Great article: what steel gets sharpest

[RichColvin]

Read this recently: 

https://www.morewoodturningmagazine.com/articles.php?articlesid=112&access=7e7d78763e40

Nice mix of experience and measurable data.

Kind regards,
Rich

[GKC]

That is an interesting article.

However, after an insightful discussion of which metal gets sharper, he finishes with a statement about edge holding that puzzles me.  He concludes his piece by saying "If you sharpen very frequently, which you should, then the difference in edge holding is really marginal."

I don't understand this statement.  I would have thought it axiomatic that if the edge is holding better, you don't have to sharpen as frequently.

Put another way, as a turner, I do sharpen frequently, but it makes more than a "marginal" difference to me whether I have to go back to the wheel 4 times while shaping a bowl or just once (or not at all).  I see edge holding as an important element in the frequency of sharpening.  It is not that I have to sharpen four times anyway, it is that I either have to sharpen once or four times.

I have posted the question to Lucas via the article, but the Q&A feature doesn't have a way of coming back to me.  If he finds the question interesting, perhaps he will expand on it in the magazine.

In any case, that is a side issue, I found the observations about how the different metals take an edge--the point of his article--very interesting.

Gord

[RichColvin]

Gord,

I agree.  I sharpen often as I want to keep a consistent process going.  That's why I like using a Tormek:  it doesn't take away much steel!

Kind regards,
Rich