SG-250 Bond Strength - Too Strong For All But Simple Carbon Steels (softer)

[Thy Will Be Done]

I've been using this single stone for long enough to have used half its life, it's down to 9" from 10" diameter so I feel well qualified to say this.  It glazes too rapidly for anything other than very narrow bevels and/or very soft/simple carbon steels.  It is very well suited for that but anything like high alloy or wider bevels and it stalls pretty quickly.  I have been using the diamond truing bit to both keep flat and also to recut the surface as I find that the silicon carbide 'stone' they provide will simply not make the wheel cut aggressively enough to use as a grinder doing more than a simple touchup.  Changing geometry takes far longer than it should/could in many cases.

So, all that said I'm finally going for another wheel or I'm just going to get rid of everything I have that isn't simple carbon steel.  I'm wondering if the SB-250 is a similar proposition in terms of bond strength.  I know silicon carbide can be more friable aka crumbles more easily to renew cutting ability.  That said, I don't believe the black carbide is much more friable than the aluminum oxide used in the SG-250.  So, I'm wondering how well it really works on harder to grind steels or will it glaze similarly?  Which will still mean frequent trips to the diamond bit to recut the surface all too often to keep cutting aggression high enough to work at a reasonable pace without having to press excessively hard on the wheel, which I find is not practical as it causes muscle/body issues for me.

[Royale]

For context, I sharpen knives and scissors commercially, been doing it for about... 1.5 years, and now on my second SG-250 (already down to 230mm/9" 😭)

I've used my SG-250 to reprofile many cheap-ass soft steel knives, many exotic Japanese steels, all the way up to ZDP-189.

I used to grade my SG-250 coarse quite frequently for it to cut a lot faster? Then I realised very quickly that it doesn't wear down evenly, and any slight change in the diameter (like grading again) would start to create another facet on the bevel (usually at heights 3mm or wider)

I used to think my stone was always glazed, and wasn't operating efficiently. Then I realised that when grinding any secondary bevel height more than 3mm, the progress slows to a crawl (possibly because all downward pressure is now more evenly distributed over a wider area)


In summation, before you start discarding serviceable items, why not try grinding a narrower angle (12-15 DPS) on your harder steel knives to get a better feel of how the SG-250 cuts? I learnt the hard way that the lack of significant tactile feedback during grinding doesn't mean the grindstone wasn't working 🤦🏻�♂️