New cabbing wheel scratches

Prospecting Australia

Help Support Prospecting Australia:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
Joined
May 1, 2014
Messages
1,958
Reaction score
2,530
As requested by rough2cut :p , a new cabbing topic - has anyone else experienced a "wearing in" period with new resin-bonded diamond cabbing wheels? I am noticing now that everything I am cabbing on the new machine is coming up with un-removable scratches. I have heard a number of people mention that this can occur until the wheels are well worn in. Does anyone know how long it's likely to take for this to stop happening?
 
I was talking about recoating these type of resin wheels with terry the other day,. he said new ones had ripples on then like rolled paint with too much paint that had to be smoothe down before they would give a good finish. So cab away until they go away.
Now isn't this better........ cabbing. I love a world in perfect order.
 
Maybe that's why all four resin-bonded wheels seemed to have "rough spots" in them when I first started using it - a band a cm or so wide where the stone would chatter on the wheel. Last night I only noticed it in one of them. I'll just keep playing with practice stuff and won't cab anything I really want to keep until I stop seeing the scratches.

You're right, this is so much better - now we're all happy :)
 
Yeah, I've seen this and not just on the resin bonded wheels. We have new sintered wheels at the club to replace the old 80/100 grit wheels. The 180/220 were not replaced and are (very very) well worn in so they weren't up to the task of getting the deep scratches of the new wheels out. It took a few weeks, but it's a lot better now.
I only ruined one stone on it and after that used them only to grind the general shape and used the old carborundum wheels for doming before moving to the 180/220. We've done a few weeks of hard stone (agate, pet woods) shaping on them and they are great now.
 
There arnt many lapidary wheels and discs that don't need a good break in period. The Chinese ones break in and wear out at the same time.
Let me know when they need recoating, I need a test set to play with.
 
I have used these resin bonded wheel for the past 25 years professionally and find the better quality ones work well, cheap ones will have problems at times with contamination.
They all need to be "run in" as per the instructions (if all else fails read the instructions). I used a piece of agate with a smooth face and a square or rough straight edge on one side (use the rough edge to knock off the very tops of the peaks only). Use the agate with plenty of water to run the wheel in.
Don't try to smooth the wheel entirely as this will ware the wheel excessively. AVOID PLACING SHARP EDGED OF STONE ONTO THE WHEELS AS THIS WILL STRIP THE RESIN RIGHT OFF.

As to scratches, apart from a contaminated wheel only one thing leads to heavy scratches at the polishing stage. That is failing to check properly between each step that you have completely removed all the scratches from the previous step. Do this by drying the stone and watching the light as it rolls across the surface, if there is a scratch keep working on the current wheel until it is removed, if it still does not come out go back to the previous wheel.

A crack can appear as a scratch as well so check each step thoroughly.

There is no easy way, just practice til you get it right. I hope this helps.
 
Got a polishing formula for cabbing wheel and disc at the polishing stage.
Take some metal buffing compound suited for a softer metal like aluminium so the abrasives are softer than your stones. Mix in a bit of soy wax and paraffin oil to make wax that sticks to the wheel and doesn't go to powder and fly off the wheel or disc. add your diamond powder to suit. Test this on an older wheel to make sure you get results your happy with. You can also just use the soy wax and paraffin oil on there own, using the oil to thin the wax to a suitable consistency. I made this formula a few years ago for a dental company polishing CZ teeth ceramic. they were happy whit the results. The idea is to have a compound not too oily which is annoying when you polish and not too dry than you get a puff of dust on contact with the wheel.
 
You could patent an extreme whitening toothpaste, dunno how the paraffin would taste though :)

Thanks rough2cut, I'll give that a go.

Problems with scratches have disappeared, everything works great now - I guess it was just new wheels that needed running in. I'll remember the agate trick when I get any new wheels Ken.
 

Latest posts

Top