# Pen Mill Sharpening Jig



## Aerotech (Oct 10, 2011)

I would like to sharpen my pen mills.  The problem is keeping them square.  Even one i bought brand new, that was supposed to be carbide tipped wasn't square nor was it very sharp. 

Does anyone or anywhere sell a sharpening jig that will keep these at the proper angle for sharpening???  Any help would be greatly appreciated.


----------



## bnoles (Oct 10, 2011)

Worth watching

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q19YMZpGl9k&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL


----------



## Woodlvr (Oct 10, 2011)

I am not sure if it ok to mention someone's name but Paul Hoffman used to sharpen them. Try searching through old posts and some names will pop up.

I just found this old post I am not sure if Paul still sharpens or not but you can PM him and find out.

http://www.penturners.org/forum/showthread.php?t=80913&highlight=Pen+mill+sharpening


----------



## sbell111 (Oct 11, 2011)

I consider pen mill heads to be consumable and just chunk them if they get dull.  They are simply too inexpensive to worry about sharpening, in my opinion.


----------



## ve3bax (Oct 11, 2011)

if you dont want to watch 13 minutes of video, the same basic idea is found in the link below...  I usually end up doing this while waiting for epoxy to cure when gluing up tubes... in fact, that seems to be when I sharpen everything... plenty of time to kill and everything does work a lot better when its sharp! 

http://penmakersguild.com/articles/penmillsharpening1.pdf

--Dave


----------



## DurocShark (Oct 11, 2011)

I'm with Steve, mostly. I do sharpen them, but I don't put any thought into it.

I touch the back side of each cutter to the side of my spinning grinder wheel. Same wheel I use to sharpen my turning tools. 

I really couldn't care less if one edge is a bit higher than the others. I mount my trimmer in the collet chuck on the lathe and set the lathe to its lowest speed. Then I VERY LIGHTLY touch the blanks to it. The shaft on the trimmer (or one of my adapters) keeps the blanks square. If one blade is doing all the cutting I just don't care. The only thing that matters to me is that the cutter blades are perpendicular to the shaft.

After the next sharpening a different blade will be higher. And after the cutters are too munged up to bother with I toss it and buy another one.


----------



## OKLAHOMAN (Oct 13, 2011)

Sorry to dissagree with Steve and Don but my tirmmers were converted to carbide cutters and at $35 each are not consumable. Up until this week I've been luck in that I would vist Paul at his job and he would sharpen them for me and all it cost me was lunch (he works for food) and an enjoyable afternoon, but Paul is changing jobs next week and won't be able to do me the favors he has in the past as his new job will be setting up a machine shop for a hose company in Oklahoma City. I wish him the best with his new venture and am very happy for him as this is what he wants but sad for me. We will still have lunch at times but it might not be possible for him to sharpen my mills....Guess it's back to my disk sander.


----------



## Displaced Canadian (Oct 13, 2011)

I sharpen mine with a piece of sandpaper on the edge of my workbench. Remove the shaft, rock it back until you feel that you are flat on the bevel and slide.


----------



## JimB (Oct 13, 2011)

Pen mills are actually very easy to sharpen and only takes about 1 minute so I don't know why you would simply toss them away. 

If you are sharpening on the angled part then you are doing it the hard way. You want to sharpen on the flat surface. I use one of those inexpensive diamond hones.

If you follow the link that Dave posted above it has a GREAT article with an extremely good diagram on how to sharpen.

BTW, when I said 1 minute to sharpen I meant that literally.


----------



## sbell111 (Oct 13, 2011)

JimB said:


> Pen mills are actually very easy to sharpen and only takes about 1 minute so I don't know why you would simply toss them away.


Because they are very inexpensive and I don't care to have one more thing on my list of things to do nor do I want a container full of dull heads waiting to get sharpened.  Further, I don't want to have to consider whether I'm doing it correctly or if they are 'sharp enough'.  Others are free to sharpen theirs, if they wish.  I'll spend two or three bucks on a new one.


----------

