skatingforums
On the Ice => The Pro Shop => Topic started by: Query on December 18, 2021, 12:22:25 AM
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A question arises as to how to get the edges even on powered sharpening machines, by centering the dressed shape of the sharpening wheel on the blade. Some people, like the person who tried to show me how to use such a machine (badly), iterate the process - get it close, sharpen, get it closer, resharpen, etc. That wastes a lot of steel - and therefore enormously reduces the lifetime of the blade.
You can virtually eliminate such iteration by taking measurements. Let me suggest the opposite approach, and take many measurements. This will waste little or no metal, other than what is needed to make the blade sharp. Many people would say this is overkill, far more measurements and time than a well-practiced skate tech would need. But for a novice skate sharpener, the "magic of measurement" can compensate for a lack of experience.
1. Check that you really need to sharpen. 1/2 to 2/3 of the time, you can save metal by just straightening a bent over edge. You can feel a bent over edge by running your finger across the blade sides and over the bottom. (Do not run your finger along a blade edge or burr - it is easy to cut yourself that way.) Ideally you can straighten the edge with a "steel", such as is sometimes used on kitchen knives. I use a very fine grain (e.g. 5000 or greater grit number) flat sharpening stone. I run it gently along the sides. If you want to avoid roughing up the sides (a good idea), you can use tape almost up to the bottom (hollow) of the blades. You may wish to tilt the stone a tiny bit inwards, towards the hollow, especially if you apply tape, but keep the tilt consistent.
2. Dress the wheel to the desired ROH (Radius of Hollow).
3. If your sharpening machine's blade holder forces the blade straight while you sharpen, skip to step 6.
4. Place a straight edge across one side of the blade. The shortest dimension on the straight edge is usually the straightest, so place that against the blade. Do they touch perfectly, all the way, or is the blade warped? Now do it on the other side of the blade. In some cases, the blade sides aren't straight and parallel, so it will appear to be warped. In that case, in the best possible solution is the one that creates the same deviation from straightness on both sides.
5. If the blade is warped, straighten it. Many sharpening machines have a small tool (maybe on the side) that can push against the center of the flat part of the blade, to straighten it. If the machine doesn't have such a tool, use a vice. The vice won't quite make it straight - you may need to overcompensate a little, by putting a few thicknesses worth of paper against the side the blade is warped away from. Go back to step 4 and repeat, until the blade has no warp. Note: de=warping a very warped blade can break it. So one skate tech I have known returned new blades that had more than about 1 mm of warp. This probably annoyed the blade makers – he had to pay shipping costs, and they sent the returned blades to a less picky skate tech. But if it has significantly more than 1 mm, you very likely will break it, and you will have lost the costs of the blades.
6. Use a square to mark two straight pencil lines at approximately right angles to the bottom of the blade, one near the back, one near the front of the length to be sharpened. You will eventually take measurements along these lines to test centering.
7. For the next steps I assume there are two places to adjust the centering of the dressed wheel on the hollow surface of the blade, one near each end of the blade. Assuming the blade is mounted horizontally (turned on its side), this is done by raising and lowering the blade holder, or the table, at each end. If these is only one point of adjustment, the best you can do may be to compromise between centering at the two ends, or perhaps to use the center of the length.
8. With the machine turned OFF: Mount the skates (or blade) on the machine's blade holder, centered as well as you can on the blade holder by eye. If there is no holder, but just a table on which to rest the blade, likewise adjust the table height to be as well centered as you can.
9. With the machine still off: lightly touch the wheel to the blade at one end on the outermost pencil line. Adjust a divider (https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/cd/DividerCalipers.jpg/220px-DividerCalipers.jpg) or Inside Calipers (https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/c3/InsideCalipers.jpg/220px-InsideCalipers.jpg) to the distance between one side of the blade and that side of the wheel, along that line. Check that the distance between the other side of the blade, and the other side of the wheel is the same. If not, adjust the height of the blade. Repeat until the centering is perfect. You could get an even more consistent match by using a depth gauge, such as is included here (https://www.harborfreight.com/6-piece-technical-measuring-set-94447.html) (though Harbor Freight tools are not always of high quality), or the depth probe present on many precision calipers.
10. Do the same thing at the other end of the blade. Repeat step 9 and 10 until both are perfect.
11. Things might still not be perfect, because some machines don't quite dress symmetrically on the wheel. So, with the machine still off, use the wheel to scratch a very short mark across those pencil lines at each end, moving the blade (or blade holder) by hand to make the scratch.
12. Now repeat what you just did in step 9 and 10 with the sides of the wheel, but use the sides of the scratch. Repeat this step until both until the scratches at both ends are perfectly centered on the blade.
13. Use a broad magic marker to create a dark layer across the whole hollow of the blade. (Some people use pencil - but I'm not clear how to make a uniformly thick layer of graphite with a pencil.)
13. With a cloth, wipe a very thin layer of light machine oil on the sides of the blade and along the hollow, so the cut will be clean. Not everyone does this - some people say it gums up the wheel, which then needs to be cleaned of oil. But I believe clean edges glide longer and faster.
14. Turn the machine on. Very lightly draw the length of the blade across the rotating wheel. (If there is no eye guard, wear safety goggles! Also, tie back long hair, and do not wear baggy sleeves, that can get caught in the machine.) You want to remove just barely enough metal so that the magic marker mark disappears. If you aren’t adjusting the rocker curvature or sweet spot, try to take the same amount of metal off the whole length. Do NOT round off the back of the blade, and do NOT touch the toe pick.
15. Take the skate or blade out of the machine. Using a square across the blade, check that the inside and outside edges are level. If not: the previous skate tech must have sharpened the blade very far off center; make another pair of pencil lines 1/4 - 1/3" inwards from the first ones, and go back to step 7. The repetition will waste metal. (It is actually a good idea to use pairs of straight edges, and line them up by eye. The two straight edges should be perfectly parallel. Some straight edges designed for the purpose are magnetized, so they stick to the blade)
15. At this point, depending on how coarse the wheel is, there may be a lip or burr, oriented outwards to the sides, along each edge. You can feel it by very gently running your finger across the blade sides, just like the bent over edges in step 1. (Again, do not run your finger along the blade edge or burr.) You can do one of two things: "Deburr" it by removing the burr, or straighten the burr, and polish it flat, to make an ultra-sharp foil edge. Most skate techs think they deburr it, but actually do something in between. True foil edges are very fragile – taking even one step off ice bends them over or breaks them. But they make the blade super-sharp even if the ROH is large, which I believe means they can be used to extend the lifetime of the blade. But people who don’t take good care of their edges should not use foil edges.
16. In either case, do the same thing with the steel or flat stone that I mentioned in step 1. If you tilt the stone slightly inwards, it tends to deburr rather than create a foil edge.
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Clarification:
I have very little experience with power tools. My only experience with a powered skate sharpening tool has been with an out of date machine and mostly out of date blades, and was done under the instruction of someone I did not consider a master, without the benefit of measuring tools. I have watched real masters sharpen without using most of these measurement tools.
I do not know whether the procedure will work sufficiently well, let alone with specific blades, blade holders, sharpening tools, or measuring devices.
Plus I did not include an explanatory video, in part because I don't have a powered sharpening machine.
And I should not perhaps have pictured the Harbor Freight/Pittsburgh Technical Measuring Set. While Harbor Freight tools are relatively cheap, and they provide a lifetime hand tool warranty, if you keep the receipt, my personal experience with measuring tools provided by either brand has been that they were not especially well made or especially consistent. A kit or tools from a higher end brand might have been better - I don't know what kits or brands might do better.
I would appreciate any comments on how well this would work with real equipment, and higher grade measuring tools.
Also: The blade holder I used was hard to adjust. You loosened bolts, then shifted the blade by hand. if a blade holder were adjusted instead by screws or button pushes, you could probably do what I specify faster by calibrating how far off the centering measurements were with how much to adjust the blade holder. An better design would be to build the measuring tools into the blade holder, or even better, to incorporate a self centering mechanism. I have seen blade holders that you could adjust better, though I haven't personally seen any with integral measuring tools or self centering mechanisms, unless you count the self-centering mechanism built into the Sparx machines, which I personally wouldn't want.
I have left out fine points, like Kaitsu's suggestion that you spin-balance the sharpening wheel, or various people's suggestions to polish the blade, or even how to apply tape or remove pencil marks.
(The no-longer-made hand skate sharpening tools I use, the Pro-Filer and especially the Berghman sharpeners, are more or less self-centering, but they sharpen more slowly than a professional skate tech would want, and have their limitations, as do all tools. E.g., Tstop4me says that Pro-Filers would not work with many modern blades, such as Jackson Ultima Matrix blades and Paramount blades, without modification. The Berghman tools included crumbly coarse abrasive cylinders, and only came in 1/2" ROH, and I haven't used them on modern blades either.)
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I would say that forget the idea that you use caliper to measure if blade is symmetrically in the middle of wheel. Why?
1. I can guarantee that radius in not dressed in to the middle of wheel. Why? => diamond is not most likely in the center of diamond quill + wheel thicknesses varies, errors in machines, etc.
2. Wheels side surfaces has some small amount of axial runout
3. Your caliper tip does not most likely contact exactly to the corner where chrome removal ends and hollow starts. Chrome removal angles vary a lot and they have not grind symmetrically compared to the chromed areas.
If hollow is already in the middle of blade when you start sharpening, all you need is precision square and marker pen. No matter how precise you try to make measurements before starting grinding, you need to do skate carriage height adjustments during the sharpening. At least I have never-ever managed to sharpen any skate without needing to adjust the height while sharpening.
If you have lots of money and want to try some more fancy measurement system, see…
https://blademaster.com/web/en/gauging-accessories/247-bhc2005.html
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i1dOFcz_LL8&t=7s
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BTW, I made an obvious mistake in my description. The pencil line should be across the hollow surface, not the sides.
Thanks!
While I have seen a Blademaster machine where the diamond tip seemed to be in the center of the wheel, it makes sense that there might be some variation in the things you mention.
So I wouldn't expect centering the wheel on the blade to give a perfect solution. But it might make a good starting point, before you may your first scratch.
If you add variation in wheel thickness, diamond point offsets, and axial runout, do you happen to know about how much total variation do you see, from reputable companies like Blademaster, on the $10,000-$30,000 machines? How about Wissota?
I have talked to skate techs who use the scratch centering technique, before they turn on the machine, who claim it is essentially perfectly, though of course it slows them down a bit. But I don't know the exact details of how they do it. I assume, but do not know, that the hard part would be lining up an edge of the scratch mark with the end of a caliper or divider point or depth gauge (or depth probe), by eye. I don't know how precisely one can do stuff like that by eye. I think it would be easier if you let it just barely touch, but am not certain.
I do wonder whether the wheel , if the blade is almost perfectly sharp with the same ROH, can make a scratch with clean edges. If the blade was already perfectly sharpened, the wheel would touch the entire hollow area, not just the bottom. Even if it were only close to perfect, perhaps that scratch would be too wide, to have a clean shape??
Many very good skate techs say they remove about .003" of metal/sharpening on figure skating blades. That doesn't leave room for many mistakes.
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I don’t know why I read all about sharpening, because I can feel it making my eyes glaze over, yet it’s somehow interesting. I cannot imagine trying to sharpen blades myself.
It’s not useful information, but it may interest you to hear about how sharpening works where I am. According to my coach there is no machine for holding and sharpening figure blades in the entire country, just hockey. Coaches and high level skaters go to one hockey guy who has been sharpening since before the eastern bloc fell apart, and I’ve recently had my second sharpening done by him.
I don’t know my radius of hollow, and he didn’t ask my preference either. I think everyone just gets the same whatever it it? In conversation he asked about how much I skate and who my coach is, but I’m not sure if that was chatter or meant to be useful information.
He makes no markings and uses no straight edges etc. He just looks at the blade a bit, adjusts his wheel, then holds the skate and makes a bunch of passes very carefully while still chatting about skating stuff. Eventually he holds up the skate and peers at the blade carefully and maybe does another pass or two before scuffing the edges to de-burr. ETA: he holds the skate in just his hands and brushes the blade against a vertically mounted wheel unlike the horizontal way I’ve seen otherwise.
It’s impressive, but I wish I had remembered to trace my blade before the first time and since to compare like Bill does, because I think it would have been interesting. Skating has been much nicer after the sharpenings, but I do wonder just a bit about changes to the sweet spot and such over the course of many. I went an absurd amount of time before sharpening, accidentally, but I know my coach purposely goes more than forever between his. I was at (I forget for sure, but something like 70 or 80 hours,) and my coach was like “Ah, that’s fine. You could wait much longer.” :o
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It's amazing what a person with considerable experience can do.
But still... :o :o
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Yikes! Alba_NY: It would be interesting to trace your profile and compare it to the profile of a new blade of the same type. What blade are you on?
As Bill says, impressive what experience can do, but eeeeeeeeeek!!! Maybe look for a ProFiler or even a Bergmann hand sharpener?
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I know right? :o
I realllly wish I had remembered to do the tracings. I suppose I should now and compare when I get new blades if I send my boots to Harlick this summer, (as I hope to for new soles to add a tiny bit of toe width?) If I have a mechanical pencil around I’ll see what I can do.
They are Ultima Aspire XPs mounted in April, a month before leaving NY.
Skating has felt much better after both sharpenings with no weirdness at all… just nice feeling, but I haven’t been learning to spin yet which I assume would make any change more apparent?
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Some very good skate techs seem to do pretty well without taking any obvious measurements. E.g., they can judge edge evenness by sighting along the bottom of the blade, as it sounds like yours does. I have advocated taking measurements, partly because I think it speeds up the learning process. Most of the time, I don't measure either - just once in a while I recheck the profile.
There is a special blade holder that forces figure skating blades to not be warped, and there are also special holders for certain types of figure blades that won't fit in normal holders (including some figure skate blade holders), but for the most part, I think hockey sharpening machines - as long as they aren't automatic - can sharpen figure skates.
I would be horrified if they use a sharpening machine that automatically creates a "standard" hockey profile. For example, if it removes or trims toe picks or rounds off the back, or if it causes the blade to have relatively flat rocker (longwise curvature) in the center, but to have much more curvature at the ends. :(
If almost all the figure skaters in your country go to the same skate tech, maybe they have given that skate tech a fair amount of feedback, or if the skate tech is conscientious, they may have taken the time to learn about figure blades, so it is possible they might do pretty well.
And a lot of the same principles apply.
It is true that hockey skate techs usually remove more metal - but a conscientious hockey-trained tech who has also read up or studied or received feedback on figure skates might not do that on figure skates. I would guess that if you get about 30 or more sharpenings out of a blade pair (calculated by assuming each sharpening removes about .003", and the relationship to the toe pick remains fairly good for the first .1" or so of metal removed (people disagree on those exact numbers)), they are doing about right in terms of amount of metal removed.
When hockey trained techs try to restore or modify blade shapes, they typically seek a shape appropriate to hockey - typically one shape for offensive players, one for defensive players, and goalies need their own shapes - but, again, a conscientious well trained skate tech might know better than to do that on figure skates.
So I don't think we should casually assumed that the person does a bad job, just because they take no obvious measurements, and they don't have a machine specific to figure skates.
Also, I don't know whether either a Pro-Filer or a Berghman sharpener will work with your specific blades. tstop4me has pointed out that my casual assumption that you can make them work with all modern figure blades (mine are out of date) may not be true, for several reasons.
E.g., Pro-Filers are specific to one specific ROH (radius of hollow), and they were available for more than one blade width (e.g., hockey blades are thinner than figure blades) - and the hockey Pro-Filer kits had less stuff. I wasted a lot of time making a hockey Pro-Filer work on my figure blades. I widened the slot size, and reduce the depth of the slot, using a file, while keeping the slot centered on the stone. If you are a little afraid to use tools, that might seem scary. The Berghmans were only available for 1/2" hollow, the stones that came with them were of an older crumbly type, and were pretty coarse, and I don't know if they will work with all modern blades either - the slot width is adjustable, but the depth is not. (OTOH, the old used Berghmans are fairly cheap.)
(BTW I use " as an abbreviation for "inch", which is 2.54 cm in my country. E.g., 1/2"=1.27 cm. Do most people in your country know what inches are, and do they know about the " abbreviation?)
As a good starting point, you are right - if you can scan in the shape of your blades (you may not need a mechanical pencil. If you are careful, and don't scratch the glass on your scanner, you can gently place a blades on the scanner , and just put white paper behind them, and get a good scan, without using a pencil - regardless, you should also place rulers on the same scan, so we can figure out the scaling, or put graph paper with a known spacing behind them), and someone else here happens to have the same blade style, you can check the shape. If the blade shapes are pretty close, that would be a good indicator that your skate tech might know what they are doing. Do it for both blades.
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bonjour,
Je suis en France (et papa d'une patineuse figure skate) et j'attends d'ici quelques jours ma blademaster 850 d'occasion.
on ne trouve rien en incredible edger ni wissota, alors on achete ce qu'on trouve avec des pieces détachees facilement trouvable.
Peut on utiliser la piece jointe en photo (Grinding Stones and Carbide Sharpener with Dual-Component Handle ) au lieu de la pierre à affuter.
Je suis jardinier et je fais qu'avec cela pour affuter mes outils.
Pour centrer les patins, pourrait on imaginer avec une bonne regle de mesurer l'axe de l'arrondi taillé par le diamant et de calculer facilement l'axe du patin reporté par un comparateur quelconque?
Auriez vous des astuces pour mieux faire glisser le porte patin (cire, w40, autre...).
Quelle meule? (la machine sera équipé de 8mxruby) je pensais déjà acheter une meule 88R.
Comme certains l'ont dit ici, c'est pour éviter de courrir des centaines de kilometres que je fait cela....
J'espère au moins avoir la satisfaction d'y arriver.
Merci pour toutes les infos précieuses que j'ai trouvé ici et là dans votre forum
Hello,
I'm in France (and daddy of a figure skate skater) and I'm expecting my used 850 blademaster in a few days.
we can't find anything in incredible edger or wissota, so we buy what we find with easily findable spare parts.
You can use the attached picture (Grinding Stones and Carbide Sharpener with Dual-Component Handle) instead of the sharpening stone.
I am a gardener and I do that with it to sharpen my tools.
To center the pads, could one imagine, with a good rule, measuring the axis of the roundness cut by the diamond and easily calculating the axis of the pad reported by any comparator?
Do you have any tips to make the pad holder slide better (wax, w40, other ...).
What grinding wheel? (the machine will be equipped with 8mxruby) I was already thinking of buying an 88R wheel.
As some have said here, it's to avoid running hundreds of miles that I'm doing this ....
At least I hope I have the satisfaction of making it happen.
Thank you for all the valuable info that I found here and there in your forum
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What brand and model of blades you are sharpening? What ROH (radius of hollow) do your child's skates use?
I don't know enough about the hand tool you picture to say anything. The ideas behind most sharpening tools are relatively simple. But only a few have been made accurately enough to do a good job on ice skates. And sometimes the tool has to fit the the specific blades.
Some hand tools are designed to replace powered sharpening machines like your Blademaster. The good ones work with only one ROH.
Other hand tools, like flat stones, are designed to deburr (or polish and repoint the burr) after another sharpening tool has been used. They can be very simple.
Others - like "kitchen steels" are designed to straighten or slightly modify an edge that is already there.
I'm not smart enough to figure out from your picture all the things the tool is supposed to do.
AFAIK, gardening tools don't require high precision or accuracy. But if you are good with tools, you have a big advantage.
Blademaster is a very well known maker of skate sharpening machines. Many pro shops use their machines, including some very good shops. Of course I don't know whether your machine is in good condition.
Blademaster has made many different types of blade holder. Some of the old ones are very hard to adjust: you loosen bolts, move the blade by hand, with no guidance or scales, and re-tighten them. So sometimes you make the centering worse instead of better. That wastes a lot of metal on your blades. I hope you get a blade holder that makes it easy to tell how much you have adjusted it.
I did my best here to suggest a method of centering, that I thought would work. But some other people here have expressed doubts about at least some of my methods. I haven't used a powered sharpening machine enough to be sure.
There are a lot of videos on Youtube that show people how to use Blademaster machines. Many good ones are made by people who work for Blademaster. I think Blademaster's own videos are all in English. but do not know.
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J'aurais le porte patin sh2000 et la machine n'est pas très vieille et elle est très propre.
Il est moins bon je pense que le porte patin wissota mais je pense que c'est une bonne base.
J'aurais aussi le contrôleur de Care ( perpendiculaire).
Celui qui affûter avant faisait à l'oeil, donc je suis assez confiant, pour le centrage
I would have the sh2000 pad holder and the machine is not very old and it is very clean.
It is less good I think the wissota skate holder but I think it is a good base.
I would also have the Care controller (perpendicular).
The one who sharpened before did with the eye, so I am quite confident, for the centering
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excuse me for the previous bad translation
I would have the sh2000 pad holder and the machine is not very old and it is very clean.
It is less good I think the wissota skate holder but I think it is a good base.
I would also have the Care controller (perpendicular).
The one who sharpened before did with the eye, so I am quite confident, for the centering
I would have the sh2000 pad holder and the machine is not very old and it is very clean.
It is less good I think the wissota skate holder but I think it is a good base.
I would also have the Care controller (perpendicular).
The one who sharpened before did with the eye, so I am quite confident, for the centering
Modify message
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Hello Marc,
I would say that Bahco sharp-x is not good for skates. Its designed more to garden tools and probably there you have get used to this tool.
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You can use the attached picture (Grinding Stones and Carbide Sharpener with Dual-Component Handle) instead of the sharpening stone.
I am a gardener and I do that with it to sharpen my tools.
Marc: Please clarify. I assume you are using this tool instead of a flat whetstone for finishing or repairing edges on the exterior sides of the skate blades. You are not using it to create a hollow. Is this correct?
I've never seen that tool before. But, in general, sharpeners designed for garden tools tend to have coarse abrasives, too coarse for skate blades.
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yes i thought i would use this tool instead of a flat whetstone for finishing or repairing edges on the exterior sides of the skate blades. You are not using it to create a hollow.
this tool is great for deburring but I think it won't be long enough,but i will try it anyway
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Marc
Remember that blade is curved. Long honing tool will not give you any benefits. It just creates problems for you. You really do not need any longer stone than what can be seen on attached picture. You need to follow chrome removal grinding and profile of the blade keeping honing tool constantly in same angle. I would say that its difficult with Bahco sharp-x. Traditional honing stones are quite soft and they will wear quite quickly when you remove nicks and therefore it needs to replaced relatively often. It comes also cheaper to replace just small piece of honing stone than large one.
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Merci Kaitsu,
mais je ne connais pas du tout cette pierre à roder en France et j'ai beau chercher, j'en trouve pas.
Même si bacho sharp-x est plus fait pour aiguiser de l'acier, je vais essayer quand même d'ebavurer les patins en inox.
Le plus dur, dans tout ça, c'est de bien centrer la meule.
Et je suis convaincu qu'il y a une solution pas trop chère, mais faut la trouver.
Le blademaster bhc 2005 est bien trop cher.
Je suis décu que l'axe de la meule n'est pas l'axe du radius. Ca aurait été si simple.
On doit pouvoir mesurer par rapport à la table de glisse cet axe et ajouter la moitié de l'epaisseur de la lame de patin et le reporter sur un comparateur mecanique?
Thanks Kaitsu,
but I do not know at all this stone to be lapped in France and no matter how much I search, I cannot find any.
Even though bacho sharp-x is more suited to sharpening steel, I will still try to deburr the stainless steel runners.
The hardest part in all of this is to center the wheel properly.
And I am convinced that there is a solution that is not too expensive, but it must be found.
The bhc 2005 blademaster is way too expensive.
I am disappointed that the axis of the grinding wheel is not the axis of the radius. It would have been so easy.
Should we be able to measure this ax in relation to the sliding table and add half the thickness of the skate blade and transfer it to a mechanical comparator?
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Je connaissais pas l'equilibrage des meules, et j'ai découvert ça en m'interessant à l'affutage des patins.
y a t il vraiement une grande defférence entre équilibré et non équilibré?
Ca n'agit pas sur le centrage mais plutôt sur des petites vagues tout le long du patin?c'est ça?
I did not know the balancing of the grindstones, and I discovered that while interested in the sharpening of the skates.
Is there really a big difference between balanced and unbalanced?
It does not act on the centering but rather on small waves all along the skate? Is that it?
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A wheel that is out of balance vibrates. That reduces the quality of the surface finish of the sharpened blade. It is rougher.
Here's a photo showing a very rough sharpening on a pair of skates that I received for work. The blade is shown mounted in my holder right before sharpening.
(https://www.afterness.com/skating/images/wissota/kristens_skates_wissota-arrow-36-800px.jpg)
How sensitive skaters are to this is a variable that probably depends on the skater and their skill. A slightly rougher finish might feel like a skating glide on warm, soft ice because of a little more friction. In my rink, a rough vs. smooth finish on a blade is not going to be as noticeable as how recently the ice was groomed, or if we have a warm spell causing softer ice.
That said, the wheel on my Wissota sharpening machine was adequately balanced from the factory. It's not perfect, but I get a better finish from my machine than most rink pro shops I've visited. It's certainly better than the rink sharpening shown in the photo above.
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With regards to using a coarse stone of any sort to deburr -
I personally have chosen to use an expensive 5000 grit (U.S. standard) flat stone, designed to help sharpen razors. I like the finish it creates, and feel it does less damage to the edge. If you use a coarse grit, it rounds off the edge a lot, which means your edge is effectively much less sharp. Even when I am not trying to create an ultra-sharp edge, I like this stone. But it may be finer and more expensive than it needs to be.
I tried coarser grit stones before, and did not like the results.
But a lot of people who sharpen skates make due with less expensive and somewhat coarser grit stones.
I would be curious what grit sizes the other people in this discussion use.
The type of edge you want for garden tools may be different from a figure skating or hockey blade. A garden tool sometimes hits rocks, so it should not be very sharp. On well maintained ice rinks, there are no rocks.
I think a little unevenness and variability doesn't matter much on garden tools, but can affect skating a lot. A flat stone is easier to control than a curved stone, so it is easier to produce a uniform edge.
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I believe Marc was referring to original topic, how to level the blade before starting grinding (to save some material / extend blade lifetime). I believe that if the blade does not contact exactly in the middle of wheel does not have so much to with chatter marks. Eccentricity would do that. Attached picture where you can see how much I do have currently offset on my machine. I could adjust it to be better, but I have been too lazy to do that. Randomly I may use some other wheels with different thickness.
Lots of skate techs uses method where they start machine and make witness marks to the blade and adjust the height based on the witness marks. I do not like this method as I feel that in long term blade would look like a bread knife (exaggerated). I use almost same method, but I do my best to avoid changing the blade to become bread knife. Like I mentioned earlier, in my opinion all you need is precision square and marker pen. Here is link to instruction how I do the leveling for every single blade before stating the machine. https://www.dropbox.com/s/pco8i1q090te7st/Simple%20instruction%20for%20levelling%20blade.pdf?dl=0
I know that the next question is that what about if the edges are not even?
That mistake (hopefully) has been made someone else than you and unfortunately repairing that consumes always some metal / liftime of blade. Typically before the edge which was lower has become sharp, you have found the levelness. At least very close. Levelness may still change a bit until both edges are sharp. If you wheel cuts very aggressively (typically means lots of sparks) you will remove material also very quickly. My recommendation is dress wheel so that it will not cut so aggressively until you have got edges to be even. You can even use wax on wheel to reduce the cut until you have found the levelness close enough.
So if the edges are not level when you start grinding, you need to adjust your skate holder so that you remove material from that side of the hollow where edge is higher. Witness marks on painted blade helps on this task. Estimating correct amount of error compensation requires some experience and good luck too. Sometimes you are luckier than in another time. That is the way how life goes.
Precision hair edge square is the only edge checker what I personally trust. Commonly used magnetic edge checkers are also good as their long "wings" increases accuracy. With the square measuring distance is much shorter. Magnetic versions are made from aluminum and they wear in use. Another more major issue is that blade side surfaces are not always flat. If you take a look my Youtube videos, you can see how badly blades side surfaces can be convex. Precision square tells me also that. When square shows me that the side surface is not flat, I can try to make sharpening so that cabs on both sides of convex shape are identical.
Its more matter of opinion which edge checker tool is best. The main message is anyhow that even eyes can be accurate, they will not beat good measuring tools. Even the wooden pencil is better that just eye balling the blade. See an example https://www.dropbox.com/s/89qufzkgp26yws5/Edge%20checking.pdf?dl=0
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kaitsu,
merci encore pour ces riches informations.
Quelle est ta chaine video toutube?
ou peut on trouver cette petite equerre 'Precision hair edge square'
Puisque tu es en europe ou peut on aussi trouver une equilibreuse de meule? (je trouve pas)
et je vois qu'il y en a un qui a ouvert un nouveau post
kaitsu,
thank you again for this rich information.
What is your toutube video channel?
where can we find this small square 'Precision hair edge square'
Since you are in Europe or can we also find a wheel balancer? (I do not find)
and I see that there is one that opened a new post
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The type of edge you want for garden tools may be different from a figure skating or hockey blade. A garden tool sometimes hits rocks, so it should not be very sharp. On well maintained ice rinks, there are no rocks.
I think a little unevenness and variability doesn't matter much on garden tools, but can affect skating a lot. A flat stone is easier to control than a curved stone, so it is easier to produce a uniform edge.
Actually, I want to completely unsay that.
A figure skate should sink deep enough to prevent sideways skidding, but should not go too deep.
I don't garden much. Some of th elittle I have done might have been easier if some of the tools were very sharp.
I suppose a garden sheers might be work best if ground very accurately, so the two blades slide cleanly and snugly against each other.
So - please disregard those comments.
Kaitsu: Your pictures and instructions in the link you mention are very clear. I love how clearly you have shown everything.
But I think you are assume that the blade is already fairly sharp, If it isn't, you won't get marks all the way across the blade in step 4. Many people don't sharpen very often, so the blade may not always be that sharp. So, instead, you will get a mark somewhere in the center. That is the assumption I made.
Also, some people don't want even edges. E.g., some hockey players skate mainly on their inside edges, so it is harder to push them over. So do some beginning figure skaters, though I'm not sure you should accommodate that, because they should learn to use outside edges soon. Some skating referees use their outside edges more than their inside edges, when they are dodging pucks and sticks. Neither I nor you addressed those issues here.
I also didn't talk about the deliberate "skids" (shortened outside edges) people add to parts of the blade. E.g., many hockey goalies often slide side-to-side, and want skids on the back outside edges. A very few skate techs add skids to the front outside edge on the jumping foot of figure skates, once figure skaters start doing skidded double jumps. But I think both of those skids are usually added after the blade is sharpened, or during the deburring step.
Some issues that have nothing to do with sharpening:
Your link also talks about blade warping and the reasons it occurs. Let me mention a few other things that can warp or twist a blade.
Many skate techs have told me that MK and JW blades are often sent from the factory warped, even when new. Many skate techs feel that MK's and JW's quality control program (they are owned by the same company now, and I was told they are made at the same factory, possibly on the same production line) should reject warped blades more often.
BTW, Mike Cunningham, a (retired) skate tech who had once been a welder, told me he suspected that MK and JW blades are often warped because of the way the runner and base are welded together. Metal expands when it gets hot, and if you aren't very careful about the way the pieces have been heated, after the two pieces cool, one may contract more than the other, or they may contract unevenly, creating a warp. I suppose that if the base and runner are not made of the same steel alloy, and they don't have the same coefficient of thermal expansion, that could complicate matters too.
I am not sure, when you talk about a bent "blade holder" in step 5 of your link, whether you mean the way in which the runner is attached to the base on the skate, or the blade holder you use when sharpening. Certain hockey skate companies have bolted or riveted runners on the skates between pieces that are manufactured bent, in some skate sizes, and that forces the runner to bend with it. Even if the blade is straightened, it keeps warping. Is that what you meant? Or is the blade holder that you put the blade in to sharpen it sometimes bent too?
Another skate tech told me that hockey blades often become very warped because one skater runs into another skater's blades. I'm not sure if hockey sticks can also hit the blade hard enough to bend them.
Also, the way you mount a blade on the skate can easily eventually create a warp or twist. I think you shouldn't want the skate to put a twisting or bending force on the base, which will eventually in turn warp or twist the runner. That's one of the reasons people sometimes place shims between the blade mounting plate and the skate. Also, if you mount one end of the blade on the skate, tighten it, and mount the other end to create a specific alignment, and tighten it, that eventually warps the blade. Some people mount the blade using the temporary (sliding) screw slots, look how well the blade aligns with the skaters body when they skate, and whether their weight is centered on the front and back of the runner. Then they hammer one end or both ends of the blade sideways so as to cause the screw to slide to improve that alignment. Later they use the permanent (round) screw holes, maybe after a few days or weeks. That is a relatively fast technique, that initially can create a well aligned blade. But the procedure has probably created a twisting force on the blade, which will to some extent transfer a warp to the runner. I personally think one should instead mark where a proper alignment places the front and back of the blade, and only then use the permanent holes to create the same alignment, being sure to create no warping force on the blade. But that takes more time to do, and not everyone agrees.
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Another more major issue is that blade side surfaces are not always flat. If you take a look my Youtube videos, you can see how badly blades side surfaces can be convex. Precision square tells me also that. When square shows me that the side surface is not flat, I can try to make sharpening so that cabs on both sides of convex shape are identical.
I assume you know that blade side surfaces are often DELIBERATELY not flat. Blade companies usually charge more for blades with non-flat surfaces. E.g., with dovetail shapes, that are wider at the bottom - though that would be concave, not convex.
I'm not sure if there is a good reason for a blade to deliberately have convex sides. But perhaps there is a structural engineering reason to shape them that way - i.e., can you ever make a slightly lighter blade of a given strength or stiffness shaped that way? It wouldn't surprise me if ultralight blades whose runners are bound to non-metalic substances, such as carbon fiber, were often deilberately not flat on the sides.
I should have also clarified that on plated runner blades whose plating has been removed at the bottom working surfaces (e.g., that have a "chrome relief"), the hollow should be centered on that portion of the blade, not the plated portion.
I do not know if there are any runners that are plated with a softer metal at the bottom too. If so, that would create problems if the plating is not the same thickness on both sides. I can't think of a good way to solve that, since if your edges are initially level, they might not stay that way as the plating metal wears away.
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With regards to using a coarse stone of any sort to deburr -
I personally have chosen to use an expensive 5000 grit (U.S. standard) flat stone, designed to help sharpen razors. I like the finish it creates, and feel it does less damage to the edge. If you use a coarse grit, it rounds off the edge a lot, which means your edge is effectively much less sharp. Even when I am not trying to create an ultra-sharp edge, I like this stone. But it may be finer and more expensive than it needs to be.
I tried coarser grit stones before, and did not like the results.
But a lot of people who sharpen skates make due with less expensive and somewhat coarser grit stones.
I would be curious what grit sizes the other people in this discussion use.
The type of edge you want for garden tools may be different from a figure skating or hockey blade. A garden tool sometimes hits rocks, so it should not be very sharp. On well maintained ice rinks, there are no rocks.
I think a little unevenness and variability doesn't matter much on garden tools, but can affect skating a lot. A flat stone is easier to control than a curved stone, so it is easier to produce a uniform edge.
Refer to this thread https://skatingforums.com/index.php?topic=8701.0 , Reply #12 and #13.
Each edge is formed by the intersection of two surfaces: an inside surface that's a portion of the hollow and an outside surface (external to the hollow) along the nominal "side" of the blade. Unless the ice is very soft, the edge does not bite into the ice very deep. So typically we need be concerned with the surface finish only near the apex of the edge. [If the ice is so soft that your blade sinks in deep, you'll have inherently high friction anyway, so surface finish won't be an important factor in that instance.] The hollow will be ground with either a commercial powered machine or a manual sharpener; the abrasive will be 100 grit or maybe 320 grit or so at the finest. So, unless you polish the inside (hollow) surface as well, I don't think you gain much advantage (if at all) in using an ultrafine 5000 grit (vs a 320 grit or at most a 600 grit) whetstone to polish the outside surface only [as discussed in a previous post, PBHE (http://precisionblade.com/index.php/product-catalogue/) supplies a manual unit for polishing the hollow; and I've seen listings for polishing wheels for commercial powered sharpeners, though I've never come across a tech who uses one].
Since we have recent members who are interested in sharpening, I'll discuss (in a separate thread) my latest refinements in honing both surfaces of an edge with a "steel".
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But I think you are assume that the blade is already fairly sharp, If it isn't, you won't get marks all the way across the blade in step 4. Many people don't sharpen very often, so the blade may not always be that sharp. So, instead, you will get a mark somewhere in the center. That is the assumption I made.
This method works even the blades would be dull. Wheel just don´t contact in to areas where the steel has worn out. Most part of the hollow still exists, right?
Bad nicks will causes sometimes troubles when they are higher than the hollow. This marker trick hardly ever align blade so accurately that height adjustment of skate carriage would not needed while grinding. It ensures that you wont start to grind 3.8mm thick blade with 4mm blade setup, like too many skate techs do. I call them plug&play sharpeners.
Also, some people don't want even edges. E.g., some hockey players skate mainly on their inside edges, so it is harder to push them over. So do some beginning figure skaters, though I'm not sure you should accommodate that, because they should learn to use outside edges soon. Some skating referees use their outside edges more than their inside edges, when they are dodging pucks and sticks. Neither I nor you addressed those issues here.
So far no-ones has requested from me to make uneven edges for their figure skates, but I have lots and lots of experience that figure skaters has been much more happier to their skates after unevenness has been corrected. Quite may of them say that spins are much more easier after uneven edges were grind to be even. If someone wants uneven edges to their figure skates, I will guide them to go these so called plug&play sharpeners. I do not have enough accurate angle protractor to ensure that skater will get every time same unevenness to their skates. Repeatability combined with the high accuracy are that those key factors which ensures that skater does not need get used to "totally new skates" every time they are sharpened. 0.25 degrees deviation in the squareness should be still acceptable, but typically deviations are somewhere 1-3 degrees.
Instead of making uneven edges for the very beginners, better idea is to grind a bit deeper hollow for them so that they can trust to their skates. Maximum glide is not most important feature in that stage. Skates should be anyhow sharpened properly also for them, even they often walk on concrete fools without blade covers.
Warped blades
My instruction assumes that skate tech has done his/her duties in earlier step where blades has been mounted into the boots. When I get skates which I have never been sharpened before, I will always check and correct blade straightness. So in my instruction the marker will indicate if I follow the same traces as last time. If not and skates should in condition of your previous sharpening, then alarm bell should ring in your head and you should stop to think what has changed.
I would estimate that 70% of the figure skates are suffering from the wrapped blades and mostly because skate techs does not pay attention how they wrap / twist / bend the blade while they mount them.
Unfortunately Sid Broadbent planar boots didn't fly on figure skate world. In roller skates they are used, even the benefits would be same or even higher on figure skates. I would say that planar boots would solve quite many issues.
I am not sure, when you talk about a bent "blade holder" in step 5 of your link, whether you mean the way in which the runner is attached to the base on the skate, or the blade holder you use when sharpening.
I am referring to skate carriage where you mount the blade while sharpening. With skate carriage you can force blade to be more straight or bent it to be not straight.
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I am really happy to discuss with the best sharpeners (kaitsu and tstop4me that I discovered in a short time, and others certainly ....).
My job is a gardener, and one day I was offered a little sharpening training, and since that day, all my tools cut like a razor. every gardener sharpens with a grinder or a sharpening stone, not me. I sharpen with a bacho sharp x. When you sharpen a hedge trimmer with a grinder, in some sharpening the teeth break !!
I believe in grinding wheels for roughing, yes but not to finish?
And the tstop4me tools look great for finishing the hollow in the axis: The blade is honed using a 15 micro finishing film on a honing mandrel with the exact radius as the grinding wheel.
From my small level, I believe that it is the best tool to properly finish the interior of the hollow.
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I am really happy to discuss with the best sharpeners (kaitsu and tstop4me that I discovered in a short time, and others certainly ....).
My job is a gardener, and one day I was offered a little sharpening training, and since that day, all my tools cut like a razor. every gardener sharpens with a grinder or a sharpening stone, not me. I sharpen with a bacho sharp x. When you sharpen a hedge trimmer with a grinder, in some sharpening the teeth break !!
I believe in grinding wheels for roughing, yes but not to finish?
And the tstop4me tools look great for finishing the hollow in the axis: The blade is honed using a 15 micro finishing film on a honing mandrel with the exact radius as the grinding wheel.
From my small level, I believe that it is the best tool to properly finish the interior of the hollow.
Just to clarify:
* I don't have a power sharpener (at least right now). Kaitsu, supersharp, and Bill_S are the ones here with experience with power sharpeners. I've used the Pro-Filer manual sharpener.
* The PBHE honing tools were previously discussed. I haven't used them myself, and can't comment on how well they work or not. I use a steel for honing. I have previous posts on that, but I'll be providing an update on improved tools.
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Unfortunately Sid Broadbent planar boots didn't fly on figure skate world. In roller skates they are used, even the benefits would be same or even higher on figure skates. I would say that planar boots would solve quite many issues.
Yeah, it's a real pity the co-planar design was not accepted. It was understandable when blade companies and boot companies were entirely separate entities, and the co-planar design would require co-operative redesign of boots and blades. But since Jackson/Ultima and Riedell/Eclipse have been supplying both boots and blades for a number of years now, I was hoping they would see the light. But apparently not.
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Refer to this thread https://skatingforums.com/index.php?topic=8701.0 , Reply #12 and #13.
So, unless you polish the inside (hollow) surface as well, I don't think you gain much advantage (if at all) in using an ultrafine 5000 grit (vs a 320 grit or at most a 600 grit) whetstone to polish the outside surface only [as discussed in a previous post, PBHE (http://precisionblade.com/index.php/product-catalogue/) supplies a manual unit for polishing the hollow; and I've seen listings for polishing wheels for commercial powered sharpeners, though I've never come across a tech who uses one].
Great discussion thread! These are my thoughts based on my experience with the Incredible Edger machine that I have used since 2006. I’ve been fortunate to be able to experiment on my own blades to test different ideas. I am mostly an ice dancer but do some spins and single jumps plus moves in the field.
CHROME RELIEF BAND SMOOTHING
I have experimented with polishing the chrome relief band on skates because years ago I noticed that when I had to clean rust off the chrome relief band, the band became smoother. As Kaitsu says, both sides of the knife will affect the feel of the final product. I tried it on my own blades at the time and I could feel the difference in the smoothness of the glide. I then tried it on some of the skates belonging to other adult skaters and coaches and all of them said “I don’t know what you did different this time, but they feel so smooth”.
Since then, I’ve added that step for new blades that have a rough chrome relief band, and it has also reduced the amount of rust I need to deal with. The smoother band traps less water and is easier to wipe dry, so in the end I think I do less work by smoothing the ground chrome relief at the beginning of blade life. I check the smoothness of the chrome relief when I am given skates to sharpen, and usually will end up smoothing it again about once a heat to reduce nicks and surface damage.
The procedure is: I lay the blade on its side on my workbench on top of a smooth sheet of plastic and smooth it with a flat gummi stone, lubricated with Tri-flow or WD-40, laid flat on the chrome relief band, and spend a minute or so on each side. This is not an attempt to create perfection, particularly because I have not yet created a tool or holder that makes the process perfectly precise. However, it is a big improvement over what the blade manufacturers are providing.
Most skaters want to get every advantage that their equipment can bring them. There is no advantage in leaving the chrome relief band rough, so as long as you have enough attention to detail to be able to smooth it while holding your stone flat to the side. Marc—it sounds like you probably already have enough experience sharpening garden tools to be able to try this. The small piece of stone in Kaitsu’s photo is a good choice, as well as the Swix gummi stone that I borrowed from my ski tuning kit.
I now skate on stainless blades with no chrome relief. The sides of the blade are flat and parallel and the steel is highly polished. With level edges after every sharpening, I am consistently skating on blades with the same edge angle and with smooth sides and a pretty smooth hollow. I think it really helps to have the edge angle consistent within a small range (it will change slightly as the blades wear down from newly sharpened to their duller conformation).
HAND-POLISHING THE HOLLOW
I have also experimented with hand-polishing tools for smoothing the hollow. A tech who used to sharpen a lot of school figure (“patch”) blades showed me how to use a small chunk of wooden dowel wrapped in garnet paper to smooth the hollow after machine grinding. The adult skaters and coaches gave me very positive feedback on adding this step. Eventually, I found the PBHE website and I ordered the tools that they make for hand polishing (a cylinder wrapped in 15-micron grit sandpaper that is exactly the size of the hollow). Unfortunately, I found the holder for the cylinders to be very frustrating to use. The brass adjustment screws scratch the sides of the blade and are finicky to get centered on the blade. The holder gets very sloppy on parabolic or tapered blades. Since I had years of experience hand-guiding the dowel through the hollow, I switched to hand-guiding the cylinders and don’t use the holder at all. This produced a better finish than the dowel and garnet paper. The blade must be clamped securely with the hollow facing up to do this, because you need to both see and feel the travel of the dowel or cylinder. I also very strongly recommend cut-proof gloves because I sliced my thumb open (requiring 3 stitches) when my hand slipped. The disadvantage of this method is that if your hand slips and you run the cylinder up over the edge, you dull one single section so you have to regrind with the machine and start over with the hand polishing. Not the ideal system, but I did this for about a year and a half while slowly troubleshooting through my machine to reduce the chatter it was producing. It allowed me to provide a better finish than my machine could produce at the time. (I have now realized that the spindle bearings were aging and that was the biggest source of vibration.)
After tearing the machine apart and rebuilding it multiple times to reduce vibration, plus replacing parts, switching to Blademaster ruby wheels and learning how to balance them (thank you, Kaitsu!), I now get a considerably improved finish with only a tiny bit of micro-chatter. I’ve compared it at 15x magnification and it is clearly smoother than what I was achieving previously with the hand tools. After skating on it, I can tell it is smoother. It feels superb right away. Previously, it would take about 3 hours of skating on freshly sharpened blades before my school figures felt smooth and normal—there was always some increased drag on the freshly sharpened blades. Now they feel smooth from the first moment on the ice. I think I could improve it further with the hand tools, but it may be to the point where the difference would be undetectable.
I had previously been convinced that the hand tool was a critical final step in the process, but now I can see it is just one of the ways to improve the machine finish, and may not be necessary. Also, you will need cylinders to match every ROH, which gets expensive. Eventually, I want to develop a better holder for the cylinders to see if I can get a more perfect finish, but that’s on my list for future projects.
Marc—before you invest in the hand honing tools, I recommend seeing what kind of finish your new machine produces.
DE-BURRING AGTER GRINDING
In all cases, I deburr the edges after I finish grinding. I can see and feel the difference in smoothness and also feel the difference on the ice. Edges that are not deburred are very grabby and tend to make skaters hate having their blades sharpened. I use a ceramic stone for this, a 5mm-ish cylinder that I was given for this purpose by the tech who showed me the dowel-and-garnet-paper technique.
LINING UP THE WHEEL WIH THE BLADE
I follow the same procedure as Kaitsu. I was trained to grind a tiny spot to determine alignment, but once I was working on my own I became concerned about creating inconsistencies along the blade. Turning the wheel by hand scrapes the marker lines without removing extra metal. I have tried to check lineup by viewing the blade and wheel from the side, but unfortunately it only gives you a rough idea of lineup. Once you have successfully sharpened one blade in a pair, you will probably find that the second blade is lined up close to that same position, but never assume that a blade is the same as it’s partner. I measure every blade at at least 3 locations (front, first stanchion, second stanchion) with a precision square many times through the process. I’ve heard a lot of people say the “eyeball it” and that they “have a pretty good eye”. It’s really difficult to see tiny differences in edges as close together as on a skate blade, so using a tool is the sensible approach. Using the square is reliable and sure. A good precision square is a really important investment.
YAY FOR THE FORUM
It’s frustrating when no one else around you has any interest or experience with sharpening. It took me years to find this forum and to have the opportunity to discuss sharpening details with other techs and it has been extremely valuable to connect with this group. I have to add that it is a tremendous relief to find that there are others out there that are having the same questions and figuring out answers. Since I know I have a tendency to overthink things (probably a pre-requisite for being an engineer), it’s wonderful to discover that I’m not alone. For those of us who don’t want to be “plug-and-play” techs, this is a great place to share. I’m actually kind of envious of people like Marc who can get started while having access to people with expertise. So much less agonizing over the startup process! Have fun with it and ask all the questions… you will be glad you did.
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So, unless you polish the inside (hollow) surface as well, I don't think you gain much advantage (if at all) in using an ultrafine 5000 grit (vs a 320 grit or at most a 600 grit) whetstone to polish the outside surface only...
Since we have recent members who are interested in sharpening, I'll discuss (in a separate thread) my latest refinements in honing both surfaces of an edge with a "steel".
I like the very fine stone partly because I often like to reshape, redirect, and polish the sharpening burr into a very sharp but fairly fragile foil edge.
In addition, I often use the stone instead of a steel, to straighten rather than sharpen an edge.
I think both of these applications work best with gentle tools, that won't damage the foil much.
I have wondered whether foil edges contribute to my difficulty centering spins. Could it be that spinners should want their blades too shar?
I would love to know about your recent experiments using a steel.
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With a very fine grindstone and too high a grinding pressure, the burr may not be removed. The corner of the blade will be just mangled. A very sharp corner is formed on the groove side, which is higher than the hollow grinding itself. A similar but even worse result is achieved with stick sharpeners like a sweet stick. The blade should be checked on the groove side with a fingernail. If the finger nail grabbs when it slider to the hollow side to the edge, it’s not a good thing. Like Supersharp described, skates probably feels grappy also on ice, skater struggles with spins and they have problems with Twizzles. Or that is at least feedback what I have received.
It is also true that with coarse honing stone you may mistakenly round just sharpened edges. That has happened to me too many times and I have been forced to make new power grinding. Deburring of figure skates is not so easy as could be imagined. That is mainly due the unpleasant chrome removal grindings >:(
PS. I did update slightly my instruction.
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Yeah, it's a real pity the co-planar design was not accepted. It was understandable when blade companies and boot companies were entirely separate entities, and the co-planar design would require co-operative redesign of boots and blades. But since Jackson/Ultima and Riedell/Eclipse have been supplying both boots and blades for a number of years now, I was hoping they would see the light. But apparently not.
The ski industry made this change eons ago, much to the advantage of everyone involved. I had hoped that maybe when HD Sports acquired both MK and Wilson, there might be the opportunity for them to make some useful changes since they would have a bigger market share. Skaters all over the world would really benefit from a shift to co-planar or, at a minimum, a single angle to be used between sole plates and a flat surface on both the heel and toe plates. Mounting blades can be quite complicated, but it doesn't need to be. All we need is boots with flat soles and blades with flat sole plates.
Imagine how much more precise blade mounting could be if we weren't fighting to get the surfaces of the sole plates and boots to meet on flat planes! Probably 90% of the skates that I see that have been pre-mounted either have the blade positioned incorrectly (lined up with seam regardless of whether seam is at center of front or back) or the blade is mounted with either a twist (due to sole plates being on different angles laterally) or mounted so it is curved (the center of the blade is not on a straight line between the front and back of the blade). If every pair of skates that has been mounted wrong was instead mounted correctly, there would be a lot more happy skaters out there on the ice.
I have skated on blades that were twisted and that are mounted on a curve (on purpose, checking to see if I even notice a difference) and even a very small twist or curve makes skating more difficult. Your edges just aren't where you expect them to be. For example, on a twisted blade, when you rock back from front to back, you may be on an inside edge at the front and an outside edge at the back. Your foot will have to learn to make up for the twist by rocking back and doing whatever is required to stay on the inside (or outside) edge. And when you replace your blades, you will have a whole different set of things to adjust to. What a nightmare.
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I like the very fine stone partly because I often like to reshape, redirect, and polish the sharpening burr into a very sharp but fairly fragile foil edge.
I have wondered whether foil edges contribute to my difficulty centering spins. Could it be that spinners should want their blades too shar?
My guess is the foil edges make it harder for you to center a spin. Typically, once you are really really good at spinning, you can make it happen in spite of things like extreme sharp edges or dull edges, but while you are building that skill, you need a little maneuverability in the blade to find your center. Having the foil edges probably prevents some of the fine adjustments that the rest of us are performing by having blades that can shift just a tiny bit on the ice to help with our axis.
I'm curious as to what you like about the foil edges--I would think they would be very grabby and make it difficult to create minute adjustments without having to force the blade from one position to another. Do you feel like you are getting less friction because the edge that is into the ice is so thin?
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That is mainly due the unpleasant chrome removal grindings >:(
Another plus plus plus for stainless steel blades.
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Another plus plus plus for stainless steel blades.
Mirror polished stainless blades does not have chrome removal grinding, but their edges often are rolled in the polishing process. Eclipse Luna and Capri are good examples from that. Those blades are just wasting stainless steel and energy which has been used to produce them.
https://www.ice.riedellskates.eu/c/blades
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Mirror polished stainless blades does not have chrome removal grinding, but their edges often are rolled in the polishing process. Eclipse Luna and Capri are good examples from that. Those blades are just wasting stainless steel and energy which has been used to produce them.
https://www.ice.riedellskates.eu/c/blades
* Check that website carefully. The Luna and Capri blades are not marketed under the Eclipse line. In the US, those blades are not even offerred separately (https://www.ice.riedellskates.com/Catalog/Eclipse-Blades?categoryId=&filters=&sortby=1&page=1&pageSize=8&crite). The Luna and Capri are low-end junk made in China; they are not good examples to call out. In the US, they are sold pre-mounted on Riedell skate kits (boot plus blade combos). Big advantage for careless beginners is they don't rust.
* Blades marketed under the Eclipse line are made in Canada by Step. They bear the Maple Leaf/"Made in Canada" insignia. If you want to do a true comparison, you should compare the Wilson Coronation Ace to the Eclipse Aurora. As I mentioned in another post, I think that the Aurora is superior to the Coronation Ace in almost all respects, with the exception of the flatter spin rocker. The prices vary somewhat with exchange rates (Coronation Ace made in the UK; Aurora made in Canada). When I bought the Aurora several years ago, I think it was about $20 less than the Coronation Ace; at present, it's about $15 less; at times, it's been $10 - $20 more [in the US market]. I believe that if Eclipse copied the spin rocker of the Coronation Ace and kept the price within $20 or so (higher or lower) of the Coronation Ace, it would be a runaway seller. Eclipse blades are not sharpened at the factory.
* Stainless steel runners on Paramount and Ultima Matrix chassis+runner blades are not mirror polished (not sure about the Eclipse separate runners).
ETA: You seem to have a love-hate relationship with chrome relief. On the one hand, you think it is responsible for Wilson/MK blades being the best in the world. On the other hand, it is a source of grief to you. Have you compared the Wilson/MK chrome relief to the chrome relief of other manufacturers (in particular, Eclipse ... they claim CNC chrome relief process)?
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Luna and Capri blades are definitely junk. I suppose that Riedell thinks that a skater in their lower series (Opal, Pearl, Emerald, Diamond) can't tell the difference, and I see the advantage in their being stainless. The quality of the steel and the rolled edges...terrible.
It is very frustrating to be given these blades to work on because you are compelled to do as good of a job as you can, but there is no way you will be able to turn these even into an okay blade.
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agree with you 2 (supersharp and kaitsu)
3 small traces by turning the grinding wheel by hand (if the grinding wheel turns with the motor we can understand that it makes a bread knife !!)
supersharp
one cannot imagine initially sharpening with the machine (centering well) and, suddenly, in a second step to finish with a cylinder (copper pipe, hard wood, other ...) with very fine abrasive paper ?
And in a third step to deburr the exterior?
(I apologize again for: the machine translation, and I cannot insert quote)
d'accord avec vous 2 (supersharp et kaitsu)
3 petites traces en faisant tourner la meule à la main ( si la meule tourne avec le moteur on peut comprendre que ça fasse un couteau à pain!!)
supersharp
ne peut on pas imaginer dans un premier temps d'affuter à la machine ( bien centrer) et , du coup, dans un deuxème temps de finir avec un cylindre ( tuyau cuivre, bois dur, autre...) avec papier abrasif tré fin?
Et dans un troisème temps ebavurer l'exterieur?
(je m'excuse encore pour: la traduction automatique, et j'arrive pas à insert quote)
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Marc,
I suggest to read another thread => http://skatingforums.com/index.php?topic=8695.0
If the power grinder is making chatter marks or other ways not so good surface finish, you can try to improve it by hand polishing. The main issue in these tools is that they cannot correct unevenness so well and some of them travels easily non-parallel in which leads to dull edges.
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I first thought you were joking. But now it's clear you're not. For the reasons discussed above, I don't think the chrome relief is the secret to MK and Wilson's success.
You are right, I was joking. Chrome removal or actually rolled edge is not secret to the Wilson or MK success. I was trying to challenge people to disagree with me the rolled edge benefits. As we can conclude, I didn't success so well to get different opinions. This explains quite well why they success even the quality is getting worst and worst. As long as users does just not understand blades technical features, manufacturers can do what ever they want. People are sharing glory to "world best blades", no matter how bad the manufacturing quality would be. People should use some time to inspect their blades with measuring tools. After that should watch manufacturer advertising videos. If you have any technical background, it is quite easy to make conclusions why touch point lengths in new blades can vary 5mm between left and right foot and 10mm between identical blade pairs, why 7ft rocker radius can be almost anything and how Parabolic blade can be parallel even it has "parabolic grinding", etc, etc. These things users will never see because they do not measure their new blades and neither most of the skate techs. Some of the quality issues are fixed by skate techs before skaters uses them first time.
Wilson and MK success is based on myth that they have world best blades (best means also best quality to me . Even-though some other manufacturer would make 100% copy from the Wilson profiles, but with better quality, people are still too scared to buy any other brand. For this reason most of the blade manufacturers needs to refer to Wilson blades. Skaters are grown from generation to generation to believe that they should choose same blades as his/her coach and what coach coach have been using in the time when there was not any other blade manufacturers than these two.
ETA: You seem to have a love-hate relationship with chrome relief. On the one hand, you think it is responsible for Wilson/MK blades being the best in the world. On the other hand, it is a source of grief to you. Have you compared the Wilson/MK chrome relief to the chrome relief of other manufacturers (in particular, Eclipse ... they claim CNC chrome relief process)?
I hate rolled edge blades from the bottom of my heart. This is the reason why I try to wake-up people to use their own brains to think technical differences example between the rolled edge blades and dovetail blades. They are like mirrored designs from each others. It could be expected that rolled edges would exists only at lower grade beginner blades, but unfortunately they exist also on very high-end blades. In general level I hate poor quality.
I would love to check also other brands than just Wilson, MK and Ultima, but people are not buying any other brands. Exception is of course the the very beginners skates where price is priority 1. I have been using Paramount skates blades in my daughter but I changed them to Ultima blades, as Paramount's are so hard to get on our country. I would like to see Matrix blades also without dovetail design, just like in Paramount skates blades. Ultima´s dovetail design is very sensitive to have very deep nicks on edges and they are getting thinner and thinner in every sharpening.
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I'm curious as to what you like about the foil edges--I would think they would be very grabby and make it difficult to create minute adjustments without having to force the blade from one position to another. Do you feel like you are getting less friction because the edge that is into the ice is so thin?
Maybe it is just what I got used to.
I have also often skated on imperfectly maintained ice, including outdoor ice. It sometimes had incredibly poor or variable condition and temperature ice. Very sharp edges cut through the rough ice on top, so you don't need to adapt your skating style as much to ice conditions. I've skied a little too, mostly cross country. XC Skiing also occurs under highly variable conditions e.g., dry powder, very wet snow, sheer ice) , and at least for a while, I used telemark skis with sharp metal edges. And I took white water kayak lessons, from people who emphasized strong edging, and boats that had strong edges.
When I took skating lessons, I worked hardest on (low level) ice dance. My coaches emphasized deep edges, high speed over the ice, precise trajectory paths, and fast turns, all of which I think are easier - at my low level - with very sharp edges, because they help prevent sideways skidding, let you push harder (ice dance has a lot of stylized pushing strokes), and arguably creates a lower friction, faster glide (because only a very thin foil sliver penetrates much into the surface).
But maybe it makes sense that spins - and perhaps some other things, might need you to skid a little. There are certainly some common ski moves that involve skidding. And if I hadn't learned to sharpen myself, foil edges require you to visit the pro shop more often.
I've tried less sharp edges. Sometimes I use them as an exercise, to create proper weight alignment - since you need to balance more carefully to avoid skidding when your edges aren't sharp. But overall, I like the controlled feel they give me.
I'm not sure I can learn to spin well. But maybe it would be worth trying duller edges.
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Bonjour,
avec un peu d'entrainement, ce week end, j'arrive à pas mal centrer les cares et obtenir des cares qui taillent.
Mais avec ma roue de 8' j'ai fait un creux derriere le pick.
Faut que je trouve une solution afin d'éviter cela avec une meule de 8'.
Même si je pense que techniquement cela va être compliqué, avec expérience dans mon domaine (jardinier) je pense pouvoir trouver une solution, faut jamais dire jamais!
Mais faut que la trouve.
Je vais voir si la pièce jointe parait dans ce message et si ça fonctionne je vous montrerais d'autre photos.
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oups excuse me,
With a little practice, this weekend, I manage to center the cares a lot and get cares that cut.
But with my 8' wheel I made a hollow behind the pick.
I have to find a solution to avoid this with an 8' grinding wheel.
Even if I think technically it will be complicated, with experience in my field (gardener) I think I can find a solution, never say never!
But you have to find it.
I'll see if the attachment appears in this message and if it works I'll show you other photos.
Edit message
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Marc—your photo is attached to the message and is a good illustration of the disadvantage of the large diameter wheel. I have no experience with a large wheel, so I can’t help with that part of the problem.
Even with a smaller wheel, it is possible to create a distorted shape at the front of the blade. It takes very careful control to gently ease the blade onto the wheel while keeping it moving. Keep practicing and you will find a technique that works for you. I find that I get the best control when I use both hands and keep some compressive pressure between the two hands, even though they are both moving the same direction. Basically, one hand is moving the skate and the other hand is restraining the movement to add control.
I’m not sure that makes sense, particularly with some translation needed, and my limited French from secondary school is stored at the back of my brain under a mountain of more recent information…
but I think in your post, autocorrect might be changing “les carres” (edges) to “les cares” which gets translated as “cares” which is more like “soin”, to care for something. It makes sense if it is les carres and gets translated as “I manage to center the edges and get edges that cut”.
Even with the little translation glitches, it’s pretty amazing that we can communicate across the globe about these topics. Bill might be able to help you, since his Wissota sharpener has a larger wheel than my IE.
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Picture what Marc shared is what I sketched him on today morning in the Whatsup. I tried to warn him about this issue earlier. As the communication with Google translator is a bit challenging, I am not sure if he did understand what I did tried to explain him. My English is not either 100% perfect, but it seems that people anyhow understands what I try to explain.
This sharpening mistake happens so easily with large wheel machines, especially if you are beginner. I can see such a blades from every now and then. Due the toe picks you cannot tilt the skate carriage like in hockeys (see attached picture). This lead to situation where sharpening is started like I sketched to another picture. First you try to get as close to toe picks as possible. When you start to see sparks, you start to make your pass-trough. When skate carriage is moving against the table, you have some friction which makes situation even worst. Third issue is that large wheel machines has higher cutting speed, which means that it removes material faster than example Incredible edger.
With large wheel machines sharpening should be started so that you are already making your pass-tough stroke before wheel is even in contact to the blade. Other ways you create hump behind the toe pick sooner than you even realize it. This is the reason why I changed large wheel machine to small wheel machine and I will never go back to large wheel even it has own benefits. Starting the grinding behind the toe picks with small wheel diameter is 100 times easier than with large wheel. You will learn this after you have used large wheel machine and jump to small wheel machine. Used wheel on Wissota is not enough small to get help on to this issue remarkably. I have paid personally from this lessons and this is the reason why I try to warn people about the risks of large wheel machines. People are anyhow making their own choices what machine they buy. If you like more table top machines, Blademaster does have also machine with 3" wheel. Unfortunately these two are the only serial production sharpeners what I know to have 3" wheel.
When you have ones created hump (concave area), you can perhaps imagine which wheel has then wider contact area when it lays against the concave area and what that means when the wheel is rotating. Situation is getting worst and worst in every pass-trough. Feel free to believe me or not.
ps. I have updated my leveling instruction again by adding pictures from the skates where I changed ROH from 5/16" to 7/16.
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I agree that if you advance your blade into the wheel before starting the cutting motion, you will develop a divot with any rotating wheel.
I created these two animated GIF files that might show the wrong way vs. the correct way to advance the blade into the wheel to begin the cut. A light touch will mitigate the cutting rate, so never press hard into the wheel. Once the sharpening pass is started, never stop moving until it is finished. Maintain a constant speed throughout the cutting pass.
Here's the wrong way to advance a blade into the grinding wheel, and it is another way of demonstrating the "1, 2" arrows in the photo provided by Kiatsu. Don't do this, or you WILL grind a divot into the blade!
(https://www.afterness.com/skating/images/wissota/wissota_blade_improper_contact.gif)
Here is the correct way to advance a blade into contact with the grinding wheel.
(https://www.afterness.com/skating/images/wissota/wissota_blade_proper_contact.gif)
Note that the correct way begins the motion carried throughout the rest of the pass. The contact is made at a tangent to the curve of the blade. It will help provide a gentle start to the cut.
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kaitsu,
non, j'ai tout lu et tout compris, malgés nos différents langages et les quelques erreurs de traductions (mais en relisant on arrive à bien comprendre).
Cette lame est une lame d'essais, et je savais que j'arriverai à ce mauvais résultat! Mais j'essais de comprendre en me trompant, et je comprend très bien techniquement qu'il faut une machine 3'.
Mais une 3' est très compliqué à trouver en France (et les pièces détachées n'en parlons pas!) et pas trop chère.
Il n'y aurait que la Blademaster 3' peut être, mais je ne pouvais pas prendre le risque d'acheter neuf sans savoir si “I manage to center the edges and get edges that cut”.
Il faut encore que je m'entraine à faire cela, et que j'essaye de trouver une solution pour enlever cette bosse derrière le pick. (avec une wheel perpendiculaire à la lame).
Et je crois vraiment en toute vos paroles, croyais moi, et j'ai de la chance de vous avoir (et quelques autres sur ce forum) pour m'encourager '( car dans mon petit club on me prend un peu pour un fou ), mais tout le monde attends après moi (et je vous reprécise que mon métier est jardinier).
Jai appris dans mon entreprise de jardinier depuis 20 ans à faire des petites modifications des outils tel que tailles haies, tronçonneuse, broyeurs afin de les rendre plus performantes, et j'ai déjà en tête quelques idées de conceptions d'une machine 3' mais cela prendrais beaucoup , beaucoup de temps, mais faut trouver le temps, alors pour le moment je m'entraine avec ce que j'ai trouvé.
Comme déjà j'ai modifié le porte patin sh2000 blademaster et j'ai un peu copié le wissota car le réglage d'origine était vraiment nul pour centrer, et ce soir c'était déjà mieux.
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kaitsu,
no, I have read everything and understood everything, despite our different languages and the few translation errors (but by re-reading we manage to understand).
This blade is a trial blade, and I knew I would come up with this bad result! But I try to understand by making a mistake, and I understand very well technically that you need a 3' machine.
But a 3' is very difficult to find in France (and the spare parts don't talk about it!) and not too expensive.
There might only be the Blademaster 3', but I couldn't take the risk of buying new without knowing if “I manage to center the edges and get edges that cut”.
I still have to train myself to do this, and try to find a solution to remove this bump behind the pick. (with a wheel perpendicular to the blade).
And I really believe in all your words, believed me, and I'm lucky to have you (and a few others on this forum) to encourage me '(because in my little club they think I'm a bit crazy) , but everyone is waiting for me (and I repeat that my job is a gardener).
I learned in my gardening business for 20 years to make small modifications to tools such as hedge trimmers, chainsaws, wood chipper in order to make them more efficient, and I already have in mind some design ideas for a 3' machine but it would take a lot, a lot of time, but you have to find the time, so for now I'm training with what I found.
As I have already modified the sh2000 blademaster shoe holder and I copied the wissota a little because the original setting was really bad for centering, and this evening it was already better.
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You will make great progress in a short period of time, since you already are in the mindset of improving how a tool works. I hope you have some spare "disposable" blades--I really like having a nice stack of old blades on hand for practicing new ideas. Whenever skaters get new blades, I save the old blades. Sometimes people donate skates to our club and the blades are too worn to be useful for a skater, so I also keep those. I started with one pair of patch blades that were donated by the tech who trained me, which I was grateful to have but they weren't ideal since the toe pick is very flat on patch blades. Now I have some unknown amount of blades, more than 25 pairs... now that I have a cross-grinder, it has been very nice to have the old blades to practice using the cross-grinder.
Sharpening can be very stressful, but when it starts working, it is very satisfying to produce a good end product.
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Some very good skate techs seem to do pretty well without taking any obvious measurements. E.g., they can judge edge evenness by sighting along the bottom of the blade, as it sounds like yours does. I have advocated taking measurements, partly because I think it speeds up the learning process. Most of the time, I don't measure either - just once in a while I recheck the profile.
There is a special blade holder that forces figure skating blades to not be warped, and there are also special holders for certain types of figure blades that won't fit in normal holders (including some figure skate blade holders), but for the most part, I think hockey sharpening machines - as long as they aren't automatic - can sharpen figure skates.
I would be horrified if they use a sharpening machine that automatically creates a "standard" hockey profile. For example, if it removes or trims toe picks or rounds off the back, or if it causes the blade to have relatively flat rocker (longwise curvature) in the center, but to have much more curvature at the ends. :(
If almost all the figure skaters in your country go to the same skate tech, maybe they have given that skate tech a fair amount of feedback, or if the skate tech is conscientious, they may have taken the time to learn about figure blades, so it is possible they might do pretty well.
And a lot of the same principles apply.
It is true that hockey skate techs usually remove more metal - but a conscientious hockey-trained tech who has also read up or studied or received feedback on figure skates might not do that on figure skates. I would guess that if you get about 30 or more sharpenings out of a blade pair (calculated by assuming each sharpening removes about .003", and the relationship to the toe pick remains fairly good for the first .1" or so of metal removed (people disagree on those exact numbers)), they are doing about right in terms of amount of metal removed.
When hockey trained techs try to restore or modify blade shapes, they typically seek a shape appropriate to hockey - typically one shape for offensive players, one for defensive players, and goalies need their own shapes - but, again, a conscientious well trained skate tech might know better than to do that on figure skates.
So I don't think we should casually assumed that the person does a bad job, just because they take no obvious measurements, and they don't have a machine specific to figure skates.
Also, I don't know whether either a Pro-Filer or a Berghman sharpener will work with your specific blades. tstop4me has pointed out that my casual assumption that you can make them work with all modern figure blades (mine are out of date) may not be true, for several reasons.
E.g., Pro-Filers are specific to one specific ROH (radius of hollow), and they were available for more than one blade width (e.g., hockey blades are thinner than figure blades) - and the hockey Pro-Filer kits had less stuff. I wasted a lot of time making a hockey Pro-Filer work on my figure blades. I widened the slot size, and reduce the depth of the slot, using a file, while keeping the slot centered on the stone. If you are a little afraid to use tools, that might seem scary. The Berghmans were only available for 1/2" hollow, the stones that came with them were of an older crumbly type, and were pretty coarse, and I don't know if they will work with all modern blades either - the slot width is adjustable, but the depth is not. (OTOH, the old used Berghmans are fairly cheap.)
(BTW I use " as an abbreviation for "inch", which is 2.54 cm in my country. E.g., 1/2"=1.27 cm. Do most people in your country know what inches are, and do they know about the " abbreviation?)
As a good starting point, you are right - if you can scan in the shape of your blades (you may not need a mechanical pencil. If you are careful, and don't scratch the glass on your scanner, you can gently place a blades on the scanner , and just put white paper behind them, and get a good scan, without using a pencil - regardless, you should also place rulers on the same scan, so we can figure out the scaling, or put graph paper with a known spacing behind them), and someone else here happens to have the same blade style, you can check the shape. If the blade shapes are pretty close, that would be a good indicator that your skate tech might know what they are doing. Do it for both blades.
Query, I am sorry I totally missed that there were new replies here until now.
I never thought about scanning the blades, but that’s a great idea if my husband will not mind. I have a transparent pattern drafting ruler with a grid and inches (and I think maybe also cm?) on it that I can include.
I doubt I could find either of those two sharpeners here, but I expect that as you say, the sharpening guy must have taken a lot of time and included plenty of feedback. It’s just a bit wild to see how he does it!
I used metric most and learnt it in school (in the US) but had to finally get used to inches when studying at FIT. I’m quite good at recognising or marking exact inch based measurements by eye since then. ;) I don’t think many people here have much experience with inches, and now I am curious if they use the same terms for radius of hollow fractions or what??
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I used metric most and learnt it in school (in the US) but had to finally get used to inches when studying at FIT. I’m quite good at recognizing or marking exact inch based measurements by eye since then. ;) I don’t think many people here have much experience with inches, and now I am curious if they use the same terms for radius of hollow fractions or what??
I was taught in school that it was illegal to use inches and other old imperial units in most countries.
But I eventually realized that couldn't be completely true.
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I was taught in school that it was illegal to use inches and other old imperial units in most countries.
But I eventually realized that couldn't be completely true.
Illegal?! :laugh:
My (American) school system promoted the use of metric, which I thought was pretty cool, except some imperial for some things in shop class and definitely home ec.
I notice that Canada seems to mix metric and imperial somewhat. Then there is the UK with stone for weight too.
I always preferred metric except for temperature.
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AFAIK, everyone or almost everyone measure skate ROH (Radius of Hollow) and Rocker radius in fractional inches and feet. E.G., MK and JW specified their blades that way (though they no longer specify or pre-grind ROH for high level blades), even though they are located in Sheffield, UK. And, at least on the sharpening machines with dressing systems that I personally have seen, the scales were marked in fractional inches. But I think I once saw someone specify Rocker radius in metric units, so maybe I'm wrong.
That said, there are extremely good reasons for people to use metric - not just trivial one of making it easier to use base 10 arithmetic. A bigger problem with inches, feet, statutory miles, nautical miles, ounces, pounds, tons, and the square and cube equivalents, is that they have had many somewhat different definitions, at different times, as well as in different countries.
E.g., one Scandinavian country currently defines 10 inches per foot, but AFAIK all others use 12 inches per foot. The U.S.A. alone has used at least 3 different definitions of inch, foot, and statutory mile, and still uses two. (Those two only differ by 2 parts per million - the current U.S. legal inch, which the USGS called the international inch is 2.54 cm; but many map makers, including the USGS, and most but not all US state survey offices, and AFAIK all nominal runway lengths, still use an older standard, that the USGS called the "ground survey inch, 1/39.37 m. Congress created a special "temporary" exception for the USGS, so they didn't have to redraw all their maps, and the USGS tried hard to convince other U.S. mapmakers to follow them, and to make "temporary" permanent.) Various countries also still define the nautical mile - which was originally intended to be the approximate average size of a minute of latitude in the ocean near Germany - in different ways. These sorts of things matter significantly if you use large scale gridded maps, especially UTM maps.
Wooden boards are often measured approximately before kiln drying, and so are substantially smaller than the nominal sizes at the store. Plywood and particle board are always made smaller in the first place. I'm not sure if that is true in countries that use metric units. E.g., do metric countries still use "2x4s"?
Likewise for square and cubic units of area and volume, as well as acres. And we in the U.S. sometimes use other units for volume, like teaspoon, tablespoon, pinch, bushel, peck, etc.
The U.S.A. still uses at least two definitions of ounce and pound" - avoirdupois for most things, troy for precious metals. We mostly use carets for precious stones.
Even degrees, minutes and seconds of angle, when it comes to latitude and longitude can be very complicated, as there are many different ways of measuring them (in public school I was taught about geocentric latitude and longitude; I learned later that geodetic and astronomical coordinates are more common), as well as different estimated sets of reference points (e.g., points on the earth, and the earth's center, and different era nominal poles and equator) that have differently defined values, and between which other values are interpolated. It's enough for a poor navigator to run aground, be arrested, have their ship confiscated, or be tortured to death as a spy, if they fish or in some cases just enter the wrong national waters or territories. Remember the U.S. spy plane that China forced down a while ago, and the U.S. hikers that Iran arrested and imprisoned (maybe worse) as spies? I wouldn't be surprised if they inappropriate used a U.S. market GPS set to one or another version of WGS 84 latitude and longitude with maps that were drawn in some other coordinate system. You could easily run aground if you use NOAH nautical charts (which are all old, out of date, and in many cases no longer meet the U.S. must-carry provisions) with a GPS that uses WGS 84.
(Unfortunately, there are no metric systems for latitude and longitude, and even metric unit altitudes can have different meanings depending on origin baseline and projection direction. And reference points are revised by a committee after major geological activity, and/or big asteroid impacts. So they will remain messed up.)
Horsepower too - last I knew UK uses 550 ft-pounds/minute; USA uses 746 watts, both of which are far less than a horse, or even a fit person, can generate in the short term. Except - marine engines are measured very inconsistently, often differing from true used or effective power by orders of magnitude. Some marine motor makers even use propeller force while standing still to measure power. If the ratings were actually correct, many marine motors could be connected to a generator to create much more power than they used, which would be very useful. :)
Metric units are so much better. They have changed much less over time, and AFAIK are the same in all countries.
E.g., shoe and boot (including skate boot!) sizes differ country to country, manufacturer to manufacturer, sometimes even model to model, as well as by age and gender groups - but are much closer to be standardized for those who measure in metric mm. (Of course assumed foot shapes and bottom tilts are still different.)
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Hello all ,
For 3 years, I sharpening skates on a blademaster machine, I thought I knew something, but after reading Yours texts, I think that I still need to learn.
I have a sp850 blademaster and 3 holders including a sh6000. if when the blade edges are even my holder is set well?
can it be slightly tilted and still have straight edges?
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bonjour Qsuior,
content de savoir que d'autres affute avec blademaster 850.
je fais avec le sh 2000 et il est nul par rapport au sh6000 et de ce fait je l'ai modifié moi même, pour qu'il ressemble au sh6000.
vu qu'on est à peu près pareil, j'essaie demain de te faire quelque photo de tout mes réglage pour essayer de centrer au mieux.
je m'aide d'un comparateur, de niveau à bulle, stylo noir...
j'ai aussi une équerre de précision que kaitsu m'a recommandé.
Comme je lis tout, regarde et relis les post de Kaitsu, et il montre bien avec des photos comment centrer au mieux.
Tu as certainement compris qu'on avait une meule trop grande, mais je ferais tout pour essayer de me rapprocher du travail des petites meules.
Et toi de puis 3 ans, les patineurs(free skate and no hockey)) sont contents de ton affutage?
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oh, excuse me....
Hello Qsuior,
glad to know that others sharpen with blademaster 850.
I do with the sh 2000 and it sucks compared to the sh6000 and therefore I modified it myself, so that it looks like the sh6000.
since we're pretty much the same, tomorrow I'll try to take some pictures of all my settings to try to center them as well as possible.
I use a comparator, spirit level, black pen...
I also have a precision square that Kaitsu recommended to me.
As I read everything, watch and reread Kaitsu's post, and he shows well with pictures how to center the best.
You have certainly understood that we had a wheel that was too big, but I would do everything to try to get closer to the work of the small wheels.
And you for 3 years, the skaters (free skate and no hockey)) are happy with your sharpening?
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And you for 3 years, the skaters (free skate and no hockey)) are happy with your sharpening?
I think yes, slowly in my city they say that I ma good, but I know that I have a lot to learn, especially in professional blades.
I would like to buy a machine with a 3 inch wheel but it's hard to choose, I know IE is the best but maybe in my case (I have 3 BM holders), Blademster would be better?
I even made the Matrix and Paramount holder myself ;-)
And a few years ago my daughter also skates in club like Your :-)
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if when the blade edges are even my holder is set well?
can it be slightly tilted and still have straight edges?
I am not sure if I did understand you question correctly. I think most of the skate holders are not parallel to the wheel (tilted like you said). Risk to this is higher on table top machines which skate holders does have 3 adjustment knobs. Maybe some table top machine users can comment how they normally adjust their skate holder height. Do you mostly use just two knobs which are more close to wheel or all three. And when you have adjusted them, will you ensure after every skate that holder is adjusted back to square? Most likely not.
I think small parallelism error (tilting) in skate holder is not an issue as long as you measure and ensure that edges are even after your sharpening.
But if the question was, can you sharpen all skates with same setup if you have ones adjusted your skate holder, answer is: No, you cannot.
I made very quick sketch to explain one reason to my opinion. If you skate holder is not parallel to the grinding wheel, your blade height changes depending how you position the skate in to your skate holder. You can probably demonstrate this with simple test. Sharpen some blade, remove it from skate holder and paint the blade with the marker. Put it back to skate holder slightly differently than in previous time and make very gentle grinding pass. Most likely you will see that wheel is contacting differently than in previous time even the blade is same.
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The tilt of the skate blade while grinding is not critical because the holder can be adjusted to get level edges even when the blade is tilted. This drawing shows two scenarios, both of which provide level edges...
(https://www.afterness.com/skating/images/wissota/blade_tilt_wheel.jpg)
If you raise or lower the skate holder vertically with either of these two cases, you no longer have level edges.
As Kaitsu states, it is not realistic to set the holder for one set of blades and expect it to work with other blades. Blade thicknesses vary, and some blades have separate, thick support stanchions. You must test with each blade.
I have a skate holder with three height adjusters. Frankly, the adjustments are small enough with any blade that I now use the front two adjusters only. I have been ignoring the rear adjustment after having initially set the overall height. If I get a blade with a thick stanchion (i.e. Matrix, Paramount, etc.), I will have to adjust the rear too.
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Kaitsu, Thank You for Your reply
Yes I have skate holder with 3 knobs .
Yes of course normally I use only 2 and check the edges , different skates different settings
But when I bought that skate holder I made adjustment for my machine.
Your sketch is perfect , that is what I think .
And if I have something like that is it bery bad? even though the edges are squere ?
As You wrote that „ small parallelism error (tilting) in skate holder is not an issue as long as you measure and ensure that edges are even after your sharpening. ”
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The tilt of the skate blade while grinding is not critical because the holder can be adjusted to get level edges even when the blade is tilted. This drawing shows two scenarios, both of which provide level edges...
(https://www.afterness.com/skating/images/wissota/blade_tilt_wheel.jpg)
If you raise or lower the skate holder vertically with either of these two cases, you no longer have level edges.
As Kaitsu states, it is not realistic to set the holder for one set of blades and expect it to work with other blades. Blade thicknesses vary, and some blades have separate, thick support stanchions. You must test with each blade.
I have a skate holder with three height adjusters. Frankly, the adjustments are small enough with any blade that I now use the front two adjusters only. I have been ignoring the rear adjustment after having initially set the overall height to contact the center of the grinding wheel. If I get a blade with a thick stanchion (i.e. Matrix, Paramount, etc.), I will have to adjust the rear too.
It is great info , thank You ;D
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I’m not sure scanning worked well enough.
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At least for me these pictures won't tell so much when most interesting part of the blade is missing. Your picture would be more useful if the blade would be rotated 90 degrees so that we can see the blade from the longer distance. It is also a bit unclear if you have tried to use some pencil to trace the profile. Take photos from your blade so that we can see about 1/3 of the blade and so that we can see also at least lowest toe pick.
If the whole profile should be somehow evaluated, you can also trace the whole profile to the paper with the thinnest pencil what you can find. Scan that paper and let us know the distance from the tip of lowest toe pick to the end of tail so that I can get the scale from that.
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I was afraid it did not show much properly. I already had another sharpening today, and we did another set of scans for the profile. I hoped showing from the toe pick area would be the most important information. For some reason I thought the picks were in the images, but I see now that they are indeed not. I could not get the blade on the scanner flat except on the short side, and I held it in a way that I thought the pick was there. Ugh. I was going to try the pencil tracing, but its too late now for comparing sharpening.
If I move back here then I’ll have plenty of opportunity to check on all this again. I can try to do better to compare with someone else’s or a new Aspire blade now.
Does anyone have any idea about metric RoH? The sharpener asked if I was happy with what I had, and when I asked what it was the answer did not make sense at all since it was not the usual inch fractions.
I can’t try the coin trick to tell until I am back in the US.
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The scans are a bit low in resolution as well as not showing the entire blade. Like you concluded, you'd be better off tracing with a sharp pencil.
However, I took a few minutes to graphically compare your existing scan with a pencil tracing of a new MK Pro (10-1/4") blade. In Photoshop, I did some "freehand" overlays to see if I could find any glaring issues. I'm comparing your Aspire with an MK Pro, which complicates things too.
Here's the graphical comparison. You'll have to click the image to see it larger.
(https://www.afterness.com/skating/images/boots_blades_2019/blade_tracing_mk_pro_vs_aspire.jpg)
At this scale, I don't see any irregularities. There could still be some, but it's not enough to discern with the available information.
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Does anyone have any idea about metric RoH?
Does attached file help?
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Wow, thank you for doing that Bill. I have practically no computer skills and do everything analog. (My graduating class was the last one to only do flats & specs and design by hand rather than to learn Photoshop or Illustrator, and I’m pretty old school anyway so I never tried to learn it much. :-[ I definitely would have done better with a pencil in retrospect.) I’m pretty annoyed that I didn’t catch that the picks were not in the image, but I guess I can get a pencil tomorrow and trace what I have now.
I’m pretty impressed at how well those match. My blades are 9 3/4” in case I did not mention that before. Eventually I’ll compare at my favourite skate shop, but it’ll be a while.
Kaitsu, thank you for finding that. I will see if I can figure something out. What I thought he said was “18.12” which I couldn’t make sense of. If I can get my husband to call , as the guy asked, after I try skating with the sharpening then I will have him ask and find out for sure, but sometimes he gets too annoyed to act as my translator, so I don’t know if it’ll happen.
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Does anyone have any idea about metric RoH?
Are you saying that your sharpener is calibrated in metric ROH sizes? If so, I didn't know any were like that.
If it is, can you tell me again the type of sharpening machine being used?
BTW, if you look up "radius gauge" on eBay, you will find devices which can measure the radius of hollow. You touch the tool to the middle of the hollow (not the edges, which get worn down), and see how it fits. If there is a gap between the hollow and the tool in the middle, use a smaller radius. If there is a gap at the ends, but not in the middle, use a larger radius. You may need a magnifying glass, if you don't see too well up close, because the gaps are very small.
E.g., https://www.ebay.com/itm/154337128322?hash=item23ef35af82:g:y5oAAOSwsvlh3N0X is calibrated in metric, in about the right range.
And https://www.ebay.com/itm/151318272519?hash=item233b459a07:g:NOsAAOxybqpRhv6d is calibrated in inches, though the highest is 1/2".
BTW, you can convert inches to mm by multiplying by 25.4. E.g., 7/16*25.4 inch (abbreviated 7/16") is 7/16*25.4=11.1125. But Katisu did the work for you - "R" is radius in his chart.
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I’m sorry that I am not more knowledgable, Query.
Regarding the machine I am attaching a photo, and that’s the best I can do.
I’d like to get a gauge. I tried using Euro coins but could not decide if 20 cent was right or not. I think it may be? The 2 cent (which has distracting scallops on the edge) looked pretty close also, so I don’t particularly trust my eyes on the matter. 88)
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Regarding the machine I am attaching a photo, and that’s the best I can do.
Good grief. That looks like a standard bench grinder. And he's just holding and guiding your skates entirely by hand. Is he the sharpener that your coach uses?
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That's what she described earlier, and it boggled my mind then. I'm still boggled.
If there was a registration stop on the unseen side of the wheel against which the flat of the blade rides, I could almost see it in capable hands. But I fear that it's purely freehand.
Try drawing a straight line without using a ruler, and you get an idea of the difficulty.
Try giving THAT grinder to the average kid at the pro-shop!
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I’d like to get a gauge. I tried using Euro coins but could not decide if 20 cent was right or not. I think it may be? The 2 cent (which has distracting scallops on the edge) looked pretty close also, so I don’t particularly trust my eyes on the matter. 88)
Don't fret too much about this. Even if you had a set of radius gauges instead of a set of coins, skill and practice would still be needed to get good results. The main problem is that the thickness of a blade (distance between the inside and outside edges) is only about 0.16 inch/4 mm or less for a figure skate blade. That means you're sampling only a minuscule arc of a circle. Add to that, unless you have special jigs (which most skaters don't), you're holding the skate in one hand, the gauge in the other hand, and trying to keep both aligned and steady. And, if you do need a magnifier, since you don't have three hands, you need a hands-free magnifier (e.g., attached to a stand or strapped to your head). And, of course, there's the issue of proper lighting: I find the gap between the gauge and hollow is more distinct if I shine a small light from the back of the gauge, but you don't want too bright and too large a lightspot. So you've got a lot to play with ... just like skating.
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Good grief. That looks like a standard bench grinder. And he's just holding and guiding your skates entirely by hand. Is he the sharpener that your coach uses?
My coach, who I trust very much and think is absolutely excellent (and who also competed in two Olympics, coached at an olympics, coached/trained at a famous training centre etc… he has plenty of experience…) recommended him. I crossed paths with another coach having his skates sharpened one time too. ;)
It’s pretty mind boggling, I agree. That’s why I am so interested in comparing my blades etc, but I have to admit that they feel entirely alright despite the method. (Today I did have a heck of a time stopping which I always heard of but had not noticed post sharpening before, but the edges feel niiiiice. Spinning went better today too.)
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Bill, I could be wrong but think it is freehand? He touched something on the farther side of the wheel before beginning that I expected was to adjust the hollow?
This reminds me of a professor I had at FIT with decades of experience drafting and draping. She would mark lines and distances free hand and when anyone dared challenge her about it a ruler always proved her accuracy. After working at a deli a couple of months I could very accurately sense what weight was in my hand, but I still wouldn’t be up to trying this sharpening task. ;D
Anyway, all of this is why I am so interested in comparing my blades, as you know.
Tstopforme, ah, that does make me feel better that I felt like I couldn’t quite tell. At some point in the next few months I’ll see the person I purchased the blades from back in NY and see if she can measure the hollow.
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If you look at this somewhat old picture
https://www.alamy.com/bisschop-christoffel-skate-sharpener-dutch-school-19th-century-image376493329.html
You can see a person setting the ROH of a (foot powered??) bench grinder by bending a piece of metal (I think). It all depends on the skill of the user.
If he can do that, perhaps you can use that sharpening machine to get good results. :)
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If you look at this somewhat old picture
https://www.alamy.com/bisschop-christoffel-skate-sharpener-dutch-school-19th-century-image376493329.html
You can see a person setting the ROH of a (foot powered??) bench grinder by bending a piece of metal (I think). It all depends on the skill of the user.
If he can do that, perhaps you can use that sharpening machine to get good results. :)
That’s a neat painting! :)
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Albany,
Do you own copyrights of the pictures you shared from the skate sharpening? If yes, I would like ask your permission to use them in my training materials. If you want that you name or nickname is mentioned as copyright owner, you can send me personal message.
I tested also 5 Cent and 1 Euro coins to one of my test blades. As tstop4me already mentioned, third or fourth hand is useful. I was using both hands, tripod to hold camera and bench wise to hold the blade. Bright back light is also needed, just like tstop4me mentioned. I made short video to be kind of extension to tstop4me excellent advice's. https://youtu.be/uSOp4DgGuFg
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I agree that the only way to really see this is to have the skate stabilized and to have a good light behind it, and practice helps. The thinner gauges are much easier to use, as Kaitsu explains. My first set of ROH gauges were about the thickness of a skate blade, but precision cut. When they had a good fit to the hollow, you could could feel how solidly they fit in place, which is also somewhat possible with a coin.
Alba--If you can find a coin to match your current ROH size, then you will know what to tell your skate tech when you are back in NY. I recommend as new of a coin as you can get--maybe ask at the bank or store for a very new coin of the size you need? Of course, they can make a pretty good guess by seeing what the ROH is when you bring the skates in, but when the edges are worn, there is a range of possibilities for the original ROH.
I would love to be able to put a precision square on those edges after the freehand sharpening...but I bet he does no worse than a good percentage of the shops that don't bother to adjust their equipment or check edges for levelness. Our rink produces consistently unlevel edges, in spite of having equipment that is completely capable of producing a nice product.
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I have an update! :)
This morning I traced the blades. (The darned pencil I bought the other day was defective, so I had to get another yesterday.) Using a pencil worked so well and was so easy! I’m annoyed with myself for not doing that in the first place and a while ago.
I have to have Husband do the scans since the scanner uses a cable to his computer and doesn’t work with my iPad, but I lined up the papers and held them up to the light.
They matched up perfectly!
One day I’d like to compare to a new set of the same blades since they were sharpened several times, but as they are they match each other quite exactly. I’m impressed!
I got use to the sharpening very well yesterday and enjoyed the improvement to edges.
Kaitsu, I’ll message you.
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I would love to be able to put a precision square on those edges after the freehand sharpening...but I bet he does no worse than a good percentage of the shops that don't bother to adjust their equipment or check edges for levelness. Our rink produces consistently unlevel edges, in spite of having equipment that is completely capable of producing a nice product.
Do you think they don't know how to make them level? Or that they just don't take the time, or don't care.
The rink's continued poor result gives you a cool side business, sharpening skates. :) But if you charged your sharpening clients for your time, at coach rates, you might be an expensive skate sharpener. I hope your customers appreciate the careful job you do.
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Do you think they don't know how to make them level? Or that they just don't take the time, or don't care.
The rink's continued poor result gives you a cool side business, sharpening skates. :) But if you charged your sharpening clients for your time, at coach rates, you might be an expensive skate sharpener. I hope your customers appreciate the careful job you do.
My understanding is that the person that sharpens figure skates was trained to do it a certain way, something along the lines of centering the wheel in the hollow, 8 passes through the machine, make sure the edges feel sharp along the whole length, more passes if one edge is still dull. I don't think he checks the edges for squareness except maybe by eye. If the edges are off-level, they will not get corrected, and the more times in a row that the rink sharpens the same skates, the more off-level the edges become...as shown in the attached photos (Jackson Artiste with Mark II blade)...which makes me think that they weren't even checked by eye. The back of this blade is off level by about 10 degrees, so the difference in edge angle between inside and outside is going to feel terrible. It was also off level in the other direction at the front, by about 5 degrees, so there was one point about 1/3 of the way from the toe pick that was actually level. I sharpened these skates and corrected them to level, and then the skater's coach called me to see "what I had done to the skates" because the student was struggling at her next lesson. I sent the photos to the coach and she agreed that the skater needs to adjust herself to the new sharpening, and that it explained some of the strange tendencies this student had developed [which always makes me think...why did you not ask me to look at these awhile ago?]. Lots of things slipped through the cracks during 2020-2021, though.
I used to direct the skaters with lower-level blades to just have them sharpened at the rink (anything with a recreational shape, toe pick pointing more forward than down) because it is less expensive and at that level, I thought it probably didn't make a big difference to have a less smooth surface finish. This was beneficial for both me and the rink, because I tend to be really busy all the time, and the rink can sharpen on any day. The rink does recommend that anyone with higher quality figure skating blades check with me about sharpening. They don't want to risk ruining expensive blades, which is smart. My understanding is also that their sharpening of hockey skates is fine. The coarser stone is less of a problem on the stainless blades.
Anymore, I feel like it is a disservice to anyone that wants to learn to skate (beyond just skating around occasionally for fun) to let them struggle with unlevel edges, so I am stuck sharpening the low-level skates when parents request it. Stuck in the sense that my conscience will not allow me to say no. I do always let them know that the rink is less expensive, but that my sharpening will be level and smoother because I have different equipment.
As far as appreciating it...my guess is that 90% of the kids just think that this is what skates are supposed to feel like (I agree!). Centered blades, micro-adjusted for alignment if necessary, level edges, smooth finish. They also think it is normal for the skate tech to magically repair terrible things that have happened to their skates (eyelets torn out, dog chewing, and so on). When they leave and get them sharpened elsewhere, some of them start to understand that this isn't something you can just count on finding anywhere. The adults have a much better sense of what level of care their skates are getting and are generally pretty appreciative.
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Thanks for your detailed response!
>8 passes through the machine
I take it he isn't amenable to your suggestions. A few techs start out ignorant, but listen and learn. Sounds like he learned something once, and stopped.
The coarser stone is less of a problem on the stainless blades.
You mean that a coarse stone yields an adequate edge and finish on stainless steel? If so, are you talking high carbon stainless, like many high end blades use, or the soft junk some of the really cheap blades use?
Anymore, I feel like it is a disservice to anyone that wants to learn to skate (beyond just skating around occasionally for fun) to let them struggle with unlevel edges, so I am stuck sharpening the low-level skates when parents request it... Stuck in the sense that my conscience will not allow me to say no.
Think of it as a charity.
A cheap sharpener who removes too much metal is a false economy, even with cheap blades. You may also save them from injury. Wouldn't it be great if even one time skaters got reasonably well sharpened blades, and help doing a boot quick check for fit, proper lacing, and balance? I think a lot of would-be skaters give up and/or get hurt because of equipment problems, or because they don't know how to lace.
It's great that you care! :) Perhaps you can give them a business card that mentions you coach too, and your engineering services.
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And, at least on the sharpening machines with dressing systems that I personally have seen, the scales were marked in fractional inches. But I think I once saw someone specify Rocker radius in metric units, so maybe I'm wrong.
Just for example...meant for those whom are using metric units.
https://blademaster.com/web/en/replacement-quills/535-tsm680n.html
https://parduc.com/688-medium_default/timanttitappi-05-x-6-irtok%C3%A4rjell%C3%A4-wissota-yhteensopiva-tarvikevaraosa.jpg (Wissota)
https://www.kiekkotarvike.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/ssm-2_finnish_manual.pdf (page 9)
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with my blademaster, I even measure with a caliper for the length of the diamond, because with the diamond marks it is not even very precise.
At the moment I am using 5 euro cents (half hollow), 2 euro cents (3/4 hollow) and 14 mm washer (full hollow for my daughter)
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In some post Query mentioned that measuring tools are just for beginners and professional sharpeners does not need them. I found video from the guy whom must be most advanced figure skate tech, as he can do even the sharpening just by free hand using "Dremel". Unfortunately he is not probably able to write in English, so that he could share his knowledge in this forum for all beginners whom still need to use measuring tools to ensure edges evenness's. https://youtu.be/oJO9LpTFyWw
Note that he also managed to sharpen one skate in less than 2 minutes. Its very close to 5 minutes per pair of skates what Query keeps enough to make professional sharpening s.
There was also another video where you can see competitor for Pro-filer => https://youtu.be/4bbk2g5if30
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In some post Query mentioned that measuring tools are just for beginners and professional sharpeners does not need them.
That's going a bit further than I actually meant.
I think even most of the experts sometimes use measuring tools.
E.g., if someone brings them skates they haven't seen before, they likely measure ROH in some way. And they might sometimes measure squareness, or something equivalent. They also likely use the radius measurement built into the dresser quill.
But they don't need measuring tools all the time. Just some of the time.
The two videos you shared may not produce exactly what most figure skaters want. They both seem to be using fairly coarse grinding media, which might not produce the cleanest edges - though I am only guessing that.
The first video technique looks a bit dangerous to me. You could hurt yourself if you slip, and you can't tell if the guy used eye protection. But maybe it doesn't seem that way to people who have more experience using power tools?
I can't tell whether the second video technique can produce a hollow of the same circular cross sectional shape most of us are used to. Also, I'm not clear that he can adjust the gap size - it may only work with some skate thicknesses, and the tool was only applied to a hockey blade, which are thinner. It might even be a home made tool, and not available to the public. In addition, the problem that tstop4me has frequently pointed out with the Pro-Filer, that it may not work well on some blades because of side honing, or because there isn't enough space above the edges for the parallel gap elements to fit against the blade, would likely apply to that tool too.
There have been many hand skate sharpening tools. I've only tried a few. Some were absolute junk. Some of them looked like they could work, but were not well enough made to produce consistent results.
The only ones I tried that seemed to be made well are the Pro-Filer and the Berghman tools. But I haven't tried all the tools.
I've seen hand tools that looked pretty good on videos (including one that I think was sued out of existence for patent violation by Edge Specialties), but were specific to hockey skates.
I usually sharpen my blades in a few minutes using a Pro-Filer - but that is because I usually keep them pretty sharp, so there isn't much material to remove. I often don't even need the coarse stone. And most of the time, I remove so little material, that I don't need to re-measure anything. Plus the Pro-Filer has ROH built in. Plus, I can feel if I did something wrong when I skate on them, which is a different kind of measurement.
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I found video from the guy whom must be most advanced figure skate tech, as he can do even the sharpening just by free hand using "Dremel". Unfortunately he is not probably able to write in English, so that he could share his knowledge in this forum for all beginners whom still need to use measuring tools to ensure edges evenness's. https://youtu.be/oJO9LpTFyWw
That video places a whole new spin on the old phrase, "Rule of Thumb". ;D
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Do you folks who use power tools more than me feel you could safely do what that guy did?
Using a round grinding ball is quite clever. I've thought of trying to do it with a grinding disk, but using a ball means that alignment isn't quite as critical as with a disk.
I think it would be a little easier (and safer) if you taped the Dremel tool (or equivalent) to a small square, one arm of which would slide along the blade, rather than using a thumb. That would also (I think) let you center the hollow on the blade a more consistently. Aside from the fact that the tool would thereby be dedicated to this one task, for this one blade (both blades, if they are the same thickness), and the fact that the centering operation would (at least for me) take a lot more time than it did in his video, what do you think of that idea? Could you make it, or some variation on the theme, work well?
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Good morning all,
I just posted about edea screws, but the talk will be longer here.
despite my abscence on skatingforums, I do not fail to follow you.
I am certainly the only French here and proud to be there.
Since May, my daughter has made a French championship final where she finished 10th but had the ability to finish on the podium (first place was impossible!)
Every time I follow her, I visit the sharpening workshop (7/8...10 workshops) and they welcome me very well because they are interested in sharpeners!
And what sharpeners!!?? very nice people but totally incompetent.
In France we have a very, very big problem with sharpening.
Already to the question, how much time do you spend there: 5 minutes per skate!!!!
And they also answer me: don't break your head for that or for children!!!
Well if, precisely:
I like to sharpen it so we do it as best as possible.
our ice rink only opens in October and I calculate to improve my centering:
Still with my blademaster, I improved the setting with a home-made skate holder! (like wissota), I check with a precision square, I fixed a comparator (magnet), I improved the sliding of the skate holder with talc (advice from a French hockey team sharpener), a light above the sharpener... and I check the curve with the pbhe template.
often, I don't quite manage to center the first shot and I correct until I get the right result.
I tried to communicate, to discuss sharpening, with Jean pierre riopel, jake brunott, sharpener of great champions, but I have not had any answers to date.
I thank you all again for all that you teach me.
Bonjour à tous,
je viens de publier sur les vis edea, mais le discours sera plus long ici.
malgrès mon abscence sur skatingforums, je ne manque pas de vous suivre.
Je suis très certainement le seul français ici et fier d'y être.
Depuis le mois de mai, ma fille a fait une finale de championnat de france où elle a fini 10 eme mais avait les capacité de finir sur le podium.(la première place était impossible!)
A chaque fois que je la suis, je visite l'atelier affutage (7/8...10 ateliers) et on me reçoit très bien car on s'intéresse aux affuteurs!
Et quels affuteurs!!?? des gens très gentils mais totalement incompétent.
En france nous avons un très très gros problème d'affutage.
Déjà à la question, combien y passez vous de temps: 5 mn par patins!!!!
Et on me réponds aussi: faut pas se casser la tête pour çà ou pour des enfants!!!
Et bien si, justement:
çà me plait d'affuter du coup on le fait le mieux possible.
notre patinoire ouvre que en octobre et je calcule pour m'améliorer le centrage :
Toujours avec ma blademaster, j'ai amélioré le réglage avec un porte patin fait maison!( comme wissota), je vérifie avec une équerre de précision, j'ai fixé un comparateur(aimant), j'ai améliorer la glisse du porte patin avec du talc ( conseil d'un affuteur de l'équipe de france de hockey), une lumière au dessus de l'affuteuse... et je vérifie la courbe avec le gabarit pbhe.
souvent, je n'arrive pas tout à fait à centrer au premier coup et je rectifie jusqu'au bon résultat.
J'ai essayé de communiquer, pour échanger sur l'affutage, avec Jean pierre riopel, jake brunott, affuteur de grand champions , mais j'ai pas eu de réponses à ce jour.
je vous remercie tous encore pour tout ce que vous m'avez appris et m'apprenez.
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Good for you for maintaining high standards for your own sharpening and rejecting the mediocrity seen elsewhere! Also, great job on the skate holder. It looks well-made.
I have a question about the dial indicator mounted on the magnetic stand that is seen on top of the sharpener. Do you use that to level your skate holder left and right, or to set an approximate center of the blade on the wheel, or both? I suspect that something like that, cleverly used, might provide better setup without as much trial-and-error experimentation.
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Think you bill's.
I do as Kaitsu taught me:
learned to have marked with the black pen the partie to sharpen, I make a mark with the grinding wheel, and when I found the center with the mark of in front or behind I regulate my comparator and that I report all along the skate
(and not on the skate holder because all that would be far too easy)
And from one skate to another, even of the same pair, it's different: the sharpening of the skates is made only of adjustments and adjustments.
I have been doing 3 pairs with the comparator and the new skate holder and I am gaining in quality and if it can help anyone other than me to progress, so much the better
I hope you will understand with the translation
je fais comme kaitsu m'a appris:
aprés avoir marqué au stylo noir la partie à aiguiser, je fais une marque avec la meule, et quand j'ai trouvé le centre avec la marque de devant ou de derriere je règle mon comparateur et que je reporte tout le long du patin
(et non sur le porte patin car tout çà serait bien trop facile )
Et d'un patin à l'autre même d'une même paire c'est différent: l'affutage des patins est fait que de réglages et de réglages.
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I have tested similar setup with my sharpening machine. I did have two different targets for using dial gauge.
I wanted to have some scale to my height adjustment knobs. It didn’t work. In my machine skate holder is moving along the linear guide rails which are equipped with ball bearings. I cannot lock skate holder to certain position in the same way as in table top machines where skate holder stays rigidly in same position as long you move it. As blade in not probably never laying 100 parallel compared to any guide rails, even the smallest change in skate holder position changes also dial gauge reading. This lead to situation where I do not know if the dial gauge reading was changing because I could not hold skate holder in same position or from my height adjustment.
I though also that dial gauge could be used to check blade straightness and level the blade in to my machine. Ones again blade straightness deviations, thickness variations and parallelism issues crushed the nice idea. Even I could use dial gauge to get chromed area be nicely level in longitudinal and transversal direction, it does not mean that grid edges would be in level. This because the chrome removal grinding in not necessary in the middle of chromed area.
I have already given-up in means of having some dial gauge system to ensure even edges, but I am still hoping to find some solution to get scales for my height adjustment. If I would have tripod type of skate holder, arranging the scales for height adjustment would be much more easier.
Marc, I am not sure how stable your machine is from vibration point of view. In my machine I have noted that even the very small things will affect to surface finish. This probably because guide rods starts to resonate quite easily. Also weight and stability of skate holder will affect. My main concern in your own design is that how well it absorbs vibrations…or does it increase vibrations. I do not claim that your skate holders isn’t good. I just want you to pay attention also to rigidity of the skate holder.
Attached blade thickness variation from one blade what I have measured.
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The thickness variations on that Coronation Ace blade are crazy!
I measured my new, unmounted SkateScience synchro blades awhile ago out of curiosity, just along what will be the sharpened edge. They were very consistent down the entire length of both blades. The blades are stainless with no relief grinding, which of course helps make them more consistent. The blades have not been sharpened yet.
When I have a chance, I will measure my old SkateScience dance blades as well, just for the information.
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kaitsu:
je sais qu'il est très difficile de régler le parrallélisme avec des guides rails ( j'ai des machine à bois avec un peu le même système de rails).
Par contre, je ne savais pas qu'il pouvait y avoir des différences d'épaisseur de lames!! et tu as raisons, je viens de mesurer la prochaine paire et c'est pas la même épaisseur!!
je ne comprends pas le 3 eme paragraphe, mais peut être que c'est cela qu'il me faut répondre: je pense que le porte patin est assez rigide et que le patin du coup ne bouge pas beaucoup.
Le comparateur m'aide pas mal à m'approcher de la réalité, mais je vais essayer, donc, de faire des calculs en tenant compte de l'épaisseur des lames
I know that it is very difficult to adjust the parallelism with rail guides (I have woodworking machines with somewhat the same rail system).
On the other hand, I did not know that there could be differences in the thickness of the blades!! and you're right, I just measured the next pair and it's not the same thickness!!
I don't understand the 3rd paragraph, but maybe that's what I need to answer: I think the skate holder is quite rigid and the skate doesn't move much.
The comparator helps me a lot to get closer to reality, but I will try, therefore, to make calculations taking into account the thickness of the blades
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Hello Marc,
I hope my sketch helps to understand what I see to be small risk. If you compare your design to Wissota Design, you will notice the difference.
https://wissota.com/product/elite-3-d-universal-figure-skate-holder/
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J'ai du mal à traduire n'étant pas chez moi!
Mais je comprends ce que tu veux dire maintenant.
Je me suis donc inspiré de wissota pour faire mon porte patin mais j'ai eu du mal à copier la pièce que tu dis trop étroite. Et franchement je pense pas qu'il y ait beaucoup de vibrations au niveau des 2 extrémités
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Attached blade thickness variation from one blade what I have measured.
Did you happen to notice if it was at least symmetric - i.e., how well the chrome relief section was centered on the blade sides, and whether that stayed the same down the blade?
Mike Cunningham told me that chrome plating is sometimes of unequal thickness on the two sides. That would make automatic centering difficult.
I believe many skaters can learn to compensate for slightly non-level edges - as long as the tilt is uniform down the whole blade. Which you can check for.
Some blade holders only use the staunchions (https://blademaster.com/web/en/precision-skate-holders/448-sh6500.html?search_query=figure+skate+holder&results=5); would thickness variation matters less, because you could be more consistent?