Thread: DMT DIA flat Plate

Has anyone seen or used this plate yet. It seems it's sole purpose in life if to lapp stones. They don't give a grit rating, at least not that I've seen. They do say it will lapp stones to. +/- 0.0005 flat. and it's a monster at 11x4.5, Less than the famous DGLP. The DMT costs around 199.00

Amazon.com: DMT DIA-FLAT Lapping Plate: Home Improvement

Looks intersting - but a bit pricey. My DMT is flat enough for me so I don't see a real need to buy this new one. Knowing the grit would be nice - I wonder why that's not listed? I bet contacting DMT directly would bring the answer though.

I read about it Rich. IME with a bunch of DMTs what they call "flat" isn't necessarily what we would call flat. IOW, if you take a machinist's straight edge and lay it across a DMT it may not be perfectly flat. I did this with two and returned them. A 325 and a 1200. They agreed on the 325 and sent a replacement. They returned my 1200 because it was within their specs. I have a 600 that is dead nuts flat with the Starratt straight edge but the XX 120, the 325, 1200 and 8000 are not absolutely flat. That is with 8" plates. I'd suspect it would be harder to maintain flat with an 11" plate. OTOH, mine are all close enough for what we are doing so if you have the $200 to spare and want to test it out, why not.

I doubt anyone makes perfect flat diamond plates, this one has been a round for a ~1, it should be the same as smaller sized ones, just easier to lab 8x3 stones due to larger area,

about a year and a half ago i bought a dmt 325 10x4 inch for around 79 usd. cant remember from where .

Rich, according to DMT it is the 120 grit
Dia-Flat™ Lapping Plate | DMT® - Diamond Machining Technology

I was curious, another member brought it to my attention. I use my XX for primary lapping, then a well worn dmt C (325 next) and depending on the stone, I may wrap wet sandpaper around the dmt and use it that way (600, 800 and 1000g) works well....

It's new to me, but welcome!!! I found after getting the Shapton DGLP that all of my hones lapped with the DMT8C325 were high on the ends. I measured and found that my DMT8C was high in the center and dishing my stones by about 3 to 4 thousandth's, so I opened a new DMT8C325 and it was also high in the center. I was hoping for a DMT that was machined to a high spec for flatness and it appears they had already provided that, but I hadn't come across it. Thanks for the post, I'll be getting one!!

Best regards,

Howard

I haven't bought diasharps (one sided metal core hones), but I've heard people saying that they've had trouble with flatness.

I have bought several duosharps and bench stones (the ones with the plastic cores) and they have all been good.

And two atomas, both of those have been good.

I would be hesitant to spend $200 on something that only comes in one fairly coarse grit size, especially when the duosharps are usually fine, and at $100 or so, the atomas are very very good for flattening stones (as long as the lubricant is water for the atomas, since they have an adhesive holding the replaceable surface to the core).

The trick with the cheaper hones (the duosharps and the atomas) is to make sure that a dedicated side that is used to flatten stones never does anything else other than flatten stones.

I use mine for mostly lower grit stones.(nothing past 4k level) On fine stones that need more than maintanence work it is also useful but I follow up with another water stone to calm down surface.

Very flat, very fast but it will tear up finer stones more than I like and many of you may feel the same. Still a very nice tool for folks who do lots of sharpening.