I received my $299 tormek the other day from the amazon sale, the
planer knife jig, which I got for 40% off, will be here in a few days
(there's my dual drive-by). I just got around to playing with it
tonight. I haven't seen the video since I don't currently own a
working vcr, but I did read the book cover to cover. I sharpened two
chisels and noticed a couple things. I also have some questions.

I was shocked by how much water the stone soaked up.

I used the angle-finder thingy to to start off. I had a 1" marples
that was in sad shape. It took far longer to grind than I think it
should have. I would say that I ground on it for maybe 10 minutes.
Each time I looked at it, I could see a line moving slowly up the
bevel. This is sort of what I expected, but it just went too slow.
Mabye it's because it was a larger chisel. The quarter inch chisel did
go a lot faster.

I went back through the tivo and found the sharpening station episode
of nyw. The guy there only put the grader on the stone for 6 seconds
(I counted). But I think the manual sasy 30. What do you do?

Do you do your chisels in a batch, doing all the coarse grinding, then
grade for 1000 grit, then do all the fine grinding? or do you regrade
between each chisel going back ad forth between 220 and 1000?

The book says to flatten the backs of the chisels on the side of the
wheel. I'm thinking that I should be able to get literally a mirror
finish on the back and the bevel, but it just isn't happening. It's
really sharp, but I can still see lines on the back for example from
the original machining. Should I go back and do it again to get the
complete mirror finish?

I was reading someone else's post on woodnet, i think, about how the
manual says nothing about breaking in the leather wheel. There's
certainly nothing in the book about it. Should I be doing this, and if
so, how?

I have exactly one hand plane, a stanley jack plane I think. I plan on
buying a lot more once I have a few more machines. I noticed that the
iron has a curve, to stop the corners from digging in I guess. How
would you grind this curve on the tormek? The manual suggests a
technique that doesn't seem very doable to me. I think it would just
square off the iron anyway. Do you have a technique for this?

I'd say I'm probably 90% of the way there. The chisels were in bad
shape with nicks in the edges. Now, they're completely straight,
square, and sharp. They're also a lot shinier than when they started.
I was able to shave thin pieces of end-grain off of some southern
yellow pine I had handly. So I'm very happy with it.

tia, brian