Sharpening - I'm sorry!

[Craigus]

So uh, yeah. This will go down well. I've done some searching but you can imagine the outcome of that.

I'm not looking for anyone to tell me what they do or why I should use one method or the other.

I currently use 'scary sharp' or whatever you want to call it with wet & dry on a flat tile and glass cleaner, whilst it is good and I can get a decent edge and I could carry on with it, I don't want to. I have a very small space to work in which makes having to stop and sharpen a pain as I need to pretty much clear all my work to make space to sharpen, so I want to make it as hassle free as possible. Frankly I'm sick of either having to fix down the paper and having it rip, or let it hold with water which I haven't found to work very well and many ripped sheets, keeping a supply of paper on hand, cutting it up... I've decided diamond stones will be simpler for me and less hassle to 'set up'.

99% of my sharpening is plane irons and chisels. Most of the time sharpening is just to bring an edge back from being a bit dull rather than any serious flattening, so I think I am looking for 2 stones for this then use a leather strop with honing compound to finish off?

Are any of the cheaper stones any good or is DMT really the only way to go? Will 400 and 1,200 do for for chisels and planes?

Sorry, again.

 

[RobinBHM]

Off we go

 

[bugbear]

BugBear

 

[Zeddedhed]

I've got a double sided 400/1000 diamond stone from Axminster and that's what I use now. I mainly work in easy timbers - Oak, Iroko, Maple, Cherry, Walnut and sometimes beech and it's been good enough for me. I've been accused of having an 'agricultural approach' to sharpening before, but it gets my irons and chisel sharp enough to pop hairs on the back of my arm and thats good enough for me.

 

[marcros]

So uh, yeah. This will go down well. I've done some searching but you can imagine the outcome of that.

I'm not looking for anyone to tell me what they do or why I should use one method or the other.

I currently use 'scary sharp' or whatever you want to call it with wet & dry on a flat tile and glass cleaner, whilst it is good and I can get a decent edge and I could carry on with it, I don't want to. I have a very small space to work in which makes having to stop and sharpen a pain as I need to pretty much clear all my work to make space to sharpen, so I want to make it as hassle free as possible. Frankly I'm sick of either having to fix down the paper and having it rip, or let it hold with water which I haven't found to work very well and many ripped sheets, keeping a supply of paper on hand, cutting it up... I've decided diamond stones will be simpler for me and less hassle to 'set up'.

99% of my sharpening is plane irons and chisels. Most of the time sharpening is just to bring an edge back from being a bit dull rather than any serious flattening, so I think I am looking for 2 stones for this then use a leather strop with honing compound to finish off?

Are any of the cheaper stones any good or is DMT really the only way to go? Will 400 and 1,200 do for for chisels and planes?

Sorry, again.

i would snap up one of the cheap Trend ones on ebay and give them a go. see what you think to the method. On the other thread, it appears that they have a coarse and a fine side http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/DIAMOND-WHETS ... SwT4lWTKPf

 

[MIGNAL]

I have a double sided one for a few years, very much like the Trend. It was probably manufactured in the same place. Mine is more like 320G and 600G. I'd never tried diamond plates before and it was primarily bought for sharpening card scrapers. Like other diamond plates it cut aggressively for the first few weeks. I actually found that an advantage. It's still being used, so it's hardly complete junk. Unfortunately I've never used the more expensive plates so I can't compare.

 

[YorkshireMartin]

Craigus, I use Eze-lap 2" x 8" stones. They are OK but the external dimensions of the stones are not uniform, so if you're making a mount, be prepared to be flexible.

I got £2 worth of sapele offcut from a local yard, 1" thick by about a foot square. Planed it up and routed it. Space for three stones, a large section of leather for honing and a couple of slots at the top to rest chisels. Sealed it with osmo topoil as I use water as a lubricant. I used the little rubber feet off the bottom of the eze-lap stones to stop the mount shuffling around on the bench. Oh and I didnt fix the stones down as I want to be able to rotate them.

It works fine. Stones cost about £100 for 1 each of 250, 400 and 1200 grit. Leather was 4mm full hide from ebay, an offcut and it cost me about £3 posted. I use green rouge (10k grit) on the leather. The whole thing is portable and stable to work on.

I use the above for chisels and plane irons.

Careful with DMT, whilst they are supposedly very good, I'm certain I read somewhere that some of the stones are plastic with a diamond coating...don't quote me on that though.

 

[mrpercysnodgrass]

For twenty five years I used a 6" grindstone, two DMT stones, corse and fine and a thick piece of leather glued to a block of wood rubbed with honing compound. I got edges sharp enough to deal with the the most difficult of grains. Last year I got seduced into buying a Tormek T7. It gives me beautifully sharp edges but to be honest with you its a bit of a phaff so I now end up waiting until all of my chisels are blunt and then spend a couple of hours sharpening them all in one session. The only real advantage to the Tormek is, it is impossible to fuxxk up the temper.
If I were you I would purchase two or three 8" DMT stones at a cost of £120 - £180 and a nice thick piece of leather, you won't go wrong and they will last you a lifetime and save you a lot of money and phaff.
P.S. I have not discarded my DMT stones, they are now about 25 years old and work just as well as when I bought them. Someone mentioned the Axminster double sided diamond stone, I also have this but it is not a patch on DMT.

 

[Graham Orm]

I've got a double sided 400/1000 diamond stone from Axminster and that's what I use now.

+1

I've tried them all. This works as well as anything and cuts the steel very quick. I also strop on leather with aluminium oxide paste, but that's optional, the diamond stone is plenty good enough.

 

[BearTricks]

I go up through the grits on wet and dry then finish on a Japanese ice bear whetstone from Axminster. Then just touch up on the stone when needed.

To be fair the stone does wear away quickly. But it was only about £30 which is nothing compared to the amount that some sharpening systems cost.

Sent from my LG-H815 using Tapatalk

 

[Graham Orm]

I go up through the grits on wet and dry then finish on a Japanese ice bear whetstone from Axminster. Then just touch up on the stone when needed.

To be fair the stone does wear away quickly. But it was only about £30 which is nothing compared to the amount that some sharpening systems cost.

Sent from my LG-H815 using Tapatalk

I had a period on wet stones, but got fed up of the mess and spent more time flattening them than sharpening.

The thing about keeping a tool sharp is that it needs to be touched up often. A double sided diamond stone and WD40 make this quick and easy with minimal mess and the stone never hollows.

 

[Zeddedhed]

I've got a double sided 400/1000 diamond stone from Axminster and that's what I use now.

+1

I've tried them all. This works as well as anything and cuts the steel very quick. I also strop on leather with aluminium oxide paste, but that's optional, the diamond stone is plenty good enough.

I forgot to add that i also give them a quick rub on the leg of my Lederhosen (in other words a bit of old leather belt glued to lump of dead tree. I use a mystery block of yellow stuff that says Flexcut on it. I think it's a honing paste lump)

 

[Sgian Dubh]

Sharpening can be as simple or as complex as you want to make it. For simplicity, I suggest you consider an old fashioned two sided oilstone, coarse and fine will do for 95% of most work. Here's a link to a Norton stone from Axminster at about £35, perfectly good for general sharpening and blade maintenance: http://www.axminster.co.uk/india-oilsto ... oil-403604

All you'll need extra is an oilstone box, and some 3 in 1 oil for when the 'honing oil' runs out. The box might take an hour to make if you don't have much in the way of equipment. Incidentally, there's nothing wrong with the other suggestions you've received, but I think simplicity for the sharpening process is generally a pretty good way to go - I've been doing it 'simple' for over forty years, and never noticed my planes and chisels underperform, and nor has anyone else that I'm aware of. Slainte.

 

[Adam9453]

ITS have their double sided ultex diamond stones on offer at the moment and they're a great buy

 

[Halo Jones]

Tried waterstones for 3 or 4 years and they were good but then I bought a set of new chisels and looked at the hollow in the waterstones and said "no thank you"

I then bought the eze lap diamond plates that Paul Sellers recommended.

Now... they don't give as nice a finish on my chisels but everything stays flat and I just whip out the diamond plates and sharpen and strop. They still cut very nicely and I sharpen more often because it is easier, so everything is in a perpetual state of pretty sharp. Therefore I think I will stick with the diamond plates. For now..........

Carry On......

 

[skipdiver]

Sharpening can be as simple or as complex as you want to make it. For simplicity, I suggest you consider an old fashioned two sided oilstone, coarse and fine will do for 95% of most work. Here's a link to a Norton stone from Axminster at about £35, perfectly good for general sharpening and blade maintenance: http://www.axminster.co.uk/india-oilsto ... oil-403604

All you'll need extra is an oilstone box, and some 3 in 1 oil for when the 'honing oil' runs out. The box might take an hour to make if you don't have much in the way of equipment. Incidentally, there's nothing wrong with the other suggestions you've received, but I think simplicity for the sharpening process is generally a pretty good way to go - I've been doing it 'simple' for over forty years, and never noticed my planes and chisels underperform, and nor has anyone else that I'm aware of. Slainte.

Agreed. Got a couple of oilstones-one of which was left in a shed of a house i moved into and one i bought when i was an apprentice. Sharpening seems to have become some kind of dark art that requires all sorts of expensive gizmos but i've just stuck with what i was taught at 16 and it's served me well enough. Like you, i've also been doing it 'simple' for 40 years.

 

[BearTricks]

I go up through the grits on wet and dry then finish on a Japanese ice bear whetstone from Axminster. Then just touch up on the stone when needed.

To be fair the stone does wear away quickly. But it was only about £30 which is nothing compared to the amount that some sharpening systems cost.

Sent from my LG-H815 using Tapatalk

I had a period on wet stones, but got fed up of the mess and spent more time flattening them than sharpening.

The thing about keeping a tool sharp is that it needs to be touched up often. A double sided diamond stone and WD40 make this quick and easy with minimal mess and the stone never hollows.

Which brand of diamond stone/which grades of coarseness would you recommend?

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[Penfold]

I use a concrete block, seems to work well and is cheap.

 

[MIGNAL]

400/ 1,000 (1200) + a strop will suffice for virtually everything. I'm not saying it's the ultimate but it should be sufficient to get the job done. There are many ways to go about it. I used to hand grind at 100G and micro bevel at 8,000G. Nothing between the two. That worked perfectly well too.
As for the brand of diamond stones, I think that was part of the OP's original question i.e. are the cheaper diamond stones good enough? I would say that the double sided stone that I bought is. I'm just not sure how it compares to the DMT's or how long it will last.

 

[Doug B]

I've used cheap diamond stones but found them unsatisfactory, so about a year ago bought a couple of DMT stones from http://www.buybrandtools.com/acatalog/D ... Bench.html I waited until they had an offer on them (they regularly have offers it was just a case of waiting till the offer related to DMT stones) & have been very pleased with how they've performed