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[Clansgian AT wmconnect.com]

>  lust for one of those  
> old sharpeners where you sit on a tiny seat and push foot pedals to  
> power the big stone wheel.

Such a wheel is for gross reshaping of metal, not actual sharpening unless it 
is a cultivator disk or shovel or some such.

For the actual sharpening you need files, and for honing you need stones.

With a few execptions, you have the sharpening device working the edge as if 
the tool were cutting off a piece of the wheel, file, or stone.  And yet I 
see 
people most often doing just the opposite!  That is, the wheel wolld be 
turning TOWARD you as if the axe is trying to cut away a piece of the wheel.

When the edge is sharpened or honed, there will be a wire bead left on the 
edge.  You use the opposite motion to remove the bead, that is, you strop the 
edge when you are done.

James   </HTML>