Great for honing, but doesn't replace stones and grinders

I love my Work Sharp! But it has limitations that you will have to work around. One major one is that it will not sharpen plane irons wider than two inches! When I tried to sharpen my iron from my #7, using their auxiliary sharpening fence, I inadvertantly added two extra angles. I then had to use my stones to correct these new angles.

When sharpening plane irons 2” and smaller, it does a good job, but you need to do the initial sharpening on a stone first, or be prepared to spend a lot of time and money with their sandpaper sharpening. But once the initial grind is established, this system is GREAT for repeatablity on your angles! Creating a micro bevel is as simple as clicking an adjuster to a new angle and grinding through the grits to get crisp micro bevel. This sharpener has made my block planes sing! And, oncde they lose their hone, it is a simple process to return them to sharpness! This has 4 angle settings, 20, 25, 30 and 35 degrees. These allow for precise, repeatable angles on your planes and chisels.

The ability to precisely flatten the back of your plane irons and chisels is one great feature of this tool! Another is its small footprint. That alows you to keep it on a side table/workbench for quick resharpening when needed.

You can find various 6” PSA aluminum oxide sandpaper at your local body shops in varying grits. Look for a hole punch that will punch the required center hole. I found a set on Ebay some years ago. I find that I only need to grind to 400 grit, then hone my iron or strop it on a piece of leather with jeweler’s rouge. Extra glass wheels are available for around $20, and a leather stropping wheel is available for $30. I already have a lot of lether scraps and some Barge cement, so I will be making my own stropping wheel with an extra glass wheel I have.

One of the realy neat things of this sharpening system is the slotted, see-through grinding wheels. I have not used these, but they say that it allows turners a way to see their tool’s edge as they sharpen them. Cool for turners!

I only gave it 4 stars due to its inability to sharpen plane irons wider than 2” but Work Sharp has said they will introduce, later this year, a jig that will allow the sharpening of these wider irons. I look forward to this, for sure!

God Bless,
Hawg

-- Saving barnwood from the scrapyards