Thread: Drill Bit Sharpening Station

Yes, that would work but there isn't much wear on the wheel anyway, It's not like you are grinding lots of material off the drill for each sharpen, unless you have to repair a broken drill or you need to re-profile a drill that was wrongly sharpened, like I had to do with the 19mm bit that I had previously sharpened on the Drill Doctor. Even so, if there is wear, you can always reposition the jig so the bit hits a new patch of the wheel or even turn the wheel over and work off the other side. I am using the fine wheel on this little 6" Ryobi grinder, it's nowhere near as abrasive as an angle grinder disc but it could be worth a try if you have nothing else to do when the rain sets in next week.
One thing I would like is some sort of calibrated slide gadget so you can reposition the jig exactly in reference to the wheel. It would make changing/rotating the bit by 180 degrees much easier than taking the bit holder out of the base to rotate the bit. I might work on that when it rains.

Do you just eyeball that you have ground the first edge in a vertical orientation?
I was thinking of a little tab that you adjust to register against the flute when you grind the first side. Provided the flutes are fairly undamaged, they should be ground accurately 180deg from each other?

On the front of the jig there is this little brass "finger" that sticks up and you rest the inside of the "flute" of the drill bit against it to keep things vertical. This ensures that the cutting edge will be vertical on both sides of the drill. The "finger", which is slotted, is held in place by 2 screws and will beed some up-and-down adjustment for different size bits (up for large, down for small and in the middle for things like 10mm).
The thing is so simple even I can use it.

I have always just set the bit by eye and never had a problem, the little tab got removed very early on I guess but that was literally a couple of decades ago.

Originally Posted by Chris Parks

.... the little tab got removed very early on I guess but that was literally a couple of decades ago.

My index tab also went AWOL about the same time and I just eyeball the orientation and 180° rotation, which seems to be sufficiently accurate. A quick check to see that both lands have been ground on the tip to the same width (i.e., meeting in the centre of the web) confirms that.

I'm starting to think that removing that indexing finger thing might just be a good thing. It's easy enough to set the edge vertical and with some drills having a thicker "web" than others, well getting the position just right would be easier if that peg wasn't there. Another job for tomorrow.

Originally Posted by Old Hilly

I'm starting to think that removing that indexing finger thing might just be a good thing.

It's easy enough to remove, just put it somewhere where you can find it if decide to reinstall it later...