We mostly agree that our turning tool's edges ought to be sharp and without serrations, the bevels smooth and even. We do not all agree on how sharp, how smooth and in what form the edge and bevel should be. Furthermore, the ways and means we woodturners use to sharpen tool edges and smooth their bevels are not agreed on at all, to put it mildly. :)
In my simple view, (ignoring grinding) sharpening is a sort of continuum of whetting > honing > stropping > buffing/polishing. Where we woodturners stop off in the sequence varies, but whether necessary or not, isn't a well honed and polished tool edge that's not friable a good thing? A soft, fine grained, lubricated abrasive moving smoothly and slowly away from an edge fixed in the desired geometry should be good for doing this and the Tormek seems ideal. Except that it's not affordable for every turner, and that's a formidable exception regardless of what you count important.
I don't read the Tormek users group and I don't own a tormek, but I wonder if more affordable devices have been purpose made in some of your shops. I've run a dry 120 grit stone slowly backward. I've run an old motorized true wet grindstone. I've run wooden wheels and discs charged with emery cake, I've run rubberised wheels and I've rubbed tool edges on surface plates smeared with diamond dust. None made an edge that cut my finger like a gouge sharpened on a friend's Tormek.
What makes the Tormek so special and so well thought of by so many of us? Have any of you made something that's 'just as good' for private use? I don't mean knockoffs or plagiaries. Is there no substitute for a Tormek?
Turn to Safety, Arch Fortiter