PART X
Time so start prepping the tooth. Anyone who has worked with mammoth tooth knows it can be a pain sometimes.
I would rather spend more time in preparation in order to minimize issues later.
First I will use some tape to make a handle to hold the tooth and keep my fingers away from the disc.
I will sand the front of the tooth completely flat on the disc sander.
Now that the tooth is flat on the front I have a block of wood that has been milled flat and parallel.
More super glue.
I will glue the tooth to the wood face down with super thin glue and clamp it down. I have a steel block to spread out the clamping force.
The block is wrapped in cling wrap, super glue won't stick to it.
I had a set of tooth that was very porous and the glue wicked up through the tooth and glued itself to the block once.
Glue the second piece down the same way.
While I'm waiting for the glue to set up completely I will dust a few ten-thousands off the back of the bolsters and each side of the spine
Once the glue has set on the tooth I can go to the grinder with a 36 grit belt and hog off the back down to about .020 of my final thickness.
Having it glued to the board makes it much easier to do this as I can use a good amount of pressure and not be concerned about breaking it.
It also helps in the next step, surface grinding the back perfectly flat.
To do this I use these really cool but ridiculously expensive hold down clamps. ( with fortunately for me I have on permanent loan)
They are made to hold non-magnetic items down on a mag chuck, like this block of aluminum.
Place the fingers on the clamps against edge of the part to be held, see how the fingers are raised off the chuck.
To be continued ...