Guess I'll weight in with old school, even if you don't want to hear it.
I grind steel. I have been grinding steel for a long time.
I don't just mean grinding a bevel on a 1/4" chisel. I mean making a
1/4" chisel
or any other size I like, from scratch. Or grinding other tools or
knioves or machine parts, whatever i want or need to make from metal.
Grinders 8" and under run at 3600. This is standard and has been for
generations.
10" is better because they take it down some.
But the surface speed is not terrible dissimilar.
Of course you can burn steel. You can burn steel in any number screwups.
Learning to --not burn-- steel is why you came to the party.
Fortunately its not so unforgiving as many people seem to think.
There is scorching, which is not the best, but its recoverable. A tinge
of blue is not reason to cut your own throat, is my point. This is often
a few molecules deep and you are going to hone that away anyway. You
have to screw up worse that that to be unrecoverable.
Being able to remove amounts of steel is what you do if you do screw
up and truly burn a blade. Go ahead and take the next 1/4" off and get
to undamaged steel if you need to.
I like a "snagging" wheel. This is as coarse as it gets, made for
shaping steel during manufacture.
Barring that (snagging wheels are hard to get) the coarsest you can
usually get is 24 or 36.
This is my bread and butter.
I lost access to my 10" grinder so I currently suffer an 8" grinder. I
have a couple of smaller grinders too. 5 & 6". Plus belts and disks of
all kinds and sizes.
I am looking for a 2 X 72" belt grinder if you have one in the corner
unwanted?
The Secret to grinding steel is to grind it. When you don't know what
you are doing at all get some low carbon scrap and grind that. Grind it
boldly and deeply. See how it works for yourself.
Its not glamorous and its not particularly pleasant. But its the only way.
Low speed grinders are just a rich man's attempt to sharpen an already
finished tool. The "gents" approach. Its squidging around the edges and
not going to teach you all that much.
Get a regular grinder and buckle down and teach yourself, if you want to
be accomplished and secure there is no shortcut.
Its how Bob Loveless and Buster Warinski did it too (look em up).
Looks like standard 10" bench grinders start around $400, 2 X 72 belt
grinders higher but not too much. In the Tormek territory and you have a
meaningful grinder not just a prissy toy.
Each knife in this drawer was a design exercise. It was taking
existing designs and adapting them to my own personal preference. Every
detail of every knife was deliberately done, for a reason. As it should be.
I forged then ground every one of them, save one. I did it with
standard grinders.
Low speed grinding would have never got me there. I would still be at it.
http://users.snowcrest.net/kitty/sgrandstaff/images/knifepix/drawer.jpg
yours Scott
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*******************************
Scott Grandstaff
Box 409 Happy Camp, Ca 96039
scottg@s...
http://www.snowcrest.net/kitty/sgrandstaff/
http://www.snowcrest.net/kitty/hpages/index.html
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