quote:

Originally posted by Ken226:

quote:

Originally posted by djpaintles:

quote:

Originally posted by offgrid:
Suggest to look at the TS Prof K03 guided system. Great single stone system.

several $100,000's of dollars of machine tools and willing to spend $1000's of dollars of machine time on them to make a tool that's not as efficient as a $600 Tsprof 03.

You made alot of assumptions. What if it's just an old guy with alot of time on his hands, using a couple thousand$ worth of machinery?

Like this sharpener, the machine that made it was a homebuild project. I built that CNC from a used Grizzly G0704 mill. I bought that mill for 800$ off Craigslist, and converted it to CNC for about another $800. In 10 years that machine has paid for itself many times over.

The fancy enclosure was from a later project, also a craigslist purchase. I bought the enclosure for a couple hundred dollars and spent 2 days routing and rewiring the machine to fit. I even put in some cool lighting from home depot. I'll admit, when you said 100,000$ in equipment, I was pretty flattered!

It's a hobby. I didn't make this knife sharpener because I need one. To quote my own post from a up above "Im doing this project for the challenge".

Like it says at the bottom of your own post, "this is supposed to be fun". Well, I had more fun building this sharpening system that I would've had ordering one on Amazon.

I applaud your creativity and skills! The shop where I used to work DID have several hundreds of thousands of dollars of equipment and likely wouldn't have done a better job machining than you did with your way cool setup!

My point (perhaps overdone) is that few people are going to have the machining skills and equipment to duplicate your machine and the of all the different guided machines on the market the TSPROF is currently the best.

But anyway Well done on your personal sharpening system you have well deserved pride in what you made.

Next we should talk about stones............ (Check Offgrids Rex121 post)

quote:

Originally posted by djpaintles:.



I applaud your creativity and skills! The shop where I used to work DID have several hundreds of thousands of dollars of equipment and likely wouldn't have done a better job machining than you did with your way cool setup!

My point (perhaps overdone) is that few people are going to have the machining skills and equipment to duplicate your machine and the of all the different guided machines on the market the TSPROF is currently the best.

But anyway Well done on your personal sharpening system you have well deserved pride in what you made.

Next we should talk about stones............ (Check Offgrids Rex121 post)

Thank you!

Of course, I understood and agree with the point you made. Had I not been wanting to make something, that TS Prof would have been my choice.

I will definitely want some better stones. I bought some aftermarket stones made for the Edge Pro, and epoxied them to some 3d printed plastic stone holders.

I just finished and tested the sharpener with these stones, and while the sharpener work great, these stones are mediocre at best.

What stones do you use? The only real requirement is that they are about 6" long. I can 3d print mount blocks to fit almost any size/shape.

I read through the rex 121 post by off-grid. It seems the Cubic Boron Nitride stones are worth the money.

I found these, which are perfectly sized for my 3d printed holders. What do you think?


https://www.gritomatic.com/pro...ava-cbn-for-edge-pro

quote:

Originally posted by Ken226:

quote:

Originally posted by offgrid:
With your machining ability consider copying the TS Prof clamp bar to allow for a single or double clamp. Holding a long knife with a single clamp, not so good! Double clamp option is one of the reasons I bought a TS Prof over the WE. You can purchase the self-centering TS Prof clamps. The clamps won't meet your toolless requirement, believe a better design having the two clamp option. My WE owner buddies who have used my TS Prof also agree.

After I get the WE clamp and get a chance to try it out, I'll consider a dual clamp setup. I'm not sure which WE clamp version they compared the TS Prof clamps to, but the WE gen 3 clamp seems to be quite a bit different than the older gen WE clamps.

The Gen 3 jaws are flexible and have a vertical split to allow clamping of both flat ground and distally tapered blades.

Once it arrives, I'll play with it to determine if there are any issues that need solved.

I'm not sure wich version WE clamps my buddies have, it is not the one you pictured.

Knife pictured is 8 1/2". There's no way a single clamp would support this blade or a longer blade. Supporting a long blade on a single clamp is the gripe of my WE buddies.




I certainly appreciate your machining skills and desire to build your own stuff. Probably a good thing I don't have a CNC mill! I repaired/maintained industrial woodworking equipment. I can look at most any machine design and find fault, hard for me to turn that off. The single clamp on the WE is a hard one for me to overlook I made three changes to the TSProf. The guide rod is two pieces, a few times it loosen on me while sharpening. Thought about squirting blue locktite on the joint, but I occasionally go to friends and sharpen there knives good to keep the long rod in two pieces. Instead picked up a linear bearing solid shaft. The bushing for the guide rod is harden steel. Steel on steel? Really? It was starting to wear. Reamed out the bushing and pressed in a proper bearing/bushing. Replaced the tiny knob/handle with a larger one.

Stones? Depends on what steel you're sharpening. Based on your post regarding frequency of use of the Lansky, the Venev diamond stones will serve you well for Super Steels. Suggest not going over 800 grit with those. If you want a polished edge use Ceramic stones above that, then strops. I regret buying the two higher grit CBN stones. For strops I prefer Kangaroo or Basswood. For non Super Steels Chosera stones are excellent. I don't have lots of experience with different brand emulsions or sprays. A bottle will last for years and it's expensive to be trying a bunch of different brands. Of what I've used the Hand America diamond spray is very good. The spray is a bit messy when applying compared to the emulsions, easy to over spray. I've tried WE's house brand paste prefer Ken Schwartz's emulsion and the Hand America spray, feel I get get more bite with those.

Have Fun!

Thanks for the reply offgrid. From your advice, I ordered a couple higher grit ceramic stoned and some strops for polishing.

I've been touching up the edges on my Shun knives with this new machine. It's been super easy to get them back to that scary sharp state they were in when new. About 20 strokes per side with 3000 grit aluminum oxide and there were shaving arm hairs again.

Both of these knives are a little over 8" long and I've had no issues at all with the clamp. It actually seems to hold these flat ground blades better than some of my much shorter Benchmade knives, which have weird flats, curves and angles like my 940 Osborne. My stones easily reach all the way out to the point, with room to spare.

I have no doubts that dual clamps would hold it more securely, though this one does seem pretty secure. It doesn't feel like there's any chance of it moving. I'll keep using it and see how it goes.

What angle did you sharpen the Shun? Encourage you to push the angle! The knife will tell you if you go too far during use. Knife I pictured is sharpened at 20 degrees inclusive, holds up great.

Also suggest to pick up some of the Rizla paper for standard testing. You get an edge to cross cut that paper, oh my!

quote:

Originally posted by offgrid:
What angle did you sharpen the Shun? Encourage you to push the angle! The knife will tell you if you go too far during use. Knife I pictured is sharpened at 20 degrees inclusive, holds up great.

Also suggest to pick up some of the Rizla paper for standard testing. You get an edge to cross cut that paper, oh my!

I sharpened the Shun to 16° per side.

20° included angle? 10° per side would be crazy sharp, should i be worried about chipping the edge? These edges are like glass, they chip easy.

I'll order some rizla!

I tried it on a gas station receipt. Thinner than notebook paper, but not as thin as cigarette papers.




This knife is 9-1/4" long:

quote:

Originally posted by Ken226:

quote:

Originally posted by offgrid:
What angle did you sharpen the Shun? Encourage you to push the angle! The knife will tell you if you go too far during use. Knife I pictured is sharpened at 20 degrees inclusive, holds up great.

Also suggest to pick up some of the Rizla paper for standard testing. You get an edge to cross cut that paper, oh my!

I sharpened the Shun to 16° per side.

20° included angle? 10° per side would be crazy sharp, should i be worried about chipping the edge? These edges are like glass, they chip easy.

I'll order some rizla!

Yes, 10 degrees per side. Push things! If the edge micro chips or rolls, add a couple degrees.... find how low you can go. I sharpen a few friends kitchen knives/veggie cleavers at 20-24 degrees depending on the steel. Most of the EDC Super Steel knives I sharpen are at 30-35 degrees depending on use. Knifesteelnerds website has a lot of good info/test on edge angle/retention.

Cool you're going to order the Rizla paper!

The Rizla paper is an excellent and inexpensive test for edge sharpness. I ordered mine on Amazon and it came in from a head shop in England. I felt kinda weird with that many rolling papers I wondered if my neighbors thought I was a serious dope smoker! LOL

I really like the OP's 3d printed stone holders for the WE. NICE

In my mind the WE is still the fastest sharpener for smaller blades because you are doing both sides essentially at the same time with the disadvantage being you have to spend twice as much for the stones!

Also the TSPROF requires more space to operate and store ready to use. Both systems have advantages and disadvantages.

There's definately more than one way to skin a cat

quote:

Originally posted by djpaintles:
The Rizla paper is an excellent and inexpensive test for edge sharpness. I ordered mine on Amazon and it came in from a head shop in England. I felt kinda weird with that many rolling papers I wondered if my neighbors thought I was a serious dope smoker! LOL

I really like the OP's 3d printed stone holders for the WE. NICE

In my mind the WE is still the fastest sharpener for smaller blades because you are doing both sides essentially at the same time with the disadvantage being you have to spend twice as much for the stones!

Also the TSPROF requires more space to operate and store ready to use. Both systems have advantages and disadvantages.

There's definately more than one way to skin a cat

Since I started using my 3d printed stone holders I've discovered a slight design flaw. Its way too easy to get a fingertip protruding out past the stone. Not a huge deal on up strokes, but going down it's quite noticeable! I still have my fingertips, but won't need nail clippers for awhile.

I reworked them in cad to a single stone holder, with some finger protection. I'll edit this post with a cad rendering shortly.


I'm gonna print up a few of these for some of my better stones: