Shopsmith Forums

Hey all-

I was considering the jointer blade/planer blade sharpening tool a couple weeks ago when it went on sale ... but being the late bird, SS doesn't want to be nice and offer me the discount now - so much for being a consistent customer

So-instead of buying one of these items, i started doing some research to better understand the sharpening process which led me to this table (sorry the table didnt translate well) :

Grit Size--- Particle--- Use

200 80 μm Removing chips from a damaged blade
500 30 μm Roughly sharpening a blunt edge
1000 8 μm Smoothing a rough edge into a medium edge
4,000 4 μm Smoothing a medium edge into a sharp edge for cutting
meat
8,000 2 μm Further smoothing a sharp edge for cutting fish or
vegetables (sinews in meat will bend an edge this sharp)
30,000 0.5 μm Polishing an edge to a mirror-smooth (but possibly fragile)
finish.


The SS sharpener utilizes the 150 grit conical sander, which if I look at the table above puts me before the first line in the table which is "removing chips from a damaged blade". This doesn't seem to go far enough toward sharpening in my mind.

On the other side, I watched a William Ng video where he makes a sharpening holder and then uses 6000-8000 Grit Whetstones for his blades, which seems more in line with actually "sharpening" according to the table above.

As I don't have the SS version, I'm not certain that the instructions don't lead to whetstone sharpening later on...


Can anybody clue me in - why the seemingly large difference in grit choice for sharpening ?


b

I have the Shopsmith Planer/Jointer Knife Sharpener. I cannot speak to the questions of the different grits and uses in the table you listed but I use my sharpener with little pressure against the Conical Sanding Disk when sharpening knives. If there is a nick a few light passes takes care of that. If it is dull maybe a light pass or two is sufficient. Also when doing Jointer knives all three can be done at the same time. I find it to be an efficient and simple to use sharpener. I restore Shopsmith tools and have used it on many sets of knives. If there was a finer grit choice for the Conical Sanding Disk I would try it for sharpening.

As an alternative or as a way to compare the costs of other systems which accurately sharpen planer blades to the SS sytem check out this Canadian firm:

https://www.elitetools.ca/en/product/s- ... r-grinder/

it is affixed to a belt sander 'kit'
https://www.elitetools.ca/en/product/vi ... r-grinder/

The neat thing about these products now is they sell in Canadian dollars which are trading quite low against other currencies.

The jig is 45.24 shipping is 13.91 to the US

With this sander you can get belts in grits down to 1200.

Be sure to check out the scissor sharpener that actually works
https://www.elitetools.ca/en/product/sc ... ener-s-10/ (52.17 USD)

In the US Lee Valley sells some (but not all) the jigs

You can also buy direct from Viel. https://www.vieltools.com/categorie/vie ... er-grinder

rpd wrote:You can also buy direct from Viel. https://www.vieltools.com/categorie/vie ... er-grinder

OK So what is the French word(s) for it?

JPG wrote:

rpd wrote:You can also buy direct from Viel. https://www.vieltools.com/categorie/vie ... er-grinder

OK So what is the French word(s) for it?

The site has English and French, There is a button up near the top (next to "currency) to toggle back and forth