DMT or Shapton after Spyderco 204UF

M

multitoolsrock!

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Aug 1, 2014
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Hi, my progression of stones goes from DMT XC/C/F/XF to Sharpmaker M/F/UF triangle stones. I have jig set so I can put a 12.5 or 15 degree with the diamond stones and then finish with 20 or 15 on the Sharpmaker stones. I've got Aus8, 8cr13MoV, 154CM, S30V, S110V, CPM-20CV, ZDP-189.

I'd like to get another stone after the Sharpmaker UF triangle stone. I've been reading the posts and it seems like a D8ee or a Shapton 4000 or 8000 could work. About 5 years ago, people were noticing the D8ee took along time to break in, but more recently, they are supposedly pre-worn in by DMT.

I totally agree with others that the general diamond scratch pattern is deep and random, especially during the break-in period. For this reason, I'm leaning toward the Shaptons, except they are expensive! Anyways, would appreciate your thoughts. Thanks.
 
Just on grit size, DMT XF is 9 micron. I don't have info on the sharpmaker but I do have one also. It seems like if you do 12.5, then you're simply adding a microbevel with the 15 degree sharpmaker.

I don't know about D8ee. Is that the DMT extra fine? that would be a 3 micron grit. Then a shapton 4000 is 3.69 grit and a shapton 8000 is 1.84

I suppose a good progression is from your DMT XF to the Shapton 4000. All my recommendations is just looking at the micron size.

Besides the DMTs that you have, I have the Medium Extra fine which is 6 micron, then the DMT Double Extra Fine which is 3 micron. Follow by the Shapton 8000 and then the Shapton 16000.

I find for quick maintenance, I use the Spyderco UltraFine benchstone. they don't give a grit size but it's pretty smooth. followed by a basswood strop.
 
Rey HRH,

Yes, the DMT D8EE is the double extra fine. How do you like yours? Do you think it's worth it to get the Shapton 8000 for even better edge? Just to let you know, i'm not using these for a straight razor or anything yet, i'm just hooked on get a better and better edge, like so many others have been. Those Shaptons seem like they cut very nice but get pricey.
 
I like mine. If I go past Fine using my DMT stones, then I go MF, XXF, then Shapton 8000 and Shapton 16000 then strop. Worth it to get a better edge is relative. The question is can you really tell the difference or will it be just for the thing you have between your ears? Can you use the stone to achieve what it is able to? I haven't let not telling the difference and my lack of ability to use the stone to keep me from getting the stones.

But I do think I am learning more and more. Mainly, that I need to keep reducing the pressure as I go to finer and finer grits. I normally use back and forth scrubbing. On the shaptons, I can get the edge sharper after some initial strokes but afterwards, it seems to get less sharp. I find I have to switch to just edge trailing strokes like I'm stropping. Next time, I'm going to ust just edge leading then edge trailing.

I'm also hooked on the idea of getting a better and better edge. I got the material to make my own strop from horse butt using instructions that a member here kindly shares. and I just got .25 micron polycrystalline diamond solution for use on bare basswood.

I say if it's not taking food away from your family or risking the roof over your head, then go for it. There are a lot more destructive past times.

But breaking out the DMT stones and the shaptons take some set up time. so i still recommend the Spyderco UF Benchstone and a strop.
 
The Spyderco UF stone is around 3 micron, so it will be the rough equivalent of a 5k waterstone. In my experience it produces a nice mirror polish and makes screaming sharp edges. I don't think ANY DMT stone following this will polish the edge finer. I think you'd need to go to something else.

What are you looking for in terms of improvements? How sharp are your edges now? Can you make a blade shaving sharp from the DMT C alone?

If you just want a finer stone, that's one thing. If you're looking for actual cutting performance increases, that's another.

Brian.
 
Very interesting stuff thank you. Nothing practical in this for me, sharpening is just a nice diversion from the craziness of real life (like being on schedule and budget)! So I just cut paper to determine cutting performance.

To me, phonebook paper (yellow/white) and computer paper are no test, anything relatively sharp should cut that. McMaster Carr (thin) and MSC (thinner) catalog paper are a much better test. If I do the progression down to SM UF triangle rods, i'm able to cut through MSC paper easily with a fast cut. But a very, very slow cut doesn't always work because of chips in the edge.

i'm still learning about destressed edges. I was in the school of "sharpen to a burr, then slowly remove it" but now see the wisdom of not doing this. It makes sense to remove the weak material and slowly work to the apex with as little burr as possible. With S110v and ZDP-189, I get chips in the edges which I think is because of breaking off larger size burrs and/or being too heavy handed when progressing up the grits.

Getting a finer grit stone may not actually be helping here but its just cool to try and get the perfect edge.
 
You shouldn't be getting chips in your edges from sharpening. Like you said, maybe you have burr remnants hanging around on the edge.

Regarding paper tests: There are certainly a lot of different grades of paper. But regular phonebook paper is a pretty high standard. But there's more to it than "will it cut". Can you cut phonebook paper, with a push cut? Now, what about against the grain of the paper? Ok, now try making a push cut at 90 degrees to the paper's edge. But make sure it's truly at 90 degrees in all three dimensions. No leaning of the blade side to side or front to back. A true 90 degree cut.

This is a pretty hard test for most sharpeners.

But you might actually want to back up a step. See if you can make a phonebook paper slicing edge (slow slice) from your DMT C alone. See if you can make the edge from the DMT C shave arm hair. When you can, things will change.

Brian.
 
Dmt eef will scratch a shapton 4k finish, I have both or all the stones your asking about .

My progression is diamonds then ceramic or water stones then spyderco ceramic . Grit rating aside the diamonds leave deeper scratches in the bevel .

IMHO your going to need to go over the 10k grit mark in water stones to improve on the UF finish .

Now a 4k shapton would help in getting the diamond scratch pattern out to move on to ceramics .
 
bgentry said:
The Spyderco UF stone is around 3 micron, so it will be the rough equivalent of a 5k waterstone. In my experience it produces a nice mirror polish and makes screaming sharp edges. I don't think ANY DMT stone following this will polish the edge finer. I think you'd need to go to something else.

What are you looking for in terms of improvements? How sharp are your edges now? Can you make a blade shaving sharp from the DMT C alone?

If you just want a finer stone, that's one thing. If you're looking for actual cutting performance increases, that's another.

Brian.
Click to expand...

This plus a million and a half . I can get a push cutting edge off of a dmt xc . If your knives aren't 90% to sharpness off your coarse st stone then work on your technique .

I watched cliff stamp push cut news print off 36 grit stone as well as a clay brick. I called BS to myself but I tried it . He's right .

I see Jason B. In here IIRC he said in one of his videos he prefers a lower grit stone finish below 220 IIRC. The finer stones and pocket knives are for looks IMHO. You can get your knife sharper than you'll ever want/need with some practice.
 
Bgentry: Thanks, just tried it, yeah, it's noticeably more difficult to push cut at 90 degrees than at shallower angles. I'll do this more in the future. But in general, i've not been able to cut cross-grain hardly at all, just little cuts, even though these knives would cut arm hair. To get good long cuts across grain is pretty amazingly sharp. i'll also try the DMT C only, that would seem to be a very toothy edge! Lastly, when I said "chips" i was meaning the edge looks like it has been chipped. So I'm thinking when I flip the burr back and forth it breaks, making the edge look like the metal chipped away.

Spartan00: Yes, maybe one of my problems (among many) is that DMT XF to Sharpmaker Medium triangle stone is too big a jump and needs something (not DMT XXF) to fill the gap.
 
Spartan00: Missed your last post but saw it now. I'll have to try push cutting after a DMT C or XC. I have a V-block set up which holds the diamond stone at an angle so my stroke is vertical and downward, similar to the sharpmaker. I do it in the kitchen sink under dribbling water to keep the stone wet. But I do a few strokes on one side of the blade and then switch to the other. I'm not alternating every stroke like you would when the stone is horizontal.
 
multitoolsrock! said:
Bgentry: Thanks, just tried it, yeah, it's noticeably more difficult to push cut at 90 degrees than at shallower angles. I'll do this more in the future. But in general, i've not been able to cut cross-grain hardly at all, just little cuts, even though these knives would cut arm hair. To get good long cuts across grain is pretty amazingly sharp. i'll also try the DMT C only, that would seem to be a very toothy edge! Lastly, when I said "chips" i was meaning the edge looks like it has been chipped. So I'm thinking when I flip the burr back and forth it breaks, making the edge look like the metal chipped away.

Spartan00: Yes, maybe one of my problems (among many) is that DMT XF to Sharpmaker Medium triangle stone is too big a jump and needs something (not DMT XXF) to fill the gap.
Click to expand...

You don't need it for performance . What is your technique ? I see your setup ,but are you doing a western stroke (one pass flip other pass flip) . Japanese style back and forth? Walk me through that and I'm confident I can get you a satisfactory edge with what you have now .
 
Try this . If your going back and forth do 20 strokes on ome side and flip, then do 20 on the other side , check sharpness .

For now start off with the coarse . Anyhow 20 passes on side 20 passes the other check sharpness, remember light light pressure here .

Also watch you scratch pattern . Make sure your scratching all the way to the edge and not just the bevel. Once your scratches are the entire length of the bevel to edge do this .

You did your 20 a side . Now go to 10 a side . Do your 10 a side then 5 . After 5 do 3 . After 3 alternate one side for one side with super light pressure .

Now do say 10 alternsting and check sharpness . Now for the most important thing imo. Now stropping strokes on the dmt coarse one side then the other , super light pressure . Do 10 alternating check sharpness .

The edge trailing stroke is where it's at for coarse edges . On some of my knives I do edge trailing only through all grits , and the results speak for themselves .

A 325 grit dmt gives posSibley my favorite edge for a one stone sharpening . The key is no pressure and alternating those last strokes.

When the edge is sharp enough to pop off arm hair then move to the next grit and only until then.

The higher in grits the less pressure and skip the 20 per side back and forths, just either alternate 1 for 1 then finish edge trailing and move on. They key is crazy light pressure
 
So I take one of the 2" x 6" diamond stones, set it up in the holder, and do downward strokes while sliding the contact area of the edge from the root to the tip. I only have one of each stone, i have to spin the set up 180 degree to do the other side. So it's easier to do some strokes on one side, spin it around and then do the other side. When I'm doing the strokes on one side, it's usually just downward, not up and down (like scrubbing) unless there is a ton of material to remove. Then I do the other side, feel the sharpness, use the magnifier, decide whether to move up in grit or stay there before the burr starts to form.

One other side note, how do you know when your stone is broken in? When the scratch pattern is uniform? It might be i have one of them that is not fully broken in, i noticed some stray scratches on the Hogue EX01 that looked strange at the grit level I was at.
 
multitoolsrock! said:
So I take one of the 2" x 6" diamond stones, set it up in the holder, and do downward strokes while sliding the contact area of the edge from the root to the tip. I only have one of each stone, i have to spin the set up 180 degree to do the other side. So it's easier to do some strokes on one side, spin it around and then do the other side. When I'm doing the strokes on one side, it's usually just downward, not up and down (like scrubbing) unless there is a ton of material to remove. Then I do the other side, feel the sharpness, use the magnifier, decide whether to move up in grit or stay there before the burr starts to form.

One other side note, how do you know when your stone is broken in? When the scratch pattern is uniform? It might be i have one of them that is not fully broken in, i noticed some stray scratches on the Hogue EX01 that looked strange at the grit level I was at.
Click to expand...

The problem is doing too many strokes per side makes burrs that can make you believe your knife is dull. The alternsting strokes prevent this or not prevent but reduce it .

As far as broken in the "calm down a bit" when new you can kind of see your bevel shimmer with Diamond dust broken it stones don't do this .

When the scratches become uniform and you don't feel any rough spots in the stone it's broken in.

I would suggest ditching the jig. If you haft to mark your bevel every stroke it's worth it .Eventually you'll he able to feel the grind on the stone and find your angle instantly .

Sharpening at one fixed angle is not always going to work.
 
i'll have to try switching sides every stroke and even the horizontal approach. I know what you mean the burr can make it feel like you have a dull edge. I made the jig thinking it would make a more consistent angle, but I sounds you can get pretty good at "feeling it".
 
Mr. Multitoolsrock,

You're pretty much exactly the target audience I had in mind when I wrote The Seven Secrets Of Sharpening. You might get something out of reading it. Reading through this I've thought of at least 3 of the secrets that I think apply here. I hope it's helpful.

I wish you good luck either way. :)

Brian.
 
After a Coarse DMT the only reason to continue with diamond abrasive is because the steel alloy has too much wear resistance and cannot be sharpened on anything but.

If the alloy being sharpened does not require diamond or CBN then after a Coarse DMT the next logical step is a 1000 grit waterstone. This is a good transitioning point because the 1000 is plenty coarse enough to remove the Diamond scratches but also fine enough to set the stage for polishing.

I would never recommend mixing so many abrasives in a progression, it only makes things more difficult and confusing. If you plan to use diamond then use them on the coarse level and follow with waterstones in the medium and fine range. As for ceramics, I think the Spyderco UF is worth having and works very well for minor touch-ups.

As for the grit relations of these stones, The DMT EEF and Spyderco UF yield a similar scratch patter but because the ceramics have a burnishing effect there is a much higher shine to the finish. The diamond plates technically don't produce any polish at all, the abrasive is so hard that its all cut and no polish when interacting with the steel. However, because the diamond is so hard and very sharp it cuts a very polished scratch... it becomes much more noticeable as the wear resistance increases in the steel. As for waterstones... well, they do everything you wish the other stones would, but you can't just get an 8000+ stone and expect it to work in a random progression of stones.
 
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