Coming full circle with sharpening setups

Misanthropia

Misanthropia

Joined
Jul 10, 2011
Messages
1,941
Well I think I've finally made up my mind...

I'm going to buy a variety of bench stones. When I first got into knives seriously four years ago, I bought a sharpmaker and wasn't very pleased with the results. So one night, I stayed up until like 4 AM and taught myself to free hand. I loved the freedom that came with it, and my gripe with fixed sharpeners was born.

Nevertheless, I felt that the Sharpmaker wasn't sufficient so I bought a Work Sharp. After ruining the tips on a few knives, it became apparent that the efficiency of powered sharpening just wasn't worth it. Sold the Work Sharp.

Next I bought an Edge Pro. I loved the precision results others seemed to have, and I liked the idea of using natural stones instead of diamonds. Sharpened a few knives with it, and came to the conclusion I didn't like the amount of variables introduced by the system, nor did I love scratching up some of my knives and making a giant mess. So went the Edge Pro.

Finally I believed I had reached the zenith of sharpening when I bought a Wicked Edge. It felt like the end-all, be-all of sharpeners. Everyone seemed to have such spectacular results, and I was attracted to the idea of being able to accurately reprofile knives without issue. And yet, I've only used it a few times and continue to freehand with the Sharpmaker rods instead.

Personally, I don't reprofile knives very often. It's a combination of a lack of patience and a lack of confidence in my abilities with my new setups. Fixed sharpeners are kind of a strange concept with hand sharpened knives; obviously there will be natural variations in edge angles, and a fixed system will force you to reprofile the knife if you even want to touch it up. I could never really get past that limitation and I find myself eager to finally do some real freehand sharpening with good equipment. Here's my proposed setup:

DMT 8" Coarse
DMT 6" Fine/Extra Fine
Spyderco 8" Medium Benchstone
Spyderco 8" Fine Benchstone
Spyderco 8" Ultra-Fine Benchstone
Shapton Pro 8000 grit ceramic waterstone
Balsa strop w/2.5 micron diamond paste
Balsa strop w/1.0 micron diamond paste
Leather strop w/white and green compound.

I believe this setup will be effective for my collection of folders, which all use modern steels. The most wear resistant being a few in M390, otherwise most of it is S35VN, CTS-XHP, or D2.

Feel free to critique this setup or make any suggestions, it would be much appreciated!
 
Last edited by a moderator:
Depending on what you are doing, I think your proposed set up is over doing it.

All you really need is one coarse stone, one fine stone, and a strop or two. That should put a razor edge on any knife you own. If you haven't already bought the stones, I'd recommend a Norton economy stone and a DMT fine diamond hone. Going to strop from there will do ya.
 
jackknife said:
Depending on what you are doing, I think your proposed set up is over doing it.

All you really need is one coarse stone, one fine stone, and a strop or two. That should put a razor edge on any knife you own. If you haven't already bought the stones, I'd recommend a Norton economy stone and a DMT fine diamond hone. Going to strop from there will do ya.
Click to expand...

It definitely is excessive to just get a knife "sharp", but I don't want to sacrifice capabilities by selling my WE so this setup essentially recreates the steps of the WE.
 
Misanthropia said:
It definitely is excessive to just get a knife "sharp", but I don't want to sacrifice capabilities by selling my WE so this setup essentially recreates the steps of the WE.
Click to expand...

There's no reason you can't do that with your existing WE hones (use them freehand), assuming you haven't already gotten rid of them.

With the finishing-grit stones in particular, like the Spyderco ceramics, you might eventually find you don't need a large bench stone for the relatively light refinement chores. A large bench hone (8" or larger) is most useful at coarser grits, for heavy grinding jobs like rebevelling; really speeds things up. After that, assuming the edge was fully apexed from the beginning, it's relatively easy to refine the bevels with smaller hones; especially if you're using all your hones in a tight sequence. I have the Spyderco 8" stones in the medium and fine grits, and have almost never used them. If needing a ceramic at all, I've gotten a lot of good use out of a Spyderco DoubleStuff pocket hone for the same types of finishing tasks, and it doesn't take much time.

The DMT EF will come very close to emulating the finish of the Spyderco medium anyway; both will leave a fine 'satin' finish, and the diamond hone will be less prone to burring and more effective (faster and cleaner-cutting) on high-wear steels with heavy vanadium carbides, as well as the D2 you mentioned. Between those two, I'd likely stay with the DMT EF, and pass on the medium Spyderco. The polishing steps that'd otherwise be done on the Fine and UF Spyderco could just as easily be done on hard strops of wood, using diamond compounds or CBN. And again, the strops would be much less prone to creating burring issues, as I think that's the biggest drawback to ceramics in general. It's the reason I've gradually moved away from using ceramics much at all, save for very light burnishing tasks.


David
 
Last edited:
FWIW, i prefer the finish left by spyderco for some reason.

My DMT edges at the same grit just dont seem to have the same bite.

I like the diamonds for reprofiling, since i too am lazy and impatient.
Then ceramic to make it sharp.
 
The proposed set of stones is redundant to say the least. lots of stones and compounds doing the exact same thing.

Based on the steels you have listed a Coarse and Fine diamond hone plus a strop with 1 micron diamond compound would be your best bet. Your biggest hill to climb is the Vanadium content in high alloy steels, Diamond and CBN are really the only abrasives fully capable of honing these high alloy steels which limits the available sharpening tools.
 
Jason B. said:
The proposed set of stones is redundant to say the least. lots of stones and compounds doing the exact same thing.

Based on the steels you have listed a Coarse and Fine diamond hone plus a strop with 1 micron diamond compound would be your best bet. Your biggest hill to climb is the Vanadium content in high alloy steels, Diamond and CBN are really the only abrasives fully capable of honing these high alloy steels which limits the available sharpening tools.
Click to expand...

This, I mean no offense to any freehand pros, but I find it a little funny the same folks who preach about the superiority of freehand tend to suspiciously avoid modern steels, if you re-profile s90v by hand without diamonds I want to shake that hand, assuming you still have one by that point.
 
I think the ability to freehand precisely is an amazing skill. But I wouldn't ever recommend that someone start out that way unless they have a lot of patience and sacrificial blades. The OP went through a valuable learning curve to come back to bench stones. You learn a lot from using guided systems, and makes the move to freehand less frustrating.

In my own circle of friends, I've seen a number of people buy a bench stone (before I show them what I use) from a big box thinking they will sharpen their knives to a razor edge and perfect bevel. Then after destroying a couple of edges, they pick up a $10 drag-through sharpening "toy", and just convince themselves that the blade is sharp. Heck, I did that myself not too many years ago. And I hate myself for it. ;) If I have the opportunity to show my knives, I can elaborate a little on how a novice can get close to that edge.

Now that I've learned tons about the process, geometry, and different metals, some day maybe my eye-hand coordination (my weak link) will let me do the same thing and go back to the bench stones.
 
I like a 10" stone the best, more work accomplished per stroke in my mind. 2-3 stones and strop is enough for me usually.
Dozier
 
jackknife said:
Depending on what you are doing, I think your proposed set up is over doing it.

All you really need is one coarse stone, one fine stone, and a strop or two. That should put a razor edge on any knife you own. If you haven't already bought the stones, I'd recommend a Norton economy stone and a DMT fine diamond hone. Going to strop from there will do ya.
Click to expand...

I agree. But he's learning. Give him some time. DM
 
bflying said:
I think the ability to freehand precisely is an amazing skill. But I wouldn't ever recommend that someone start out that way unless they have a lot of patience and sacrificial blades. The OP went through a valuable learning curve to come back to bench stones. You learn a lot from using guided systems, and makes the move to freehand less frustrating.

In my own circle of friends, I've seen a number of people buy a bench stone (before I show them what I use) from a big box thinking they will sharpen their knives to a razor edge and perfect bevel. Then after destroying a couple of edges, they pick up a $10 drag-through sharpening "toy", and just convince themselves that the blade is sharp. Heck, I did that myself not too many years ago. And I hate myself for it. ;) If I have the opportunity to show my knives, I can elaborate a little on how a novice can get close to that edge.

Now that I've learned tons about the process, geometry, and different metals, some day maybe my eye-hand coordination (my weak link) will let me do the same thing and go back to the bench stones.
Click to expand...
If not freehand to start, how "guided" do you recommend? Is the Work Sharp WSKTS really guided? What about DMT's device for clamping stones? Is the SharpMaker considered a guided solution?

I'm not criticizing your answer. I'm sincerely interested in sorting out the hundreds of recommendations/opinions about which stones, which sharpeners, which progressions, etc.

Thanks to everyone here for being generous with your knowledge, experience and advice.
 
Last edited:
The top three, and probably most used by novice knife freaks are, wicked edge, edge pro apex, and KME. I have two of the three and grab the KME first.

I consider a guided system one that holds the set angle on both knife and stone. The Sharpmaker is really just a vertical freehand because your hand, arm, or wrist can change the angle with any stroke. So unless your eye/hand coordination is perfect, you can make a good stroke, then immediately destroy it on the next. But I still love them for fine stone touch up.

The inexpensive guided systems (sold at big box stores) are just not as precise (looser tolerances). You can still get a sharp knife with them, but if you admire those pics of perfect polished edges, you'll appreciate one of the three above.
 
I don't really consider the edge pro and wicked edge as for people who can't sharpen really. More like for those who demand perfection that cannot be obtained free hand.
 
Sold the Wicked Edge here and just ordered these, I took everyone's suggestions into account and got rid of some of the redundant items:


DMT 8" Coarse
DMT 6" Fine/Extra Fine
DMT 8" Extra Extra Fine
Spyderco 8" Fine Benchstone
Spyderco 8" Ultra-Fine Benchstone
Balsa strop w/2.5 micron diamond paste
Balsa strop w/1.0 micron diamond paste

I may need to buy the Extra Coarse in the future, but I don't do much reprofiling so it didn't seem like an immediate concern. The Spyderco stones are mostly for polishing before the strops, I realize that finishing with a DMT EEF is probably sufficient but there seems to be a lot of conflicting reports about the finish it leaves.
 
Misanthropia said:
DMT 8" Coarse
DMT 6" Fine/Extra Fine
DMT 8" Extra Extra Fine
Spyderco 8" Fine Benchstone
Spyderco 8" Ultra-Fine Benchstone
Balsa strop w/2.5 micron diamond paste
Balsa strop w/1.0 micron diamond paste
Click to expand...

Very similar to what my setup is, actually:

DMT C
DMT F
DMT EF
Spyderco M
Spyderco F
Spyderco UF
King 1000/6000
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top