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Inspired by ChuckM's http://lumberjocks.com/projects/85784

Got a nice deal on this Ryobi grinder at the Depot, but the tool rests are utterly useless. So I searched here and found a few designs. This one looked good to me.

Sharpened up my chisels today. Only one needed grinding, but this did the trick for sure.

I actually built all the parts and then went out to get the bolts. The main pieces are 4" wide, so I got 4 1/2" bolts. Spot the problem?

Yeah, I forgot to add in for the side bars that hold the two pieces together. So those two pieces got cut down a bit on each side. All works good now though.

My chisels are all scary sharp and most of my arm hair is now missing because I kept shaving my arms and marveling at how sharp the edges were.

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great quick little build. by the way..i'm keen to know how you got your chisels "scary sharp" beyond the initial grinds on the grinder?...I also want to use my grinder to set some of the primary bevels…but I'm exploring the options beyond this stage…..any ideas would be welcome….cheers
 

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cyclops, sure, I'll share. :)

For sure, grinding is just to establish the bevel. You need to hone after that to get the edge cutting sharp. There are a few options, the main ones being oil stones, diamond stones, water stones and sandpaper. The sandpaper method is the one that has come to be known as "scary sharp". I chose that because I'm just beginning myself and don't have any decent quality sharpening stones of any kind. Just google "scary sharp".

Basically, you just need to get ahold of a bunch of sandpaper. You can get 80 - 320 or so at any home center, but you'll need some higher grade stuff for real polishing. It's actually made for automobile body finishing. I got some on Amazon in 400, 600, 1000, 1500 and 2000 grit. The high grit stuff is usually wet/dry sandpaper, so I use it wet.

First you want to polish the back and get it dead flat. At least the last half inch to inch. Just start at the lower grits and move up to you get to the 2000. The lower grits may take some time, but as you get into the higher ones, usually just a minute or less on each grit does the trick. In the end, you should have a mirror smooth surface.

Then you need to do the front bevel. I use this honing guide to make sure I get the angle right.

www.amazon.com/Robert-Larson-800-1800-Honing-Guide/dp/B000CFNCKS/

Actually, most of my chisels didn't really need grinding, so I established a primary bevel of 25 degrees with the sandpaper, starting low grit and going through 2000.

Then raised it to 30 degrees and just used the 1000 and 2000 to establish that secondary bevel.

On the one that was in rougher shape, I did grind it to create the primary bevel. You could probably just go straight into the secondary bevel from there. I stupidly started with lower grade sandpaper at 25 degrees with really mostly just flattened out the hollow bevel I'd created by grinding. No harm done, just extra work I probably didn't need to do. Then I hit it with the 1000 and 2000 at 30 degrees for the final secondary bevel.

They now all have a mirror finish and easily shave the hair off my arm. Not to mention, they go through wood like butter. Not bad for a noob.
 

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3,876 Posts
Very Nice Design! Handy to have one of these,
 

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194 Posts
Very good build. Happy sharpening.

Chuck
 
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