We mostly agree that our turning tool's edges ought to be sharp and
without serrations, the bevels smooth and even. We do not all agree on
how sharp, how smooth and in what form the edge and bevel should be.
Furthermore, the ways and means we woodturners use to sharpen tool edges
and smooth their bevels are not agreed on at all, to put it mildly.

In my simple view, (ignoring grinding) sharpening is a sort of continuum
of whetting honing stropping buffing/polishing. Where we
woodturners stop off in the sequence varies, but whether necessary or
not, isn't a well honed and polished tool edge that's not friable a good
thing? A soft, fine grained, lubricated abrasive moving smoothly and
slowly away from an edge fixed in the desired geometry should be good
for doing this and the Tormek seems ideal. Except that it's not
affordable for every turner, and that's a formidable exception
regardless of what you count important.

I don't read the Tormek users group and I don't own a tormek, but I
wonder if more affordable devices have been purpose made in some of your
shops. I've run a dry 120 grit stone slowly backward. I've run an old
motorized true wet grindstone. I've run wooden wheels and discs charged
with emery cake, I've run rubberised wheels and I've rubbed tool edges
on surface plates smeared with diamond dust. None made an edge that cut
my finger like a gouge sharpened on a friend's Tormek.

What makes the Tormek so special and so well thought of by so many of
us? Have any of you made something that's 'just as good' for private
use? I don't mean knockoffs or plagiaries. Is there no substitute for
a Tormek?


Turn to Safety, Arch
Fortiter



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