Question: grs graverhone vs. powerhone

James · May 14, 2020

I would love to hear any reviews of the graverhone. I have a older powerhone,and find it very difficult to rough out and do relief grinds on standard size carbide square gravers. I have a grinder with green wheel, and for the hone a "gator" coarse diamond wheel, but it still takes forever to get shaped. Wes Griffith showed in a class a high torque highrpm capable hone, from a custom maker, that would do rough grinding lickety-split. apparently carbide gravers are not sensitive to some heat, and with hss with judicious dipping can be ground more agressively as well. Can anyone relate whether the graverhone has much better adjustable rpm and torque than it's predecessor?

monk · May 14, 2020

i now use a dc tape transport motor. on the shaft i use a variety of diamond impregnated discs. this home brewed device can grind too fast if i'm not careful. i can change discs from 100 grit- 1200 in about 20 seconds. 2rpm to maybe 1000 by turning a knob on the power supply.
i control the speed using a variable power supply. since the discs are larger in diameter than the powerhone, i can get near instant results . i preload the disk with a bit of mineral oil. never burned a graver usin it.
also i use a grs fixture to do the diifferent angles and facets needed.
you can use a dc motor from a discarded treadmill or any other device with a dc motor.

Sam · May 15, 2020

The PowerHone is a fixed speed of 260RPM. The GraverHone is adjustable speed and makes shaping new gravers 10x faster and easier. It’s also a high precision tool with 0° toolpost accuracy.

James · May 15, 2020

monk said:
i now use a dc tape transport motor. on the shaft i use a variety of diamond impregnated discs. this home brewed device can grind too fast if i'm not careful. i can change discs from 100 grit- 1200 in about 20 seconds. 2rpm to maybe 1000 by turning a knob on the power supply.
i control the speed using a variable power supply. since the discs are larger in diameter than the powerhone, i can get near instant results . i preload the disk with a bit of mineral oil. never burned a graver usin it.
also i use a grs fixture to do the diifferent angles and facets needed.
you can use a dc motor from a discarded treadmill or any other device with a dc motor.

Thanks sir, its great explanation and thanks!

James · May 15, 2020

Sam said:
The PowerHone is a fixed speed of 260RPM. The GraverHone is adjustable speed and makes shaping new gravers 10x faster and easier. It’s also a high precision tool with 0° toolpost accuracy.

Thanks Sam, I,m a GRS guy, so your review is Gold to me...By the way, your advanced shading video is priceless, true Master demonstrating his Forte! thanks so much for producing it!

jmyates · May 15, 2020

GRS has a pretty good deal on GraverHones at the moment....https://grs.com/product/graverhone-vs-110-v/ I upgraded from my PowerHone this morning!!!!

Mitch

jerrywh · May 15, 2020

I have GRS's graverhone that Sam is talking about and I love it. They should have made it 20 years ago and it would have saved me buying 4 others. It is the best I ever had and it is reversible also.

monk · May 15, 2020

Sam said:
The PowerHone is a fixed speed of 260RPM. The GraverHone is adjustable speed and makes shaping new gravers 10x faster and easier. It’s also a high precision tool with 0° toolpost accuracy.

egads ! i didn't know about this one. i live under a rock. news travels slowly there.

Sam · May 16, 2020

jerrywh said:
I have GRS's graverhone that Sam is talking about and I love it. They should have made it 20 years ago and it would have saved me buying 4 others. It is the best I ever had and it is reversible also.

Agreed, however when the PowerHone first came out there wasn't much (or any) carbide being used for gravers and overheating HSS was always a concern, so the RPM was kept slow enough to prevent that. Nowadays carbide is the choice for many and it's not subject to heat like HSS is, so a high speed sharpener is the thing to have.a

Still, with my GraverHone, the only time I use the higher speeds is for shaping up a new graver. Once that's done all resharpening is done at its slowest speed.

jerrywh · May 16, 2020

Do your selves a favor and look up the annealing process for HSS. I guarantee you won't take the temper out of it with a graver hone. Also look up the tempering temp.

Sam · May 16, 2020

jerrywh said:
Do your selves a favor and look up the annealing process for HSS. I guarantee you won't take the temper out of it with a graver hone. Also look up the tempering temp.

I have heard that as well Jerry. I was always careful not to get a graver hot enough to discolor it, but supposedly it can withstand quite a bit of heat. Maybe it’s tool steel gravers that are more sensitive to heat.

jerrywh · May 16, 2020

Tool steel gravers are very sensitive to heat and can be softened at no more than 350° F. 500° F will pretty much ruin them. But they can be re hardened and tempered again. HSS must be held at over 1000 deg for a extended period time to soften them. I use carbon steel for special shapes because HSS is so hard to heat treat.
I have spent a lot of time looking for a tougher carbide but so far have not found anything better than Cmax.

Question: grs graverhone vs. powerhone

James

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monk

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