Thread: Plane sharpening: HSS steel and Naniwa SS not working

I sharpen my plane blades with a 800,3000 and 8000
Naniwa Sstones.

Recently I bought some HSS plane blades. I have a lot
of difficulty getting these blades sharp with my stones.

I can get a wire edge with the 800 stone, but not with the
3000 stone. Maybe I need to sharpen longer on this stone,but
it's just too time consuming.

I think my Naniwa stones are just too soft. The chosera stones
are much harder I read and suited for tough steels. Unfortunately
they are really expensive as well.

I read the Sigma power 1000 and Bester 1200 are good and affordable
stones for HSS steel. Also Shapton glass is very good(unfortunately very
thin as well).

Maybe the 8000 stone is ok, but the 3000 SS is just not a good intermediate
stone for HSS steel?

Anybody know some affordable stones that will help me sharpen
HSS steel?

Perhaps I will be selling my SS stones. I like them very much for
01 and A2 steel,but not for HSS steel.

Thank you in advance.

If he doesn't respond to this thread shoot KevinT a PM. He may or may not have experience with Naniwas but he does have a lot of experience with sharpening plane blades.

you can use Arkansas stones . it will help you a lot. Specially at the final stage.
They are very very slow and i mean it.
you have to have A lot patience.
hope this helps.

My experience with stainless knives and superstones were that they do not like each other very much. I had hard time set bevels with the 1k, so I switched to chosera and its a lot better in my opinion.

I don't know about knives or tool sharpening but I find the superstones ideal for straight razors. Perhaps the softer material lends itself the the finer blades.

Originally Posted by JimmyHAD

I don't know about knives or tool sharpening but I find the superstones ideal for straight razors. Perhaps the softer material lends itself the the finer blades.

Isn't there a saying something like "hard steel - soft stone, soft steel - hard stone" or something like that. I seem to remember it from school woodwork lessons (god that was a long time ago...!).

Regards,
Neil

While the Shapton Glass Stone is thin, it doesn't dish much at all. After 2 years of weekly use on kitchen knives I don;t see alot of loss. They are also a bit slanted tward stainless steels, glazing over rather quickly on carbon steel, so they have to be cleaned off when using carbon steel. Very hard stones and cut very fast.

I'm not that crazy about the carbon issue as 99.9% of my knives are carbon steel...

Hmmm, HSS isn't stainless steel right?

Originally Posted by matt321

Hmmm, HSS isn't stainless steel right?

I believe it is High Speed Steel ? Drill bits, cutters for lathes, milling machines and such.

HSS - High Speed Steel. It is a high carbon steel, but unlike other high carbon steels it can be heated to a dull red without losing its temper (hence the HS application where other high cabon steels would not be appropriate) and it has greater abrasion resistance, too.

Regards,
Neil