Sharpening GRS QC flat gravers by hand

I do not have a power hone, just the lindsay sharpening system with templates. The QC flat gravers will not fit the lindsay system because of their shape. Forgive me for my inexperience, but I am finally ready to sharpen my flat gravers, and I am realizing I will need to do it by hand. Any tips would be appreciated. I have been using these flats mainly for background and removal for the field on coins. Thanks!

Rusty Shackleford said:

I do not have a power hone, just the lindsay sharpening system with templates. The QC flat gravers will not fit the lindsay system because of their shape. Forgive me for my inexperience, but I am finally ready to sharpen my flat gravers, and I am realizing I will need to do it by hand. Any tips would be appreciated. I have been using these flats mainly for background and removal for the field on coins. Thanks!

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check the tip section, search bar, look at a few videos. sharpening has been around for a couple hundred years. easy to get results if one looks for the info. i sent fotos to steve on how to adapt his sharpener to do old style gravers. check to see if he kept that info. if he didn't, get back to me. easy fix-- too many words for the forum.

It's pretty easy. Sharpen the face the best you can estimate at 45° and the heel about 15°. Sweep the face left-right to sharpening, and the heel can be sharpened to and fro. Make the heel about 1/4mm in length. When cutting if the angle is too low, then resharpen the heel a few degrees higher. If it's too high, then resharpen a few degrees lower. It's a bit hit or miss until you get the hang of it, but I sharpened flats for many years this way.

Gonna get the techie tools guys/gals underwear in a bunch, but...

I spent close to 20 years either sharpening freehand like Sam mentions above or using a Crocker fixture.

It is now "old school" and be that as it may - it can still get the job done

Yes, it takes a bit of fooling with to get it to do a consistent job done, but once you take the time to make some simple alterations it will do what Rusty wants to do quite handily.


First you'll need to make an adapter out of brass tubing with a small notch to index to a QC.

Mine is soldered in place, but not necessary as long as you remember never to loosen that particular set screw.

Next you will need to get a plastic protractor like you used to use in school before there were computer screens. One of those little clear plastic ones is best. If they aren't extinct yet, maybe a 99 cent store would have 'em?

The rotation and angle dials on the Crocker have simple division markings. They are never really close to what we need. Pretty unusable as they are.

You need to alter things a bit with a center punch, small hammer and your favorite fingernail polish. (or the cheapest oddball colors)

Ask Rex, he is the forum expert on nail polish, spending lots of time wandering that aisle - he'd know what's best.


Hopefully your graver blanks are of similar lengths? Set one into your QC collet and tighten it up. Eyeball it vertically into the tubing index for now. Tighten that screw. Loosen the angle set screw.

Prop your protractor so it's standing up. Slide the fixture with the graver in it, behind it. Find your 40 or 45 degrees. Scratch both sides with indicator marks when it looks as close as you can get it.

The metal these are made of is fairly soft. You are now gonna center punch permanent little dings where you placed the scratches. Don't get overexcited when you take the hammer to the punch. Test it lightly at first. What you want needs to be deep enough hold a little dot of the nail polish. Use different colors for any others you work out...

Takes a fair amount of futzing around, but once it's done it's fairly accurate. Definitely enough for your purposes.


Oh yeah, if you have a 6" or 12" square you can set the rotation by comparing to both the square and the protractor. Center punch and use a different color nail polish on the two halves.

For example use red dots to line up 90 degrees. Green (yeah, they make it) for the 40 or 45 degrees, blue for center of the rotation, etc.


I have seen them go on Ebay for $15 fairly recently. In reality they are just a cruder variable/variation on a template system.


Brian

Flat gravers can be used just fine without a heel which would make the hand sharpening alot easier.
I guess it`s just a matter of personal preference.

I`ve gone back to not bothering with heels except for if I intend using a traditional engraving tool.

All great advice, and appreciated! I did not have time to get to it yet, but I will, and will try both with and without a heel.

I have a Crocker (rank beginner). I struggled with how to use the protractor to more accurately mark the 90 & 40-45 degrees. Appreciate your tip on Propping the protractor & sliding the fixture with the graver in it, behind it then scratch marks. And to the different nail polish colors. Thank you.

You're welcome, Carol!

It's not often that people acknowledge tips & tricks or specific answers that take some serious time/effort to write...

I would bet that more people would take that time and contribute what they may know - if they saw more results that indicated that someone was getting some real use out of what was posted.

I've seen at least 20 experienced forum members quit participating over the years - because they never saw any appreciation or acknowledgement for the help that they were offering.


Brian

Sharpening systems need to be understood as to how they work, why they work the way they do before you will ever be comfortable with what you have. Another guy told me to go to Google and search Google images for "graver sharpening jigs", besides the major manufacturers, GRS and Lindsay there are literally 100's of home made and old vintage systems that can be studied.

Before I followed his advice I had ideas that seemed to work, but after studying a few dozen systems, I understood the angles, the degrees, the whys and the reasons that something worked. I also found out that degrees can be "horseshoe close" they do not have to exact, the trick is to be able to repeat that "horseshoe close" angel every time you sharpen. Once you have the system and understand how to use it, the sharpening will become a lot easier.

I am retired and this is strictly a hobby for me, I try to spend as little as possible, besides I enjoy making my tools for my hobbies as much as I enjoy the hobby. If I screw up, I have the time to start over and try something different. Creating the angles on the jigs takes some math and sometimes a little jury rigging. But the info is out there, you have to dig it out the good info and be able to understand what will work and what may work. There is even a video of some guy making templates like the Lindsay templates, but unless you can compute the math of the template, you might be better off spending the money. It would have been easy for me to spend the money and buy the set ups ready to use, take a few classes and be a lot farther down the road than I am now. But why, I am retired, I have no intention of returning to the workforce, because I am physically unable to. If I never engrave a gun, that will be fine with me, so far I have enjoyed the trip, and one day I may decide this is not for me and I can walk away and find something else to keep me occupied.

Two rare posts in a row!

One of appreciation and someone who demonstrates what should be common sense!

This is the kind of thing that keeps ME going after all these years.


B.

I have a couple of the little Wixley electronic angle finders I use at work.
Easy to set zero, super easy to measure angles to 0.1 degrees.
Woodcraft has them on sale frequently for under $30
The intercomp brand is even more accurate to 0.01 degrees. ($69 Jegs auto parts)
I haven't tried it, I use Lindsay templates for sharpening and my faceting machine for roughing.

I would like to know what you do with a flat that has no heal. The only thing I know they are good for is cutting off gold or wire. I guess you could use them upside down. I would love to see someone try and cut out background with one.

Actually, I use flats with no heel to carve my cameos. But that is the only time that it works. It's the same as when you're woodcarving.

http://engraverscafe.com/graver_angles/graver_angles.html

playing with this valuable tool.. helps to understand also

many thanks to the creators.. someone needs to make an app for this

jerrywh said:

I would like to know what you do with a flat that has no heal. The only thing I know they are good for is cutting off gold or wire. I guess you could use them upside down. I would love to see someone try and cut out background with one.

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not so, bro. there's times i want the flat without a heel, but need it for hand clearance. simple solution-- put an amount of bend in the tang to give the needed relief.

Monk.
Still can't cut out background. What do you do with it?

You Sculpt. Heel can sometimes even get in the way when you move off the flat.

Lindsay sells a Knife and Flat combo template. It works great. If you have an template you don't use much you could pretty much cut the ''V '' off it and make a flat template. While you're at it, try the tapered heel , it's not just for lettering. I tend to use it a lot too

I do a lot of sculpting with gravers because I seldom do it by the punch method. I have yet to find any place where I needed a flat with no heel. Maybe if you made one with lift as apposed to a heel it might be good for leveling out large areas of background. I am not trying to be argumentative. If this is some kind of useful tool I would like to know what for.
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