New M-Power Sharpening System

[Frank Hagan]

The diamond stone built into the M.Power PSS1 base is really too fine to do any serious flattening of a chisel back or plane iron. The first picture shows an iron with magic marker on the back, and then, 30 minutes later, how the edge is still black along the right side. After working on this for a while, I noted a kind of swirl pattern and an uneven feeling in the diamond grit on the plate, so I don't know if there's a quality issue here, or if the base simply isn't flat enough to do the job. I ended up with my piece of granite and sandpaper to flatten the back of the iron.

Once that was done, the cutting edge on this hollow ground plane iron was quickly abraded away by the coarse stone, and then polished a bit by the medium stone, and then got almost nearly sharp with the fine stone. As I have said, there may be some operator error here, as I can't sharpen anything. But I can see that keeping an edge sharp with this system will be a bit faster than with Scary Sharp. But only a bit.

I can't really recommend this tool. If you are like me, and can't really get things sharp with a jig and the required assortment of sandpaper, then I don't think this jig will help you. If you can use Scary Sharp, I'm not sure there's a reason to change.

I think I'll save my pennies for a Tormek or, if I can find it, an industrial 5 HP 3 phase Mega Sharpener system with Turbo Boost. Or a sharpening service.

[Brian Jarnell]

Be careful Frank,you may do yourself some damage if you get the tormek.

[Vaughn McMillan]

...And I guess I will never reach the holy grail of being able to cut a hair off the back of my hand with a tool that I have sharpened.

Have you considered using hair conditioner on the backs of your hands? Leaves mine silky soft, springtime fresh, and I can shave it with a butter knife. My tools are still dull, but I feel much better about myelf.

Sorry to see you're still not getting things as sharp as you'd like. The main fault I see in this particular system is that the sharpening motion is going perpendicular to the direction the blade will go when cutting. I was always taught that a cutting edge should be honed parallel to the direction of the cut. I'm sure a bunch of Neander guys would know more than I do about this theory (and hopefully will set me straight if I'm wrong), but it was drilled into me by my dad as long as I can remember. Still, this system seems like a logical way to get the initial edge on an out-of-shape tool.

- Vaughn

- Vaughn

[Jay Knoll]

Frank

Thanks for the review, sorry it didn't work out (for you and for me!)

Jay

[Dale Critchlow]

I received my M-Power system last evening and tried sharpening a chisel and a blade from a hand plane. At this point, I am more optimistic than Frank about its viability.

The first thing I noticed is that it will take quite a bit of time to do the initial grinding of the profiles. Once this is accomplished it should be very easy to touch them up in subsequent sharpenings.

I had better luck than Frank with the flattening of the backs of the tools using the stone fastened to the base of the jig. As they suggest in the instructions, I used a marking pen to paint the surface so I could see clearly were material was being removed. Once I started grinding the backs, I could see that I had not gotten them very flat with scary sharp approach I have been using. The results with the M-Power system looked to be very good.

As Frank mentioned, there is a learning curve in grinding the front of the tool. You have to learn to hold the moving part of the jig against one edge of the dove tail guide as you move it. Again, I used the marking pen. It took quite a while to shape the tool to 25 degrees since it was off by a few degrees due to my scary sharp procedure.

The 30 degree grinding went more quickly. The techique they describe for removing the burr or wire from the back of the chisel seemed to work. You simply make swipe on two on the stone fastened to the base of the jig.

The resulting profile of the tool looked very square and uniform. However, my experience was the same as Frank's. It was not sharp enough to shave the hair from the back of my hand. The instructions recommend using a strop to achieve the "ultimate sharp edge". I need to buy a strop or a buffing wheel and some grinding polish to give this a try.

The only real downside I have seen so far is the uniformity of the diamond stones. I suspect that M-Power (which from their web site looks to be a small company) has a quality control problem with the vendor supplying the stones. This is a new product and I assume this problem can be solved. I sent M-Power a note telling them of my observations. I called Woodworkers Supply and they are sending me replacement stones today.

It will take a few weeks of use to really evaluate the system. At this point I am pretty optimistic that it will work well for my rather modest needs. I am building three pieces of bedroom furniture for my daughter-in-law and have quite a few dovetails to cut. I like the idea of being able to quickly touch up the chisels as I work.

Dale Critchlow

[Bill Lewis]

Thanks for the review Frank! I'd have to say were in the same boat, I am to sharpening what my wife is to house plants, she kills them.
I don't have a good sharpening system let alone a good technique. I bought the Veritas roller jig and angle setter may years ago. It's about the best I have, but I still have issues with it.
It'd be nice to own one of those fancy systems, but I don't use enough neander tools to justify the price just yet and whatever I buy has to also be able to do long blades as well. Fast, brainlessly easy, and liquid cooled.