Thread: What are you working on?

Yeah....Practice on junk blades or you will junk a nice one.

Messing about on my new polishing machine, trying different compounds wheels etc.

I took a bunch of blades to practice with . One of them started to clean up nice , a Baum Bros about 100 years old, so I decided to throw some scales on it, hone it and have a shave.
Pressed for time, I found some plastic scales, a quick sand and dye. A lead wedge and nickel pins. You can see I smashed the wedge pins in, no muckin about.
Not mirrored and some pitting left behind.

Shame I have no before pictures but it had a nasty frown . Took care of that and gave it a full jnat progression.

I had a great shave today with it, probably give this to one of my brothers..
Cheers

1400rpm / 1.2 hp


DMT / Shapton Glass 500


Baum Brothers Sheffield

Ya got some junkers, Mike. I can send ya a few in the box, for practice.

You might want to make a backstop for it. Something to catch errant blades and compounds. I get this vision of a blade flying thru the window, taking someone out, in the courtyard below.

Just cleaned out the gutters, and screened in the porch(crazy bad mosquitoes in SC!), and came back to read some posts... excellent replies!
Thanks guys, as I was reading through your replies and recalled a bunch of files in the brain that were becoming "deep stored". If I don't keep it fresh on the mind it goes and may never come back.
-I like the point about circles with the dremmel, I wasn't doing that, I'm sure it will help.
-Didn't have a hood on my buffer/grinder and before I realized it I had a terrible mess!
-Nice Baum Brothers, I've got the same blade and have been wanting to clean it up and gift it to my good friend. Good to know it shaves well!
Also that set up you have looks great! I've been trying to find a good polisher/grinder and have been eyeing those ones.

Mike those wheels you have look great, is there a special trick to getting the wheels conditioned like that? Looks way different than mine and I wasn't that happy with mine.
Though the wheels I had were the white cloth wheels and too big.

Those smaller wheels are what seemed at the time what I needed but I never ordered some.
So as I get back into it, getting the shop built piece by piece and trying not to be too much of a spaz due to the excitement of it all, this is all good info.

Well, got my scales sanded and scotchbrited a bit, some epoxy and bog dust applied to the nibbles and tang-scrapes.



Voidmonster Zak has also related that the scales are from George Richardson, razor scale pressers. Circa 1871!



Slowly moving forward..Rammed the powder down, had to cut a patch for the ball.
Take another shot tomorrow!

Originally Posted by outback

I got you some of the wheels, that Tom has, Mike.

Still putting a gift box together for ya, think there's a dozen of them wheels, plus some green scotch brite wheels.

Work in circles, Mike. Keeps things a lot more even, with the dremmel. Doesn't leave everything all wavey

Attachment 295310

Cool!

I've been meaning to order some greaseless compound and get a multi speed grinder (or at least one that operates at less rpm than my current one).

However, I already have a Dremel. I might try that instead.

Ok, here is what a completely rusted over junk pile W&B looks like after some sandpaper time.

As I mentioned previously, I didn't want to take off too much metal and lose the stamps. However, those pits are deep and they still have some rust in them so I'm not sure if it will need a more aggressive approach someday.

For now, it will shave again and it already has a bit of an edge as one of my knuckles can attest.

In regard to the discussion on Dremels, are you guys just using them for the preliminary sanding? I noticed with my sandpaper that the low grits are a pain to get through, but once that is out of the way the high grit polishing goes fast and easy. Would a combination of Dremel and sandpaper approaches tend to work well?

Originally Posted by sonnythehooligan

I've been meaning to order some greaseless compound and get a multi speed grinder (or at least one that operates at less rpm than my current one).

However, I already have a Dremel. I might try that instead.

Years ago I bought a corded Dremel unit, and along with it I found a foot switch (looks like a "wah-wah" pedals for one of them gui-tars). Together, they make it much easier to control the Dremel speed (the Dremel unit has its own coarse-adjust speed control, while the foot-switch gives "fine-tuning").

https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_odk...+foot&_sacat=0

The one I bought wasn't manufactured by/for Dremel; it was from a dental supply company, but it works great!

Also, Dremel makes a flexible extension (mine is 6', IIRC) that lets me hold just a very lightweight tip with grinding/polishing attachment, while leaving the heavy drive unit on the workbench/table. They're inexpensive and well worth the minimal cost.

Well, my stepfather the contractor had a Dremel which means that I had a Dremel, but that thing is no where to be found. Tools get loaned out over the years, it becomes hard to remember who has what, you know how it is.

I'm currently looking online for a decent Dremel, and I'll be looking at foot switches for sure!