Pro Grind Sharpening System for 8 Inch Grinders to Sharpen Lathe Turning Tools, Chisels, Skews, Bowl Spindle Gouges •Includes Setup Blocks and Quad Jig for 8 inch Grinders

I’ve been using this system for about a year, when it’s adjusted properly, it is a good aide in getting sharp turning tools. After the initial setup, which you really need to pay attention to detail on, it’s easy to use.

Excellent well designed product at a great price

Depending on your grinder and setup, installation of this system can be either straight forward or, as in my case, a bit of a headache. To be fair, though, that is largely out of the hands of the manufacturer. For their part, there could be a better fit between the brackets that mount to the bench and the arms used for the tools, as I often find myself wrestling to get them to slide into place.When it comes to using the system, the gouge adapter is fairly easy to use and my only issue with it is that it becomes difficult to use on gouges with a shorter shank or those with a round shank as it uses the top of the cut portion to clamp against. This is usually fine, but I have a few gouges that don't have that long cut section and even with only 2" extended, I'm already trying to clamp to a round shank. It would be nice if the clamp was recessed in the center to make it easier to use this way (I know they're probably assuming you'll just throw out that tool and go buy another, but with the cost of these tools, I'm not the only one using short tools that are still perfectly good).The flat rest is a great tool for many of the other tools, but it is also a huge missed opportunity. The rest has a guide channel and fittings for it that I'm sure are useful to some, but what I find myself wishing for most of all is a simple guide that fits into it with set angles for chisels. The setup for sharpening the roughing gouge is okay, but it's such a pain to put in place and set up that I find myself just using the flat rest and would kill to have a 90-degree guide to keep it straight as I rotate the edge on the grinding wheel. The contraption they've included for clamping your skew chisels for sharpening is also prohibitively time consuming, and if I had a solid guide to rest it against on the flat rest so it meets the wheel at the right angle, that would be so much quicker and easier. In all this time, I've only used it once, and quickly decided it was easier to just hold the chisel at the right angle and slide it across the wheel.Over all, this system could use a few improvements, but just for the sake of having a sold adjustable flat rest (that is much, much, much better than the bad joke the grinder came with) and having the gouge sharpening jig, it is worth the cost and effort it took to install it. I installed mine and the grinder to a platform to avoid attaching it directly to the workbench, but after two days of fighting with it, I screwed it to the bench because it is just too much leverage for it to sit on its own and I didn't have a good way to clamp it, so if you are hoping to make a somewhat portable mount, be prepared to clamp it in place.I asked myself if I really thought having this system would be worth it or not. If you are asking yourself the same question, the answer is YES! There are some who can use a flat rest and sharpen their bowl gouges and all with it, but I can't. At least not without taking a lot of time to slowly and carefully move it on the wheel. Being able to make a couple quick movements to set it in the jig and then pass it over the wheel is a huge time saver. Plus there's the added benefit of consistent angles. Even the best of us drift on the angles over time just using the existing edge to set the rest angle, the jigs in this kit make it fast and easy to set them and keep the edge geometry the same over time for predictable cuts. You use a solid tool rest on your lathe, think of this as your solid tool rest for the grinder.

I bought this system instead of wolverine,etc because it seemed to have ALL the stuff included. The other systems seem to have a lot of optional parts, several of which were needed in addition to sharpen the basic lathe tools. Sure, addons are fine for stuff like a special knife jig or an axe or whatever. But you expect an expensive turning tools system to be able to handle ALL the turning tools...within reason.This system has 3 main types of usage. First, using the little tool rest doodad either with or without the sliding tool holder to help run the tool back and forth. It has 2 reversible thingees that help you determine the right angle for various gouges,etc. This is really the main use, which handles chisels, skews, and the curved gouges that have standard grinds where you just turn the tool as it sharpens to get the right profile.The second usage is to use the big extend-o thingee to hold the handle of your long tool steady Be warned that if using a CBN wheel, this could be problematic as the wheel may "grab" the tool and flip it upwards.Third usage is the funky jig thingee which works to create fingernail grinds.... basically these are the profiles that a simple turning-the-tool would not work on because its more oval than circular.My main gripe really is the instructions. They do NOT appear on youtube which seems like a ridiculous oversight. I don't really want to watch them on my computer so I ripped the DVD to put on a flash drive. Turns out they COPY PROTECTED the instruction DVD. Seriously guys? Good job...wouldn't want any miscreants to be able to pirate your uh...instructions for your tool. So that was annoying and just unnecessary.All in all I am pretty happy with it. Its very nicely built, comes with all needed hardware. Also has TWO BASES so you can easily switch from one wheel to the other. You might want to get a few magnets to help store some components (though some parts are ALUMINUM like the tool slider doodad, so it wont scratch your tools). Also, drilling some holes to store the reversible angle-setters is a good idea too.

muy completo y la manufactura es excelente,buen metal yel acabado de calidad,me ha permitido lograr afilados de calidad,aun los mas complejos.