Help With Sharpening

Darrell Feltmate's site -- one of the good ones - start there.

at my grinder setup as well.http://woodwork.pmccl.com/Business/productsbusiness/turnedwood.html Then tell everyone what you have now, Grinder, Grit of wheel, Wheel Size, Tables jigs etc so they can offer assistance.

It's a little tough if they don't know what you have. Other people may have the same equipment -- or struggled with similar and be able to point you in a better direction.

If you need to work with what you have (i.e. No money unlike the rest of us rich sods) let us know that too.

If you can afford new equipment -- let me know I will test it for a few months...

Hmmmmm...... the roughing gouge is one of the easiest tools to sharpen. I don't know the tru grind jig but I am guessing that you can put the end of the handle into it? If not, you need a different jig or you need to make one. If so, run the thing out until you have matched the bevel (or if you have screwed it up, about 45 degrees). The easiest way to see this is to put a light on one side of the wheel and get your eyes on the other side. The light shining through makes this adjustment easy. The lights which come with grinders are of no real use. Get one with a long arm which is adjustable. The $10.00 kind at the big box stores work ok.

Then just rotate the tool on the wheel. It is your responsibility to keep the cutting edge perpendicular to the tool by the amount you grind at a particular place -- if you want it perpendicular.

That said, I grind my roughing gouge so that the wings are well back of the leading edge. There are advantages and disadvantages to doing this.

The plus -- in the center of the gouge it works like very body else's. If you roll it over, though, and keep the handle perpendicular to the axis of the lathe, you will get a sheer cut. I defy you to tell the results from a sheer cut made with a skew in planing mode.

The minus -- you cannot roll the tool on edge to get right up to a square part on a spindle. If I need to do that I use my 3/8 beading and parting tool.

Now, a number of tools are done the same way -- by setting the angle by indexing the tool handle against a jig. The skews, the 3/8 beading and parting tool, and some folks grind their parting tool that way.

I grind my parting tool by laying it flat on the table of my Wolverine jig and grinding it straight across. I don't use a diamond shaped parting tool (and don't recommend them) so this is easy and fast.

Bill

t> as a learner I am having trouble sharpening gouges particularly the roughing

You are not alone. Sharpening gouges is hard to master without butchering a few ends at first. WillR gave you a good lead - Darrell's site. I saw a wolverine demo a year or so ago and even got to use it. It does a nice job on gouges but Darrell has a home-built plan that works as well. You can probably build one with shop scrap and a few hardware items.

Check his site and give it a try.

Sorry but are we talking about gouges in general or roughing gouges in particular? He said roughing gouge and these are easy. The others are a different beast entirely.

Bill

R> You are not alone. Sharpening gouges is hard to master without butchering a

Hello Tony,

The Tru Grind is a good jig so you should be able to sharpen your tools fairly easy. I generally grind my roughing gouges at a 45 degree bevel with the grind straight across the end. All you need is a tool rest that is set at the right angle and then rotate the tool against the stone to get the angle and a clean bevel. Bowl gouges for outside work and part way down in the inside are good with a 45 degree bevel. About 2/3 of the way down the inside, the 45 degree will no longer work and you need about 65 to 70 degrees to be able to grind across the bottom. Spindle gouges and skew chisels should be ground with about a 30 degree bevel. If your roughing gouge will go in your Tru Grind tool holder, you should be able to set it to give you that straight across grind with a 45 degree bevel. Take a look at Woodcut's web site. I believe you can get a CD movie that will show you how to use the jig. Their web site is:

Good luck, grinding tools is the hardest part of learning to turn.

Fred Holder

As Bill says, the roughing gouge is easy, perhaps the easiest of all, because it's a constant angle.

knowing your circumstances, I will say that I find a low speed 6"grinder to suit my needs perfectly. I have a medium hardness green (SiC?)stone rated 150 grit on it for freshening edges. For a jig, I use theexisting bevel, which I can easily do by following the sequence I use on thelathe of _A_nchoring to a rest (no angles, just a steadying edge), bringingthe heel of the _B_evel in contact with the rotating stone, then tilting thehandle of the tool to _C_ut, though here the result is not a shaving, but aspark running over the top when I have full bevel width engaged. As FrankPain says, don't grind the edge, grind to the edge. The stone is so fine, the touch so light I can get the tactile feedback as the tool meets stone, and the rotation so slow that very little material is actually removed. To change contour on your tools, you'll want a tough, coarse aluminum oxide wheel, though even here the slow speed has its advantage, giving you a bit longer between press and burn times, though some of us still burn metal occasionally because we're not taking proper care.

Of course I'm talking about my mower blades, not my turning tools....