3m micron self adhesive films help needed

[ilovespringflowers]

Hello all and happy Valentines day...

Here is what I am dealing with, please advise....

I have a Power Hone
600 grit wheel (came with the power hone)
Ceramic wheel (newly purchased)

To save money (not so smart I think) I purchased..
2 GRS plain 5" wheels
3M 100 micron self adhesive finishing film
3M 60 micron self adhesive finishing film

Question in which order do I use all of these grits now?

Do I start with the 100 micron go to the 60 micron then the 600 grit and finally the ceramic?

Should I have just bitten the bullet and purchased the 260 and 1200 grits to go with the 600 and ceramic wheels?

Thank you for any advise

Laurie

 

[Tira]

Laurie,

In general the higher the number the finer the grit is. So in order from rough to fine: 260, 600, 1200, ceramic with diamond spray (various micron grades of spray are available), 60 micron sheet, 100 micron sheet. A 260 (you can even get a 100 which is more rough) would be used to move a lot of metal like when you want to change the entire shape of a graver, to make one narrower, for instance. The 600 is the one you will start with when you go to sharpen your gravers to put a face angle on. Next you would use the 1200 to get a finer finish on the face angle if you desired. Then you would use the ceramic lap with a diamond spray for the heel. This would give you a mirror polish. The 60 and 100 micron adhesive sheets you have will also give you a mirror polish heel - even finer than the ceramic lap depending on what micron spray you used.

I have not used the adhesive sheets yet. Sam used them in the last class I went to and he polished the heel to a mirror shine. I believe Sam uses this mirror polish for jewelry so the cuts reflect the light with a mirror shine. The adhesive sheets are fragile so when you go to use them be careful. Sam started at the edge and sharpened his graver. The next time he needed to sharpen he moved the graver towards the inside just a bit to get the unused portion - making concentric circles.

It depends on what your application is as to the final grit you use on the graver. Gun engravers don't usually put a mirror shine on the graver because they don't want a mirror cut on a gun - they want the cut not to reflect light so a dark shading occurs. I don't put a mirror shine on my gravers when I do motorcycle parts because the parts are chromed over.

I hope that helps you.

 

[Sam]

The 3M diamond disks I have are good but the lifespan is short if you do much graver polishing. I'm testing some new high-tech polymer diamond polishing sheets that I brought back from Japan that are really fantastic. What's different about these is that they are impregnated with diamond all the way through the sheet, and not just on the surface. I have samples from 300 grit to 10,000 grit. For polishing I'm using 3000, 5000, and 10,000 in steps. In Japan the company had some 5" steel laps overlaid with 300 and 600 grit sheets and they are very durable and withstood quite a bit of graver prep and polishing. Were they better than 260 and 600 grit traditional diamond laps? I don't think so, but the finer grits (3000+) are, IMO, what's needed most for graver polishing in jewelry applications. One drawback is price. The sheets are very expensive, but are suppose to last longer since they are filled with diamond as opposed to being surface coated.

 

[Travis]

micron

i use 3m belts in my knife shop. 100m is the first yo use . 60 m is finer and the next would be 30m, 15m, and 9 m Travis