Belt Grinder for sharpening

[george wilson]

The Wilton Square Wheel belt grinder can be configured with a flat platen,or an 8" contact wheel. I also made a hump shaped steel block that I can screw to the flat platen. It has a large radius shape ground on it that simulates grinding on a large old time cutler's wheel. The belt runs over it just fine. I have made Bowie knives on it that look like they were made on large wheels.

[David Weaver]

I wouldn't mind having one of these belt grinders to aid in shaping knife edges. I used to make my own hunting type knives with different handles/scales and was stuck shaping the edges with paper on glass and stones. I eventually started using my belt sander with a jig I built to keep angles consistent. But a rig like the Kalamazoo and Viel would def be nice for this purpose as well as re-shaping edges of my chisel and plane blades that are in rough shape or have developed a bad angle. I would miss my hollow grind though so I would still probably use the 6" grinder for most blades on my woodworking tools. It might be nice though to get a flat initial bevel on some Japanese blades. Once in a while I'll get some Japanese chisels or plane blades that have a bevel angle that is way off of what I want, sometimes as high as 38* and sometimes as low as 20*. Some Tsunesaburo blades I've gotten had the super low bevel angle that wouldn't even touch hardwood with chipping. Changing this bevel by hand is an incredible workout.

Dave, I swear you must have a small fortune wrapped up in your sharpening supplies. It'd be nice to have the options available that it sounds as though you have.

Options are nice. Not a necessity, but nice, definitely. Between the viel and the kalamazoo 1" grinders, the viel has a nicer rest but every other thing on the kalamazoo is better (wheels, motor -by far, belt speed, ...) and you can make your own rest out of just about anything and attach it to the kalamazoo because all of the stuff between the wheels is just stamped steel (you can drill it wherever you need to, attach whatever you want).

There's nothing we won't try to sharpen here, though. Even plastic scissors that come in kids sets (and just like everything else, they are much easier for kids to use if they're reasonably sharp, even though they don't exactly hold an edge).