Question: Polishing the graver

[Terrezar]

Hi all!

I want to know what peoples favorite ways of polishing their gravers are. I have of course read about several ways of doing it, but there are still so much about I don't know. For example, does polishing on leather round off the edges of the graver as the leather "gives in" when the graver is scraped against it? And when you polish, do you still use a fixture ore template, or do you just do it by hand?

Up unthil now I have used abrassive paper with fine grit and with applied graphite from a pencil.

Pleace share, and in advance: Thank you all!

 

[Sam]

In my opinion a diamond treated cast iron lap produces the finest polish without rounding the edges. I also keep a piece of diamond treated leather handy for quickly refreshing the polish when particles of gold fuse to the heel of my graver.

Yes, repeated swiping on leather can round off the sharp corners, and this is done by hand and not with a fixture.

If you don't have cast iron but have a ceramic lap, polish on ceramic and then finish with diamond treated leather.

See my previous thread about using diamond powder instead of diamond spray.

 

[silverchip]

I use a ceramic lap and a leather stop too, but my leather strop is a piece of top grain split off the hide and glued to a piece of steel for a more rigid backing to keep it flat. You can get a mirror finish cut in precious metals using 2 micron grit diamond powder.I draw my tool in a X pattern with the length of the tool to get the desired effect.I have been using powder for all of my years of engraving, we used to order it direct from Elgin.

 

[Dave London]

I ordered some also, and got a request from the seller. He was wondering why he was selling a lot of this powder all of a sudden.
I referred him to the Engravers Cafe

 

[Arnaud Van Tilburgh]

Dave LOL, what a story, should we have to make a queue having one person a week ordering diamond powder? Price could raise.

arnaud

 

[Brian Marshall]

It does give you an idea of the markup on ONE carat of the spray product...


B.

 

[Sam]

It does give you an idea of the markup on ONE carat of the spray product...


B.

1ct diamond powder and I think the rest is alcohol.

 

[Dave London]

Arnaud
Yes I though it was funny also

 

[Arnaud Van Tilburgh]

1ct diamond powder and I think the rest is alcohol.

No alcohol anymore as far as my information is correct. Now it is just water, that is why I started my search on the powder, as the diamond spray did "rust/corrode/oxide" my iron lap.
If you fill an empty bottle with distilled water and 1 ct powder you have spray to use on the ceramic lap.

Yes Dave, it made me LOL

arnaud