How to Properly Sharpen Dental Instruments
- 1). Don safety goggles to protect your eyes from lubricant and metal particles while you sharpen your dental instruments.
- 2). Lubricate your sharpening hand stone with oil if you are using an Arkansas stone, a natural stone used to sharpen dental instruments. Otherwise, dip your stone in water to lubricate it if you are using one made of an artificial material. Lubrication allows the instrument blade to move freely over the stone and keeps the metal particles from clogging the stone.
- 3). Hold a flat dental instrument you want to sharpen in the palm of your hand, grasping it securely. Position your hand against a firm working surface. Then, scrape the instrument over the plastic test stick to determine what area needs sharpening.
- 4). Position the dull part of the instrument so that all of it is flat against the stone. Scrape the dull part along the sharpening stone so that you reduce the entire surface instead of creating a new bevel at the instrument's cutting edge. Do not tilt the stone, which will keep it from cutting evenly across the instrument's surface. Move the instrument across the stone lightly, as too much pressure on the instrument will heat the edge.
- 5). Situate the instrument so that the inner concave surface is faced upward and parallel to the floor. This will allow you to remove the unwanted wire edge produced on the tip of the instrument during sharpening in Step 4. Place the sharpening stone on the inner surface of the blade, and move the blade back and forth in a sawing motion until the tip of the instrument reaches the stone, thus cutting off the wire edge.
- 6). Hold the instrument in a palm and thumb grasp--in which you hold the instrument in your palm and stabilize the instrument with your thumb--if using a mounted sharpening stone to sharpen a curved instrument such as a scaler. Let the inner concave surface of the instrument face upward, and face the tip toward you. Place the slowly revolving stone against the inner surface of where the blade and instrument handle meet. Draw the stone slowly toward the tip of the instrument until it passes off the instrument, as this allows both lateral edges of the instrument to be sharpened at the same time.
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