Planer knife sharpening

Mar 30, 2006 12 Replies

Has anyone ever used anything like this to sharpen your jointer or planer knives? Or has anyone ever dealt with these people? What does the majority do when your knives become dull? 30 bucks a set, versus 10 for one of these gizmo's???


Used anything like what? Need more info, but I take mine to my local sharpening service. They're responsive to my needs, and cost is reasonable, and then I hone 'em up myself. Tom

I am so sorry!! I forgot to paste the link! Here it is:

My father, who hates gimmicky "tools", got one as a gift a couple years ago. He was just telling me the other day that it actually works really well. He manages to hone the dulled edge on his knives three of four times before finally having to take them out of the jointer and get them sharpened. You can't keep sharpening forever with one of these things, but it really adds a lot of life to the knives as long as they're not too dull or notched up. He said it's really nice not to have to take them out of the machine, since re-aligning them is somewhat of a pain. I'm definitely thinking about getting one myself.

Josh

Tim Taylor wrote:

The secret is to remember it's a hone, not a sharpener.

If you use the hone early and often, the hone will work great. Once the knives head toward dullsville, a hone isn't aggressive enough to do much good, and a real sharpening is required.

It's kind of like touching up the bench chisels on 4000 and/or 8000 grit stones during use.

I have one of those it is for honing the planer blades not sharpening.

Mark (sixoneeight) = 618

Love my Makita water stone. I have two sets of blades, remove, the offenders, ditto the jointer or planer, whichever is not offending, and have an hour at the wheel. Usually do the plane irons then, too. This works less like the stone than a "steel" for carving knives.

My blades come back from sharpening trips much sharper than new blades. This is precisely why I resharpen my 8" and 12" blades, as well as the

6" blades from my old jointer.

In my area, all of the local tool stores, like Woodcraft, Coastal. etc... will send my blades out for sharpening, even if it's ONE blade.

You could also deal by mail with places like this:

Sharpening shops often work in batches, you're simply calling the wrong places. Ask your local tool dealers.

I sent my Delta Thickness planer blades out for sharpening and when they came back they did not want to feed the stock through the planer. I talked to the tech center and they said the blades were not to be resharpened. I replaced the feed roller and that did not help until I replaced the blade with a new blade and then it would feed the stock through the planer. I guess the honeing may help but grinding did not work.

Well, I was kinda, sorta wondering that myself. I know on one set I used, I abused the crap out them. I was just planing down some old painted stair treads, but about half way through it got hard for it to feed. By the time I was done, I just about had to tie a rope on the ends and pull them through with my truck. I know, that aint good on the equipment, but I had to do it.

Mine does, but remember that Woodcraft stores are franchises. Most of the time, tool stores send sharpening out with an "in this Tuesday, back next Tuesday" type of deal.

If they don't do it, ask the manager for local recommendations.

SOMEONE will sharpen your blades!

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