Couple sharpmaker questions

[LambAndMartyr]

1. Regarding serrations- sal recommends drawing the blade from the back to the tip. Does anyone also go the opposite direction, like in a stabbing motion? The purpose would be to avoid skipping over areas just infront of the peaks. Maybe 1:1 or 3:1 ratio of towards-tip:away-from-tip strokes.

2. On my SE military the last 3/4" that is plain edge seems to get a slight burr on it (burr is on the side with the factory chisel angle). I take it off by going back to step #3 and using one "Stab" stroke. Am I doing something incorrectly that creates this burr?

3. Is it worth getting the extra fine stones that are sold seperately?

Thanks,
Mike

 

[JD Spydo]

I am a very big fan of the 204 Sharpmaker and there are a couple of serrated Spyderco kitchen knives I sharpen on the Sharpmaker and I do them exactly as you described by going both directions. That method sure works great on the Spyderco kitchen knives that have the wavy serrations.

Now on the serrations on most of the Spyderco folders I use the Spyderco 701 Profile kit to sharpen those serrations. Personally I have found that with some patience you can use the 701 Profile stones to get your serrated Spyders to almost factory condition.

As far as the burr is concerned what I do is to simply take the back side of the blade from the heel to the tip one or 2 brisk strokes and that seems to work 99% of the time for me. Sal shows on the Sharpmaker DVD the correct way of doing it. I encourage you to go over that DVD at least 3 times while you're learning to use it.

To answer your question as to whether it is worth it to get the extra stones available for the 204 Sharpmaker>> My answer is to get both the ultra fine stones and the diamond stones. I currently have 2 Sharpmaker kits and I have the extra stones for both of the kits. Once you get your sharpening skills developed you will want to go that extra step. Because on my Spyderco folders with the ZDP-189 blade steel I notice a huge difference after using the ultra fine stones on those blades. It makes a big difference on CPM 440V blade steel as well.

Now when I got my very first 204 Sharpmaker I got an illustrated booklet that came with my 2 kits and I've actually learned more tricks from the booklet. If you don't have one of those booklets I'm sure you could get one from Spyderco. After you learn the 204 kit I also encourage to get a set of Spyderco's 701 Profiles.