Customer Reviews

Delta 23-700 Universal 1/5 Horsepower 10-Inch Vertical Wheel Wet/Dry Sharpener/ Grinder

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

I expected more from Delta. While the mechanism that turns the wheels runs smooth, the large wheel needed to be dresses up. It is very soft, so much wheel is lost during sharpening if you are not careful. The drain plug for the water basin is far too small. The tool rest for the dry grinder is cheap stamped steel, what you would expect from a cheap import. The tool rest for the wet wheel was is cast aluminum (no rust) but instead of using a milling machine to surface it, they used a belt sander, so it is not very smooth, which causes tools being sharpend and the cheap sliding miter to catch while sliding back and forth. If you are looking to sharpen hand planer blades, or wood chisels it is difficult to get a straight edge with this "grinder", but it puts a nice edge on an ax (so does a good whetstone for far less $$).

I purchased this grinder because the other choices of wet grinders were way too expensive. I mainly use the 10 inch wet wheel to sharpen my woodturning tools. The tool rest is quite cheesy, and Delta does not make a jig to help you sharpen woodturning tools. The wheel itself is quite soft and you will probably have to true it up after every gouge you grind. I agree with one of the other reviews that the drain plug is too small, but its a good grinder for the money.

I got no more than I expected. I would have loved the Tormek instead, but I was not prepared to pay that price. This Delta is a good compromise -- i.e., it beats having no slow-speed, wet grinder at all. Some problems: Out of the box, the 10" wheel needed truing and the aluminum tabletop needed to be sanded smooth. On the other hand, after taking care of those problems, it does the job it was intended to do, which is put a straight edge and a clean bevel on my woodworking chisels and plane irons. I am not convinced you can do any better for the same price, so from a value standpoint, I rate it good.

I've had the Delta for over a year now and am a little disapointed w/ the grinder. As in the other reviews, the wet wheel is very soft, and in the year of avg to light use, the 10" wheel is now probably around 7" (or less). You MUST dress the wet wheel frequently or else end up with a pretty severe oval (trust me on this one!). The dry wheel wasn't bad but I did need to add the Veritas Grinder Tool Rest to make it really useful. Plus, you will need a good set of stones (I prefer water) to truely hone your edge.

In hind site, I would rather have bought a regular Bench Grinder (i.e. Baldor). You have much more flexability in the type of wheels that you can get for grinding (shaped, silicon carbide, felt, leather, ...) unlike the 2 stones here.

This grinder is a very good design and configuration for tool edge preparation. It lends itself to a good rough out then polish of the tool edge.

The flexibility of the large wheel tool rest is excellent. The overall design eliminates all vibration, and runs smoothly.

However two main points of the operation are very lacking.

First the 6 inch wheel rest does not accomodate itself to the angles of lathe tools. Attempting to adjust this rest to more than 15 degrees is not possible because the rest design and attachment point prevent this.

Modifying this attachment by adding spacers to provide clearance will allow securing angles needed. Once this is done though, your rest will be too far away from the wheel. You will then have to add an additional plate to the rest that extends closer to the wheel.

The second detriment, is the speed of the large polishing wheel. The speed this wheel turns is too slow. It is very difficult to hold or guide a tool with an irregular edge across this wheel at the perfect angle without gouging a channel into the large wheel.

Gouges appear almost instantly, and then attempting to dress the wheel to repair these gouges takes way too much time because of the slow speed it turns. Extreme pressure is needed to grind the wheel true. This one aspect, trueing the large wheel, takes many minutes with the best of diamond dressing tools.

It will take considerable practice to use the polishing stone effectively, and the use of this wheel will consume many minutes of your time to use. Time you should be using to use the tool you just sharpened.

If I can recommend to the engineers how to improve this grinder I would suggest to:

Redesign the 6" wheel tool rest to incorporate greater flexibility of angle configuration.

Redesign the polishing wheel gear reduction to increase the rpm's of this wheel to 500 rpm.

If this were done, this would be the perfect tool sharpening grinder value available.

James Holland
Handturnedbowls.biz
cadman013@eartlink.net

This has been a disappointment from day one. Take a look at my other reviews and you'll see that I'm a straight shooter, and only too happy to give praise when warranted. Here, however, the right rating is one star. The comment about the rests being unsuitable for lathe tools is precisely right. Worse, the one on wheel wobbling is spot on, too.

The stone that came with my unit had a "hard spot" that wouldn't true no matter how much I tried to dress it out. Eventually my dressing stone "caught," and there was an ugly "snap." I opened the unit up and was amazed to find that the main wheel was splined onto a nylon gear. Instead of engineering a steel gear with a shear pin to take an overstress, Delta went with a cheap nylon gear. Mine was in pieces, all over the gearbox.

I won't waste the cash to repair it, and I'm not kidding.

It's been weeks since I endured this, so this isn't a hot-headed review. I am, frankly, amazed that Delta let this piece of junk have their name on it.

If this is what Delta is becoming now that B&D has them, I'm concerned.

I loosing faith in delta slowly but it is happening. this grinder looked and sounded OK for my purposes. But the slow wheel wobbles side to side so much it is not worth the aggravation. I tried Truing it, Shimming it and reversing the wheel. All to no effail. upon Reversing the wheel I noticed that the wheel shaft is machined to small creating the wobble. there is nothing that can be done. I am disappointed in delta For this design

I havd owned this grinder for about six months and I am ready to throw it in the trash. To start with, the wheel is too soft and requires frequent trueing.This is particually a problem when you have to stop and true while working on a blade because it changes the grinding angle. The rpm's are too slow. With soft wheel and the low rmp's it can take over a hour to grind a blade. Cleaning up is also a problem. You have to take the wheel well off to clean out the residue of the wheel, which is considerable because the wheel is so soft.

I can turly say I can find nothing redeeming about this tool!

I was a little hesitant to buy the Delta after I read the reviews but I really needed a way to sharpen my lathe tools. I did a lot of research comparing the Delta to the Tormek and in the end bought the Delta. My reasoning being I couldn't afford the Tormek and all of the accessories to go with it and the two systems "spec out" about the same.

I am a complete novice when it comes to sharpening but I am able to sharpen all of my tools on the Delta with out difficulty. Here are my thoughts: 1 Yes the 23-700 is a great idea for a tool but it is built a little "cheesy". 2. As far as sharpening speed it is just slightly slower than the Tormek based on RPM 70 vs. 90. No big deal. 3. The small wheel is not intended to "rough sharpen" lathe tools or anything other than drill bits etc. You just don't put a good tool on a 3450 RPM wheel. The tool rest does just what it's supposed to do. This should not be an issue. 4. The large wheel is soft and I do have to dress it often but I don't ever over heat my tools. 5. The wheel does wobble just like all the reviewers have said. Delta really missed this one.

The bottom line is, I am able to put a razor sharp edge on my 10 tools in about an hour. This tool has been much better than expected. (I have considered buying the Tormek adapter for the 23-700 but so far I haven't needed to.)

When this unit is used properly, dry wheel for grinding and wet wheel for honing, this tool does a more than adequate job. When honing, using the entire wheel by sliding the blade across the surface using using moderate to moderately strong, even pressure eliminates the need for frequent dressing. Cleaning could be easier and the guide could stand some improvement, but overall this is a very good tool, especially considering the price. I got what I paid for.