So I thought I'd tell everyone about this new wheel I got for my chain grinder and I would use a title that was a little easier to find in a search situation. I have been wanting to try one of these wheels for years now, but always found it really hard to spend the money on one. You can buy a fleet of the pink wheels for the money you spend on just one from diamond wheel. I did a lot of searching on the old interweb to see what others where saying about them, but usually the information was burried in an unrelated post somewhere. Any way..... I got the wheel about a month ago and finally had the chance to try it out recently. The shipping container is nice enough to ship something made of crystal..... far better than bubble wrap that the pink (fragile) wheels are shipped in. Not much as far as instructions go, but I think there is an assumption that you already know how to set up your grinder. The instructions for cleaning are good and the cleaning stick is included with the package. Use The very first thing I noticed is that the wheel is perfectly balanced. I always had some vibration with the pink wheels.... now the grinder runs very smooth. The finish on the cutters is very nice. I'm not sure what the grit is on the wheel but it is finer than the pink wheels. No heat to speak of. The pink wheels I had to "tap,tap,tap" on the cutters to avoid the dreaded blue cutter... the cbn wheel I don't have to tap tap tap as badly and the cutter is just slightly warm to the touch. I'm sure its possible to overheat the cutter with the new wheel, but I think I'd have to be pretty aggressive with my grinding without lifting the wheel to do it. No dust from the stone.... there is some steel dust from the cutter itself, but no more mountain of stone dust to go along with it. NO MORE PROFILING the stone. This is a big deal to me, but may not be to anyone else. I hated to re profile the stone every few minutes to clean the stone and keep my cutters uniform. Non of that with the new wheel as the profile does not change with use and the grit did not load up at all. As far are sharpness.... I don't know know if they are sharper than the chains done with the pink wheel or not.... but they cut great and I cut mostly dirty wood anyway so who knows. Bottom line is that I wont by using another pink wheel .... not ever. I will save up and buy another wheel from diamond wheel for my .325 and LP stuff before i have to sharpen them again.
I was looking at these last week when I had a box of pink wheels in the cart. I have not pulled the trigger on either yet. I hate the pink wheels for all of the reasons you mentioned. If I am sharpening a 32 or 36 inch chain, the wheel dressing is a pain. I also do the bounce method to dissipate the heat and avoid heating the cutter. Did you find a better place to buy these other than Bailey's or the standard suppliers?
I purchased it from Diamond Wheel through their Ebay store. I didn't get it any cheaper than buying it directly from their web site. I keep a little play money in my paypal account and ebay makes paypal purchases a two click operation. I don't buy much from Baileys any more, so I'm not sure what their mark up is on those wheels or if diamond wheel is the brand they carry. I can't remember exactly what I payed, but its was around $125 shipped to my door in 3 days. I am cutting dirty firewood for the most part, so the majority of my chains are for 18 to 24 inch bars. I find the profiling on that length chain to be a PIA. If I was doing any number ( read that as more than one ) of 32 and 36 inches I would probably go insane. I would say go for the CBN wheel and keep some of your sanity on those longer lengths. For me it was hard to pony up the money that would buy a lot of pink wheels. I'm a little on the cheap side when it comes to a lot of things, but I buy quality tools and equipment. This was money well spent in my eyes (and my wallet).
I was lucky to get one of these on a secondhand grinder I picked up a few months ago, and my experience matches Don's. After struggling with an off-brand pink wheel, the CBN was a revelation. It cuts quickly, stays cool and keeps its shape -- so much easier that it feels like cheating.
CBN is not the same thing as a Diamond wheel. CBN stands for Cubic Boron Nitride which is not the same thing as diamond. So I am a little confused about the title.
Yes I knew that but the way I read it sounded like it was referring to a diamond wheel and CBN were the same. I just wanted to clarify that there is a difference. I have two of the CBN wheels one for 3/8ths and one for .325 that I use for sharpening. They are excellent wheels. If you want to sharpen for precise accuracy over and over again on the same chain these work well. Ok I went back and read the title again. If he had put Inc on the end I would have realized that is was the company name and not a comparison between two different wheels. Thanks.
