse than you think you want (e.g., if you want something like a 1200 stone, then an ezelap 600 is a good place to start. It'll be like a 300 stone when you first get it, but settle in to much finer pretty quickly).
For most tools, a slurried oilstone will cut faster than a diamond stone, and something like a fine india much faster. Only when you get to really high hardness or a complex alloy will that change and the reality is that in the cycle of actual use, the complex alloys just aren't that much better (often worse).
Think of ice (super hard steel) vs. cork. It's not totally accurate to say that, but let's say it is for conceptual purposes.
If you have a surface of stones glued with hot glue to it and you take a big block of ice (or even polished hardened steel), it will slide across the stones and get scratched some, but they can't penetrate in.
If you take a piece of cork and run it across the stones, they'll get stuck in it and the glue won't hold on strong enough and they'll leave in the cork.
pressure is one thing - it can slow down a diamond hone, but it doesn't usually remove the well bedded diamonds. Laminated steel in japanese chisels or old blades will accelerate things because the soft part of the tool will grab the diamonds and tug them each time it goes by (the super hard layer will skate across the tops of the diamonds and be abraded, just not as deeply).
Eric The Viking
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Possibly so, DW, but your comments are useful nonetheless!
Looking at the MSDS between trend lapping fluid (which they push over WD 40, in my opinion, because you can get WD 40 inexpensively).
* it's what we call mineral spirits over here, and a slow drying naptha (at least that's what I gather the modification of the naptha is - so that it doesn't flash off and leave the plate right away).
* Look at the SDS of WD-40, it's more or less light paraffin oils and napthas. I haven't used trend honing fluid, but I have mineral spirits and naptha - you can get an idea of what the expensive stuff will work like using a mix of the two, but without being a chemist, I'd guess the naptha will flash off.
Of course, if you use WD-40, you'll never have a problem and if the stone seems slow, it's not the WD-40 - it's that the stone is slow. If the fluid ever dries a little bit on a diamond hone from lack of use, the solution is simple (probably for both). Put a little bit more on the next time you use the hone and it will cut into itself and clean off just from use.
Long story short, they're both made of inexpensive petroleum products, not very much different. They had a youtube video up touting how much better it was than stuff like WD40 because it's thinner feeling. I posted their SDS in the comments and they took the video offline the next day. Of course, there's no proof that that is related, but I did ask the question about why it was so expensive. It's easy on youtube just to make comments like that disappear without notifying the poster (I wouldn't have done anything about it, anyway)
Norton does the same thing to some extent over here, but the price isn't as extreme (they package a good quality plain white mineral oil in bottles, and at some point in the past, must've made a comparison to woodworkers of other oils that still oxidize, stink and perhaps change - leading people to believe there's something drastically different about their oil. The SDS allows you to go see the CAS number for the oil and just buy a gallon of it elsewhere...
...or in my case, I bought a gallon of oil, and then later found out it was the same spec. A pint of norton oil usually costs about the same as a gallon of the same oil used for commercial kitchen equipment maintenance, and once it's inexpensive, you'll find all kinds of uses for it - like mixing with beeswax 50/50.
* it's what we call mineral spirits over here, and a slow drying naptha (at least that's what I gather the modification of the naptha is - so that it doesn't flash off and leave the plate right away).
* Look at the SDS of WD-40, it's more or less light paraffin oils and napthas. I haven't used trend honing fluid, but I have mineral spirits and naptha - you can get an idea of what the expensive stuff will work like using a mix of the two, but without being a chemist, I'd guess the naptha will flash off.
Of course, if you use WD-40, you'll never have a problem and if the stone seems slow, it's not the WD-40 - it's that the stone is slow. If the fluid ever dries a little bit on a diamond hone from lack of use, the solution is simple (probably for both). Put a little bit more on the next time you use the hone and it will cut into itself and clean off just from use.
Long story short, they're both made of inexpensive petroleum products, not very much different. They had a youtube video up touting how much better it was than stuff like WD40 because it's thinner feeling. I posted their SDS in the comments and they took the video offline the next day. Of course, there's no proof that that is related, but I did ask the question about why it was so expensive. It's easy on youtube just to make comments like that disappear without notifying the poster (I wouldn't have done anything about it, anyway)
Norton does the same thing to some extent over here, but the price isn't as extreme (they package a good quality plain white mineral oil in bottles, and at some point in the past, must've made a comparison to woodworkers of other oils that still oxidize, stink and perhaps change - leading people to believe there's something drastically different about their oil. The SDS allows you to go see the CAS number for the oil and just buy a gallon of it elsewhere...
...or in my case, I bought a gallon of oil, and then later found out it was the same spec. A pint of norton oil usually costs about the same as a gallon of the same oil used for commercial kitchen equipment maintenance, and once it's inexpensive, you'll find all kinds of uses for it - like mixing with beeswax 50/50.
AESamuel
Established Member
I don't like using any kind of lubricant while sharpening. It seems counter intuitive to me to lubricate when I'm trying to abrade something, unless its final polishing.
I see a sharpening fluid purely as a way to carry swarf away to promote a clean stone and keep the abrasive clear for sharpening efficiency.
I first used glass cleaner, as suggested by many others, but every brand I tried caused rust. Same goes for water with detergent. I also tried lapping fluids, and though they do work. However, many evaporated too quickly so it was difficult to remove the swarf and I would have to add more after sharpening just for cleaning.
What I use now for diamond stones, ceramic waterstones - and scary sharp when the mood takes me - is a corrosion inhibitor additive for water. It seems expensive at first but as it is a concentrate which dilutes into water, it actually works out the same price as glass cleaner.
It's light as water, does t affect sharpening speed and I've never had a problem with rust. In fact I put a small puddle of the water with additive on a plane iron and left it for days. No rust, and the puddle eventually just evaporated.
I see a sharpening fluid purely as a way to carry swarf away to promote a clean stone and keep the abrasive clear for sharpening efficiency.
I first used glass cleaner, as suggested by many others, but every brand I tried caused rust. Same goes for water with detergent. I also tried lapping fluids, and though they do work. However, many evaporated too quickly so it was difficult to remove the swarf and I would have to add more after sharpening just for cleaning.
What I use now for diamond stones, ceramic waterstones - and scary sharp when the mood takes me - is a corrosion inhibitor additive for water. It seems expensive at first but as it is a concentrate which dilutes into water, it actually works out the same price as glass cleaner.
It's light as water, does t affect sharpening speed and I've never had a problem with rust. In fact I put a small puddle of the water with additive on a plane iron and left it for days. No rust, and the puddle eventually just evaporated.
I've never experimented across the board, but there are some cases where the lubricant makes the stone behave differently. For example, a washita (my favorite thing in the world, practically) once settled in will cease cutting with water - no more black appears on a stone.
WD40, however, and with a heavy hand, the stone never stops cutting.
On diamond hones, I find WD40 useful, but it's not essential as long as the stone isn't caked up. If the steel is hard, the stone isn't caked, etc, the steel should skid across the diamonds without presenting any problems. Not sure which works faster in theory - the diamonds cut so deep that a thin fluid doesn't seem to slow them down from it. On other stones, like a japanese waterstone, the stone will continue to cut with water, and then cease to do it dry. I have no idea what the explanations for all of these things are and don't want to wade into figuring out the why as long as the what can be repeated.
Long story short, either way is fine (with or without lubricant) on a diamond hone. As work gets more coarse, the thing that makes a crystolon so much faster than diamond hones is that the cutting pattern is closer to optimal, they cut everything, and in an oil bath, the particles and steel are gone - as you say - they remove the waste from the process and at that level (grinding), it's necessary.
I have just about every imaginable stone from any main system (synthetic waterstones, probably 40 of them at this point even though I don't use them, synthetic and natural (From two different continents) oilstones and japanese natural stones all the way down to what would've been a grinding stone in japan. Below the fine finish stones, the japanese natural stones just aren't that great, and it was a surprise to find that setting up and maintaining the japanese tools is faster on a synthetic oilstone rotation finished with a natural oilstone than it is with japanese stones.
I shouldn't downplay how mediocre the japanese options are below about 4000 grit in natural stones - they suck big time.
WD40, however, and with a heavy hand, the stone never stops cutting.
On diamond hones, I find WD40 useful, but it's not essential as long as the stone isn't caked up. If the steel is hard, the stone isn't caked, etc, the steel should skid across the diamonds without presenting any problems. Not sure which works faster in theory - the diamonds cut so deep that a thin fluid doesn't seem to slow them down from it. On other stones, like a japanese waterstone, the stone will continue to cut with water, and then cease to do it dry. I have no idea what the explanations for all of these things are and don't want to wade into figuring out the why as long as the what can be repeated.
Long story short, either way is fine (with or without lubricant) on a diamond hone. As work gets more coarse, the thing that makes a crystolon so much faster than diamond hones is that the cutting pattern is closer to optimal, they cut everything, and in an oil bath, the particles and steel are gone - as you say - they remove the waste from the process and at that level (grinding), it's necessary.
I have just about every imaginable stone from any main system (synthetic waterstones, probably 40 of them at this point even though I don't use them, synthetic and natural (From two different continents) oilstones and japanese natural stones all the way down to what would've been a grinding stone in japan. Below the fine finish stones, the japanese natural stones just aren't that great, and it was a surprise to find that setting up and maintaining the japanese tools is faster on a synthetic oilstone rotation finished with a natural oilstone than it is with japanese stones.
I shouldn't downplay how mediocre the japanese options are below about 4000 grit in natural stones - they suck big time.
(Coarse synthetic waterstones suck hard, too - the water will never be good at carrying coarse swarf and large particles away. They are garbage - absolutely unworkable - compared to a norton medium crystolon in an IM 313 and there's no way to make up for the advantage that mineral oil on the crystolon provides).
clogs
just can't decide
be lost without mine.....bought mine in the States years ago......
I only use water (flooded) never been a prob......
the main reason for changing from oils stones was the MESS......
my oil stones are only used for tickling stanley blades....they are all outta shape anyway....
I only use water (flooded) never been a prob......
the main reason for changing from oils stones was the MESS......
my oil stones are only used for tickling stanley blades....they are all outta shape anyway....
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