George wrote:


"Arch" wrote in message
...

And another thing. How many years does it take Ms. Average Turner to
wear down her frequently sharpened gouge to a useless length? Let's say
the gouge actually touches spinning wood for 3 hours a day for a 5 day
week for 40 weeks a year. Seems to me it would take many years to wear
down an 8 in. flute. No?


I'd say so. Now I also believe it's cheaper to sharpen for the final pass
than use the grits of paper that a sharp gouge saves, so maybe I sharpen too
much? I'll bet there's less than a penny worth of steel in a full 16" bowl
from start to finish, even if you get one of the name gouges.


Sorby came out with a tool called the Spindlemaster where you aren't supposed
to sharpen the bevel at all, just hone the top edge. IOW, the tool never
gets shortened. I wondered about this and asked the Sorby rep who was
demonstrating the tools at the local Woodcraft. He said he'd been giving
multiple demos of the tool each week for years and still using the same
Spindlemaster. So I guess they do wear down very slowly :-).


--
It's turtles, all the way down