SG-200 Expected wear when restoring tools.

[Alexandros]

Hello!
Happy to make my first post here.
I have a T4 for about 7 months.
Mainly I use it for woodworking tools (axes, knives, drawknives, planes and gouges).
Since I had in my possession many old tools I used the T4 to regrind and re-profile many old neglected or damaged tools.
4 axes, 2 drawknives, 3 planes, ~25 gouges, ~10 mora knives plus some more light sharpening of knives during those months.
I realized that the diameter of my SG stone is now 175mm.
Does this wear seem more than expected?
I realize it is a general question but keeps bothering me... Maybe I am putting too much force and wear the wheel more than I should?

[Ken S]

Welcome to the forum, Alexandros.

You did not put too much force on your grinding wheel. The amount of wheel wear you have experienced is not unusual. As you say, you have reground and reprofiled many old neglected or damaged tools. This involves considerably more grinding than sharpening tools which are merely dull. You will find that the next time you resharpen these tools, assuming they are just no longer very sharp and being sharpened at the same profile, sharpening will be much quicker and with considerably less wheel wear.

If you do not already have a TT-50 Truing Tool, I recommend that you purchase one, (The current model is much improved.) Take light cuts with it and use it frequently. This actually causes less wheel wear than infrequent, heavy truing.

One of Tormek's expert trainers told me that the learning sharpening causes more wear to the grinding wheel than subsequent sharpening. Not only are the tools generally sharper to begin with, the skills of the person doing the sharpening are more refined. Congratulations, you have put in the hard work. Youshould have smooth sailing ahead.

Keep us posted.

Ken

[Alexandros]

Thank you for your reply Ken!

I realize and have already experienced the next sharpening and was as you say much faster and much easier.
After the regrinding of my old gouges the uneven wear was really obvious, I got a cheap diamond wheel dresser (t-bar style) and to be honest it did a good job (I realize not as perfect and controllable as the TT-50 would do, some day hopefully I get my hands on one).

One of Tormek's expert trainers told me that the learning sharpening causes more wear to the grinding wheel than subsequent sharpening. Not only are the tools generally sharper to begin with, the skills of the person doing the sharpening are more refined. Congratulations, you have put in the hard work. Youshould have smooth sailing ahead.

I do feel like that will be the case, just after the measuring of my wheel I got a bit anxious maybe something was going more wrong than I thought.

Hopefully you are right and I get a smooth sailing!

[Herman Trivilino]

Hello!
Happy to make my first post here.

Welcome!

Since I had in my possession many old tools I used the T4 to regrind and re-profile many old neglected or damaged tools.
4 axes, 2 drawknives, 3 planes, ~25 gouges, ~10 mora knives plus some more light sharpening of knives during those months.
I realized that the diameter of my SG stone is now 175mm.
Does this wear seem more than expected?
I realize it is a general question but keeps bothering me...

The analogy I like to use is with brake pads. Yes, they will wear as you brake your vehicle, but they are engineered to do that.

Maybe I am putting too much force and wear the wheel more than I should?

No, more force will just mean you spend less time removing the steel, but it will still be the same amount of wear.

Note that a driver's bad habits (jack rabbit starts and the resulting hard braking) will cause more wear on the brake pads. The only bad habit that will cause too much wear on your grindstone is infrequent truing. Like Ken said, truing often means much less material will be removed from the grindstone than infrequent truing. This is because having an out-of-true grindstone accelerates the uneven wear. For example, say one side of the grindstone has a bit larger radius than the other side, causing the grindstone surface to rise and fall as it rotates during the sharpening process. As you continue to sharpen the low side gets even lower because of the way the tool digs into the grindstone as it begins to rise. Thus, frequent truing requires the removal of less material, not just during any one truing session, but overall for the life of the grindstone.

[John Hancock Sr]

Does this wear seem more than expected?
I realize it is a general question but keeps bothering me... Maybe I am putting too much force and wear the wheel more than I should?

As with others in this thread, not not too much wear. I would add that the wheels used are aluminium oxide, and a pure form which is more friable. The more refined aliminium oxide is used for fine sharpening since it is more friable. This means that the crystals break along crystal boundaries to reveal fresh sharp edges to ensure more efficient cutting and producing more refined edges. This, by the very nature of the beast, will cause more wear when re-establishing bevels since you are removing a lot of material. When you resharpen the sharpening process will be much quicker and wear much less.