Conversation with Shiva Ki

Nice 9th chakra cut Hans.
What knife did you use?

How do you know when it's sharp enough?... "When it will cut what you want to cut, the way you want to cut it." Jimmy Fikes.
 
Tai,
Hi. :)
Since Jimmy's wattles would probably be hard to come by :p :D ,what is your 3 stone sharpening set-up for sharpening? :confused:
IIRC,the last step was a cork sheet topped with polishing tape or paper,maybe not though,saw it a while back and can't seem to find it now or remember what it was.
Apologies for taking this thread off topic but its been all over the place already.
Thanks!

Doug
 
I use a set of natural Arkansas stones, soft, hard and black hard.

The strop I came up with which works best for me, is a composite strop with two sides, one course and one fine. I laminate a sheet of fine grained 1/8 inch cork to a wooden paddle using a good quality spray adhesive. Then I laminate a sheet of watercolor paper on top of the cork in the same manner. I charge the course side of the strop with a course stropping compound and the fine side with Simi Chrome or MAAS crème.

All the honing and stropping are done by hand, freehand, using the angle, the grit and the burr as the points of reference. Once you start flipping the burr on the black hard Arkansas,... you know it's going to be at least "sharp enough". :)
 
Alright, all you Weirdos...

First one to do a 10th chakra cut... and, yes there is such a thing... gets free sharpening lessons if they ever stop in to visit for a while with me and Maggie. ;) Then you can do an 11th, 12th and so on. All you have to do is to learn to 'grit-blast' the knife edge.

In the meantime, I'm gonna be without an internet connection until Maggie and I get moved into our new home. Slow as I am, there's no telling how long that will take.

Enjoy yourselves, gentlemen (and ladies). ;)

Good-bye, but only for the nounce.

Fat Freddy Fikes:grumpy: (Tai will understand...:D )
 
P.S. to my earlier note. Hans and Tai are just show-offs. Please... pay them no attention.:grumpy:

Good-bye... really. I mean it. ;)

Jimmy Lewellllynnn Fikes
 
Tai Goo said:
Nice 9th chakra cut Hans.
What knife did you use?
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tai, that's a very thin san mai blade with a +/- 1075 core, forged by the swiss bladesmith hansjörg kilchenmann. i use two water stones for sharpening, 1,000 and 6'000 grit (sometimes a coarser one if i want to change the edge geometry), and a leather strop with some 8 micrometer diamond paste on it.

122016527_c80d2a6e6b.jpg


right now your knives are only used in our kitchen, but they'll be fikes-tested soon!

hans
 
brightred said:
tai, that's a very thin san mai blade with a +/- 1075 core, forged by the swiss bladesmith hansjörg kilchenmann. i use two water stones for sharpening, 1,000 and 6'000 grit (sometimes a coarser one if i want to change the edge geometry), and a leather strop with some 8 micrometer diamond paste on it.

122016527_c80d2a6e6b.jpg


right now your knives are only used in our kitchen, but they'll be fikes-tested soon!

hans
Click to expand...

Fikes is a scary man.
 
I've always liked Shiva’s knives. From everything I've heard, they come sharp and they cut fine!

... Any "bladesmith" is only as good as his best, and as bad as his worst.

Besides, he has a really cool name.
 
Tai,
Thanks for responding to my post. :thumbup:
As soon as you replied I remembered the paddle strop you use.

I really dig Shiva's knives.I got my first one in '87,it was 440C,one of his Merc's,it's long gone but I saw it at one of the custom knife sites not too long ago.It cut very well but the carbon blades cut better,IMO.

Doug
 
This has turned into a very interesting thread. It's only the third time I've looked since I started it. I haven't read it all yet, but many thanks to everyone who's contributed their first hand experience.

Here's a reply a recent email I traded with shiva. I was asking about the different appearances of the edge bevels on some of his knives.


Those differences are inadvertant, since I work by hand and eye...

The main factor in sharpening is to make sure you get off the burr. It was the burr that screwed John Fitch`s three knives he sent to Dominique for testing for his article on camp knives. Dom told the truth, but the backlash ran him out of the business of testing knives and writing articles. He suddenly became the devil, for telling the truth. Him and 5 other men tried to cut one, one inch rope with each of the three blades John sent to Dom for testing, and none could cut one rope with any of the three.

Dom called me and described how the knives were acting, and I knew instantly what the problem was. Nothing wrong with Johns knives, he just didn`t finish the sharpening job; He left a tiny tiny burr on all three. Stropping is the secret to a great edge. Barbers of old knew this and constantly stropped their straight razors. Johns oversight killed Dominiques writing career, due to Johns loyal following; That didn`t understand what really happened.

If only one of those men had been left handed, John`s knives would have easially cut the rope. As the burr faced right. And that is the heretofore untold truth behind all the hatred towards Dominique, that also rubbed off on me for a long time. And got me a lot of bad press from Fitch loyalists on Blade Forums.

You might do the knife lovers in general a great favor to post this on BF, so makers will be more careful to strop off the burr. An often overlooked but incredibally important factor in a killer edge.

shiva​
 
tlmzdac said:
The main factor in sharpening is to make sure you get off the burr. It was the burr that screwed John Fitch`s three knives he sent to Dominique for testing for his article on camp knives. Dom told the truth, but the backlash ran him out of the business of testing knives and writing articles. He suddenly became the devil, for telling the truth. Him and 5 other men tried to cut one, one inch rope with each of the three blades John sent to Dom for testing, and none could cut one rope with any of the three.

Dom called me and described how the knives were acting, and I knew instantly what the problem was. Nothing wrong with Johns knives, he just didn`t finish the sharpening job; He left a tiny tiny burr on all three. Stropping is the secret to a great edge.
You might do the knife lovers in general a great favor to post this on BF, so makers will be more careful to strop off the burr. An often overlooked but incredibally important factor in a killer edge.

shiva[/INDENT][/I]
Click to expand...
Guess that clears up the Dominic Beaucant issue.
Seriously,I don't know anything about Dominic Beaucant.
Tim,Shiva asked me to post that as well.I declined,trying to explain to him that stuff like that tends to enflame and while he means well,trying to explain stropping,like Roger mentioned,things start to go downhill in a hurry without Shiva being here to reply to anyone's questions or to elaborate.
I know you are just posting for him but he needs to be on board,I'll Email him later and ask him about it.

Doug
btw great thread. :thumbup:
 
Doug, you have learned. A lot of it here. This is the positive power of the internet, and BladeForums in specific.

Some people, makers, and collectors alike, do not translate well to the written word.

Does not make them any less or more than what they really are.

Best Regards,

STeven Garsson
 
tlmzdac said:
This has turned into a very interesting thread. It's only the third time I've looked since I started it. I haven't read it all yet, but many thanks to everyone who's contributed their first hand experience.
Click to expand...

Well, this thread HAD taken a turn for the better - lots of good and positive discussion about knives and their sharpness and such. It had been BS free for quite some time. So.... you figured... let's bring Shiva back to tell us ONCE AGAIN how Fitch's knives REALLY couldn't cut - not even with SIX guys trying, and how Dominique is an unjustly maligned paragon of truth?? Puhleeeeeze. :rolleyes:

Roger
 
Guess that clears up the Dominic Beaucant issue.
Click to expand...

Not really. Most people opinion of DB have nothing to do with his maligining of Fitch or other makers in print.

Ask some of your favorite makers about the man. You may learn a lot.
 
I think this is just one side of the story.

Maybe folks need to talk to those who actually know what happened in the Dom/Fitch thing.

(Hint the knives where shipped razor sharp and there are well known people who saw them when they were packed. Things went down-hill when John asked that the knives be sent back rather than donated.) ;)
 
"If only one of those men had been left handed, John`s knives would have easially cut the rope. As the burr faced right."

Not for certain, as it might have been a left hand rope... ;)

-Michael
 
leatherbird said:
Anyone heard anything from Jimmy or how his move is going? :confused:

Doug
Click to expand...


Hi, Doug

I'm alive and still kicking (or at least twitching).;)

Will try to get an email off to you today. I'm using my step-son's computer right now... and will be for probably another week. I still have the same email address.

Old Broken-Down Jimmy:grumpy:
 
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