Tormek‘s New Blackstone Wheel

[Mark Koury]

Has anyone else had a chance to try this new blackstone wheel? It is billed as a faster and harder wheel for HSS and even carbide touch-up’s.

My experience has been not all that positive. I got one recently to try on the typical LN A2 blades. Today I tried a reshape of a BU plane blade. This took forever! (- about the same as the old wheel) I grant you reshaping with a Tormek is not the most efficient use - but, I wanted to try the new wheel. Given that it takes forever it still is the cleanest way to get a hollow bevel on a plane blade.

I only wish that the new wheel did what they said it would. Now I realize that I really don’t need it!

[george wilson]

How fine is it" It doesn't matter what it can grind.If it is fine,it will grind slowly and leave a smooth finish,just like any abrasive.

[Wilbur Pan]

It is true that reshaping on a Tormek will be slower than on a dry wheel grinder. But there are some things that you can do if you're reshaping on a Tormek to speed things up a lot:

1. Make sure you use the grading stone on the rough side before reshaping (not applicable to the Blackstone wheel, but for the regular wheel)

2. Use the Tormek so that the wheel is turning into the tool. With my Tormek, I tend to get lazy and not turn the machine around to set things up this way, and when I actually do it, it's surprising how much faster it works.

3. Retrue the wheel. This is a last resort method, but the wheel will never be more aggressive than after retruing. The downside of this is that the wheel wears down faster, which is why I use this as a the last resort.

By the way, I only use a Tormek for grinding. I don't have a dry wheel grinder. Recently I took a jack plane blade that was pretty flat across the edge and put a 10" radius camber on it for fast removal of wood. It took me just a few minutes using the above tips, and I have the regular wheel, not the Blackstone.

[Mark Koury]

Here is the description of the Blackstone from the Tormek site:

http://www.tormek.com/en/accessories/grindstones/

They say that the grit size is the same as their old stone but the Blackstone is harder. Again, in my experience, it cuts about the same or slightly slower with A2 steel.

I did true the wheel and I frequently use the grader (out of frustration?). I usually always grind into the blade. This Blackstone seems like a fine, hard stone - for sharpening. But, it is certainly not as advertised for reshaping blades faster.

[george wilson]

Well,it says the new wheel is still 220 grit,which is a very fine wheel. For edge re shaping,you need to get a 36 grit white Norton bench grinding wheel. They cut better than the old gray wheels by a huge margin,and cut cooler.You still cave to grind,and dip every few seconds. What I do id dip the tool in water,grind,and look for the water to sizzle. When it does,dip instantly. this is usually about every 2 seconds when the edge is getting thin,near completion.

the very best fast grinding is with 36 grit blue zirconia belts. I have a Wilton Square Wheel knife maker's grinder. It is expensive. I put a variable speed motor on it. Grizzly sells a knife maker's grinder.I don't like it as well,but it costs a LOT less,and would get tha job done. It needs shrouds over the belt to help keep dust down,but you could make them.

The Square Wheel isn't the very fastest belt grinder out there,but it is the most versatile,offering 8" contact wheels,smaller wheels,and flat platen. There are some types of inclined belt grinders that run twice as fast,but my Wilton is fast enough for me.It grinds many times faster than any bench grinder,white wheel or not.

[Mark Koury]

Tormek cool-aid - I guess I drank too much!

Back to the old grinder.

[Jeff Farris]

Mark,

Sorry I haven't visited for a while and missed this thread.

The SB-250 is particularly developed for high speed steel. I am not familiar with A-2, but I don't think it is the same or even similar to HSS.

That said, my experience so far with the SB-250 is that it does require frequent grading with the coarse side of the grader. Also, I've noticed that the stone starts behaving a bit more like you would expect once it has worn a couple of mm. I don't know if the outside has different characteristics from the casting process or if that whole idea is a figment of my imagination, but I trued mine up a couple times, and found it to be more aggressive.