Lots of good ways to sharpen a khuk: From free-hand stoning, to butcher steels, to ceramic rods, to sandpaper/mouse pads
My general plan is to use a stone or two to rough in my edge. If I'm not worried about keeping a mirror finish and the blade is pretty dull and/or needs to be convexed, I have had excellent luck using nothing more than a couple different grit sanding blocks (you know, the kind you can pick up at a hardware store for like 3 bucks in the paint section) and stropping the edge until it is what I call "axe sharp". From there, many will use finer and finer grits of sandpaper on a mouse pad to truly polish a blade to a mirror. I'm not that patient
my final step is using a decent piece of scrap 6-8 oz leather with some jewelers polishing compound worked into it. I put it across my thigh and strop the blade while I watch TV. My thigh seems to have just enough give to keep the convex meaty. I'll usually follow it up by laying the leather flat on the table and stropping the edge a bit higher 50 or 60 times each size.
The result is usually a blade with tough work edge that will pop hair off my arm and should slice paper cleanly.
Traditionally, khuks have a pretty soft spine with a fairly soft tip, then a harder sweet spot that runs along the belly to just before the recurve followed by a slightly softer steel inside the curve. I will say, some of those sweet spots can hard enough to skip a file. But they usually give up their secrets in time with care
Stop by the Himalayan Imports sub forum called
The Cantina here on the Blade Forums board. We'd love to answer any questions you have and love seeing pics too
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