japanese waterstone

[fraseman999]

Hi Folks,

Whats the saying crawl before you walk, walk before you run.

I just got a little bit carried away with myself. I should have used the Tormek for a few months then tried something more difficult.

I went out and bought myself the waterstone. I was a little bit disappointed to be honest. Put it on the machine and what a wobble! Nothing like the standard stone. Took about 1mm off it. I had to take about 3-4mm off the waterstone before the wobble stopped. Is this normal?

Not an easy stone to use, as it obviously doesn't move very much metal. So i gave a chisel a go that i had done to 1000 and polished. I found that i had to move the micro adjuster by 1/4 turn a few times to get some burr. And i was pleased with the polished look. And i dont know if i did the correct thing but i still finished off on the honing wheel, as i thought that the 6000 paste would put an extra bit off polish on it and took a tiny burr off the back.

Now its only one chisel and i spent a good twenty minutes comparing it with a polished chisel to 1000. Was it sharper Yes it was. Was it £220 sharper. lol.

My past trade was a joiner and for what its worth to anyone thinking off buying a japanese waterstone for most woodworking. The standard set up is sharper than i ever used a blade as a joiner by a mile. If however you are a cabinetmaker and want the extra sharpness then the waterstone is a good buy.

I may be back on next week after i have practiced some more to tell everyone to go out and buy one as they are wonderful. Thats if i have fingers left to type with. These chisels get scary sharp. One wrong move and you have sliced yourself!

Love this machine

John

[Ken S]

Welcome again, John.

My primary reason for purchasing a Tormek was for the grinding function. I had just prepared several chisels for a hand cut dovetail class using water stones.  They needed a lot of work flattening and polishing the backs, let alone the bevel side.  My older hands were quite soar.  The Tormek seemed like a better way than hurting my hands.  It still is.

I also liked the idea of not overheating any more edges with the dry grinder and having my chisels a bit more square.  (i'm sure you have never encountered these problems.

I'm afraid you won't get many replies about the 4000 grit wheel. It's a fairly new accessory, and, shall we say, not terribly underpriced.  I doubt many of us actually have one.

I happen to have bought one.  It was a sale situation at my local dealer. As it was on my list of future hopefuls, I bought it.  It sits pristinely in the box.

I know only one member of the forum who uses the 4000 grit water stone happily and successfully. He uses it in a separate Tormek machine than his regular wheel.  (You really didn't want to hear this, did you?)  In my opinion, that's the way to really use this fine accessory well.

The black stone, which I have used, is a stand alone stone for its functions.  For high speed steel turning tools, drill bits, planer/jointer blades; it does the whole job.  No need to switch back and forth with the regular wheel. Having a separate machine is a lot less pressing with the black stone.

The Japanese wheel is for polishing, just like the 4000, 8000, or higher water stones, diamond powder or "stones", or Arkansas stones.  To use it on a chisel, you first go through the coarse and fine gradings on the regular wheel.  then, if you have only one machine, you must change wheels.

If you are sharpening several blades, you could do all the general wheel work first, and change wheels only once.

Frankly, I find either of those choices more complicated than using an 8000 grit water stone with the blade in a jig set for a slight micro bevel.

I do plan to add a second Tormek unit someday for the 4000 grit wheel.  Until then, unless a special situation arises where I have a lot of polishing to do, the SJ wheel will probably remain in waiting.

I hope you hear from other members who have actually used the 4000 grit stone. Good luck with your new SJ.

Ken

[Herman Trivilino]

I too would like to hear from more users of the Tormek Japanese Waterstone (SJ-250).

I don't have one and don't really see a need for one. 

If I did have one I imagine I would find lots of uses for it.  I tend to be the type who tries to get by with what I have on hand.

If mounted on a 2nd Tormek it would still be necessary to readjust the jig, unless both stones were the same diameter, or you were using the homemade knife rest jig (yes, I think I'm going to give it that name officially) and you had two of those as well.

[fraseman999]

Thanks for the replies,

Ken it may not be what i want to hear, but you are spot on.

But then i found it out for myself after i had bought it!

And i just really wanted to let anyone else know before they spent £220.

I am sure i will still use it as with the new t7 i can change the stone over in 30 seconds.

Thanks

John

[Ken S]

John,

Don't get discouraged.  As strong as the Swedish economy is, you may look back on this and be amazed you bought the SJ-250 for only 220 (sorry, this Yank doesn't know how to type the pound sterling sign).

Keep thinking and doing.

Herman, I don't think adjusting the USB for differences I wheel diameter is actually a big project.  When I first bought my Tormek, I had a terrible time using the angle master.  After i redesigned and "improved" it, I tried using it in good light and found out that the standard approach as shown by Jeff in the videos really works quite well.

Ken

[Rob]

The Japanese stone is meant as a replacement ie alternative to the honing wheel. I have to say, i just don't get it.  Why would is opened £220 replacing something that works fine?

[Herman Trivilino]

Rob, for the leather wheel to be equivalent you'd have to continually add paste, and the Tormek paste is 6000 grit.  The Japanese Waterstone is solid 4000 grit all the way through.  The leather wheel hones and polishes, the Japanese Waterstone grinds.

I couldn't see spending £220 for it either, but then I don't sharpen knives for Sushi chefs.   

[jeffs55]

I have an off brand Japanese water stone mounted on a separate Tormek. It is not necessary at all in my experience and certainly not worth the money. It does put a nice shine on an edge though but so does the honing wheel. I would not recommend its purchase.

[ionut]

Hi John,

The Tormek Japanese 4000 stone is a great stone, walking requires more finesse so running sometimes is easier and will teach you how to walk properly.

First, if the stone was badly wobbly it should have been returned, this is not acceptable in Tormek language.

Second 3-4 mm of truing is humongous for that stone what am I saying here, for any stone, When you true it you have to take less material in one pass  than you use to take from the 220 one even if you have to take multiple passes. I would suggest you to start the truing from the left side of the stone in this way because the diamond tip is closer to the universal support posts when it gets to the opposite side, there will be less vibrations and less chipping on that side than if you would do it the other way around.

This is a polishing stone not a material removal stone, it is supposed to refine the edge form a 1000 setting of the original stone so don't expect any major steel removal as this stone was not designed for that. For polishing is far more efficient than the honing wheel in giving you a 4000 edge, and with no risk of rounding over the edge like it may happen with using the leather wheel if not done properly. The small ridges and valley left by the 1000 abrasive will be quickly levelled to give you a perfect straight edge. If the 1000 grading of the 220 stone is not done properly the honing wheel only will not polish properly the edge and will never be able to get you the straight levelled edge that would be required for a really long lasting extremely sharp edge it will give you more of a rounded spikes edge that has a polished appearance. The 4000 stone will always give you and precise straight polished at 4000 edge.
Now every abrasive will create a burr regardless the size of the abrasive used, the only thing that changes is the size of the burr which is proportional to the size of abrasive used, so if you had troubles with the burr was because of two possible reasons, either you were not really working the edge, or your fingers are extremely sensitive. After a proper 1000 grading and a proper angle set with the 4000 stone you should have not had to work more than 30 seconds on the edge and if you feel a burr after that the burr should be far smaller and weaker than the one left by the graded 1000. I personally have hard times feeling a burr after 4000 stone, but my fingers have a thick skin.

The manual states to not use the honing wheel after the 4000 stone but I would suggest you to use it only not in the same way as you would after the 1000 grading of the original stone. As I said the 4000 will create a small burr or will reduce the 1000 to a 4000 one, and I was able to see it with a cheap small microscope so a bit of honing wheel use will be effective in dealing with it. Tormek claims the honing compound is a mixture of 3, 2, 1 micron aluminum oxide based abrasive, but if you get a dab of it and rub it between your fingers you will feel the grit between your fingers which suggest that either the abrasives are present as lumps in that paste or they are not the claimed size. The good thing though is that immediately after starting using the paste these particles will break down so they will be the most efficient in dealing with a 1000 abraded steel and then by braking down in finer particles will do more of a finer polishing action. In my experience using the honing wheel after the 4000 stone freshly loaded with honing compound will defeat most benefits of the 4000 stone so I would suggest you to use a bit worn out compound after the 4000 stone. In my case I was able to  put together a 1 - 0.3 micron honing compound that I use after the 4000 stone which is giving me fantastic edges for a "heavy" machine like Tormek Honing on the leather wheel is also very fast and does not require any extra pressure, you only have to remove a 4000 burr which is very small.

Now because you have a second stone to your machine your workflow has to be a bit different. First the wheels will never have the same diameter and if they will, it will happen for a short period of time. So I suggest you to find the offset of your wheels and use it in order to blindly set the angle on the 4000 stone, After finishing with 1000 put the 4000 wheel in place and using the marker method find the exact amount and the direction you had to move the adjusting wheel in order to match the bevel angle. Use that offset every time when you switch the wheels and you'll get perfect results. But be careful, the wearing rate of the stones will be different so once in a while depending on how much sharpening you do you will have to update this offset. Also because you probably have one machine I would suggest you to make a template that would allow you to project each tool the same amount from the SE76 which would result in the same bevel angle for the same adjusting wheel position.. For woodworking you could have 25-30-35 degrees projections or more on that template and you could group the tools based on the bevel angle, and first use the original stone for all the tools and then mount the 4000 stone to polish all of them, so you will not have to spend 30 seconds between tools to change the stones. To be sure though you would obtain the best results you would also want to change the water in the tray when you change to the 4000 stone, so you don't run the risk of mixing 220 grit with 4000 which only results in a waste of time and steel.
And I promise this will be my last suggestion, in one of the older threads I was talking about marking the wheels to avoid small manufacturing or wear imprecision that may results in non square edges or non matching ones. Mark the shaft, the stones and the washers, and always mount the stones aligning all these marks. When you do this first time you will have to true the stones taking the minimum necessary so when you change the stone the grinding surface of the new mounted stone will match the other one regarding the square-ness in relation to the universal support.
You will soon discover how much sharper your tools get.

All the best,
Ionut

[ionut]

... and on the top of everything, using the offset I was talking earlier about, you could use the 4000 stone to put a microbevel if you like them instead of polishing the entire bevel and that would probably take humongous amount of  2-3 seconds or swipes per tool. This is not really necessary having a motorized sharpening tool, it is an option though.

Ionut

[Ken S]

Excellent post, Ionut.  Innovative and thorough; typical of the high caliber I would expect from you.

John, you have received an answer from the forum member I referred to as the only one I know of who happily and successfully uses the Japanese waterstone.

Ken

[Rob]

We're not worthy.....nice one Ionut  :-)

[Herman Trivilino]

Superb post, Ionut.  There's a lot of good information there and I nominate it to be a sticky.

It's obvious that you are a true craftsman.

[Rob]

I second that

[fraseman999]

Thanks for the excellent advice Ionut.

I am struggling with this stone. It still has a wobble so i can only assume the stone is faulty. I wonder if they will take it back after i have trued it.

Trueing it helped but it still has a wobble. When i first used it out of the box it had a massive wobble. I should have sent it back.

Thanks again

John