Edge Pro and diamonds (durability) question

Ernie 1980
I purchased my edge pro apex 16 years ago. Works well, the stones can wear, and can be smoothed.
The two suction cups have to be changed every few years.
Over all I am happy with it, did drop one stone strip and it broke in half. There was enough tackiness on the backing plate that I put it back in place and finished sharpening the knife.
Have asked Ben about different settings for knives on two occasions and he has always been polite and professional.

I guess not everyone agrees with him on somethings.
That is life.
 
Thanks for dredging up that link Dave. I'll stay with DMT for now, unless more compelling info arises.
 
Bwchase: thanks for the input about the lifespan of your system. How many knives do you sharpen in a month? Or maybe it would be better to ask how many knives you have sharpened with the stones in total?

David: thanks for that link! The actually just ordered an atoma 1200 grit plate last week, it should be here tomorrow. Those pictures are very interesting.
 
vorpalblade said:
Could you (or someone else with experience) elaborate on how Atoma plates differ from say, DMT or EZE-LAP?
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The diamonds are put down in a "dot" pattern. I'm not sure what they do to anchor the diamonds to the substrate, but it does seem to be quite strong. Atoma also offers offers replacement pads so that you can replace the diamonds rather than the entire plate--though it is not much less expensive than an entire new diamond stone.
 
Cynic2701 said:
The diamonds are put down in a "dot" pattern. I'm not sure what they do to anchor the diamonds to the substrate, but it does seem to be quite strong. Atoma also offers offers replacement pads so that you can replace the diamonds rather than the entire plate--though it is not much less expensive than an entire new diamond stone.
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Do you notice any difference in the edge obtained with Atoma Vs. DMT or EZE-LAP? Any difference in speed of sharpening? Or is it just the diamond distribution and longevity potential?
 
vorpalblade said:
Do you notice any difference in the edge obtained with Atoma Vs. DMT or EZE-LAP? Any difference in speed of sharpening? Or is it just the diamond distribution and longevity potential?
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I don't think that the edge attained off of an Atoma is substantially different than one from a diamond stone of another brand. Personally, I haven't worn out a diamond stone yet, so I'm not sure I can compare lifetime of an Atoma vs. a DMT, for example, but it does appear to wear better than the DMT's I have used so far. As to speed of sharpening, again, I'm not sure I can say one is noticeably faster than the other.

If you use diamond plates to lap waterstones, the Atoma's dot pattern does help with stiction.
 
I am extremely curious how the Atomas hold up vs. the DMT in the XXC/140 range. IMO, the DMT in XXC are way too sparsely coated in diamonds. The XC is the same I believe. After that, they are much more densely coated, and work a lot better. The C plate I have is awesome, for instance, and cuts like crazy even after years of use. The XXC I have has dropped off a LOT in terms of cutting speed, especially after having lapped a single arkansas stone and a Spyderco UF. If I knew the Atoma would hold up better, I would get one in a second. I also have a DMT Dia-Lap and it also dropped off in cutting speed quite a lot after only lapping a couple pieces of float glass - but not nearly so much as the Dia-Sharp XXC I mentioned earlier. The other issue with the Dia-Flat is that it's not flat and I need to send it back.
 
Diamond Stones, the gift that keeps on cutting slower and slower. 3 hrs. to reface a ceramic stone? Try the sidewalk. Use light pressure, it takes forever. Use heavy pressure, stones are ruined. Where can I get more of this action?
 
eKretz said:
I am extremely curious how the Atomas hold up vs. the DMT in the XXC/140 range. IMO, the DMT in XXC are way too sparsely coated in diamonds. The XC is the same I believe. After that, they are much more densely coated, and work a lot better. The C plate I have is awesome, for instance, and cuts like crazy even after years of use. The XXC I have has dropped off a LOT in terms of cutting speed, especially after having lapped a single arkansas stone and a Spyderco UF. If I knew the Atoma would hold up better, I would get one in a second. I also have a DMT Dia-Lap and it also dropped off in cutting speed quite a lot after only lapping a couple pieces of float glass - but not nearly so much as the Dia-Sharp XXC I mentioned earlier. The other issue with the Dia-Flat is that it's not flat and I need to send it back.
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Ken Schwartz uses the Atoma plates to flatten stones after cutting them for the WEPS , EP and KME systems. He has tried the DMT stuff and he reports 3x the life on atoma plates. He gets about 3 years out of the 140 , flattening 100's of stones in a day some days. Everything from Japanese Naturals to hard Shapton stones , to Choseras and Nubatamas.

I had noticed that all the microscope pictures I have seen of the surface of the DMT stuff all looks like a thin coating compared to other brands.. Then you look at the KME gold stones which have 4x the concentration , I wish I could get those in fullsize.
 
Yeah, the DMT XC and XXC are really sparse re: concentration. The finer stones are pretty good though. If Ken is reporting triple the life from the Atoma diamonds I will definitely have to pick some up. Thanks for the info! I too wish someone made a densely coated 180-220 grit diamond plate - I'm not real fond of the interrupted surface plates.
 
You have to understand while a nice guy, Ben is set in his ways. He told me before once in an email that no knife should be sharpened to 15 dps, that no steel can handle it. That's all I have to say about that.

Clay from WEPS has claimed over 500 sharpenings for a set of diamonds, and his machines, especially in-house and ones that travel to shows are meant to sharpen many, many knives everyday. They do have a break-in period of 10-15 knives or so where they smooth out and "truer" to grit, but as a result, the edges get much better. I personally got tired of blade scratching, slurry mess everywhere, leveling stones all the time, buying stones all the time, yada yada. No doubt that aluminum oxide and such leave smoother scratches that are easier to get out, but my old crappy diamonds are capable of producing fairly acceptable edges...

 
Sadden said:
Ken Schwartz uses the Atoma plates to flatten stones after cutting them for the WEPS , EP and KME systems. He has tried the DMT stuff and he reports 3x the life on atoma plates. He gets about 3 years out of the 140 , flattening 100's of stones in a day some days. Everything from Japanese Naturals to hard Shapton stones , to Choseras and Nubatamas.

I had noticed that all the microscope pictures I have seen of the surface of the DMT stuff all looks like a thin coating compared to other brands.. Then you look at the KME gold stones which have 4x the concentration , I wish I could get those in fullsize.
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This is very interesting... I have done about 230 knives so far on my stock diamond stones on the WEPS and have found no others that last as long. I did have Ken Schwartz custom cut me some 140 atomas for my WEPS, and they worked GREAT for about 20-30 knives... that's when they tapered off quickly and lost a HUGE amount of grinding power and efficiency. Now I never use them because my 100/200's cut faster than the Atomas do. I am not the only one reporting this... Clay Allison and a few of his forum members are reporting the same experience, this is why Clay does not offer the Atomas for his system.

I also bought a course/fine DMT duocourse stone for lapping my choseras with. I sharpened about 3-4 knives on it, but I am not impressed at all! Along the entire length of one side it appears worn down to the substrate and the diamonds are all gone.

All that being said, the stock WEPS diamond stones are some of the best I have found. Clay is also working (and has a prototype) of a stone that is not just plated diamond but is rather diamond through and through. This is expensive but apparently it is virtually impossible to wear out.

When I had an EP Pro I always kept extra of each stone in stock because they wore out pretty quickly (don't have numbers) but especially the lower grits. They would dish, then you have to flatten, and and this causes a lot of wear.

note: Clay and others are reporting 400-500 knives before wearing out. Bob Nash reported somewhere around 2000... wow.
 
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Hmm. Begs the question, who is making the diamond stones for the WEPS, and do they make bench stones also?
 
Hi Clay! Yes. Same here. I'd like something around the DMT XXC, XC and C range. The XXC and XC seem to be the weak point in the DMT range. I would love to see some coarser diamond stones with more dense coverage and would buy them immediately! I normally only use diamond stones to do profile work and lap my water stones.
 
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