Do you guys sharpen on a belt grinder?

C.Edmondson

C.Edmondson

Joined
Jan 22, 2009
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Usually after I have tempered and hand sanded the blade I am left with a thickness of around 1/32nd and I go over to the belt grinder on the slack area on top of the platen and start honing a edge untill I see the edge start to turn up and then I use ceramic light sticks and finally leather. Is this what most people do or do you guys perfer something different, I really appreciate all the help I find on this site, I still have a tremendous amount of learning to do and this was just one of those questions that makes you wonder if its what most people do or is their a better way, Thanks Charlie
 
I am not a knife maker by any means. I have only finished one. I have sharpened two knives on a belt grinder, and both I went straight from the slack belt, to the leather strop. (I think I ran the edge over the corner of the wood table to knock off any remaining burr first, which is a trick I saw from a real knife maker posted on here).

I can say that the knife from the belt sander right to the strop is the sharpest knife I have, and I have a lot of sharp knives (I normally do hand convexed edge with sand paper with soft backing then strop).

I am sure that a real knife maker will jump on here with some real advice.
 
I just go through the grits on a slack belt, finishing up with a 2000 grit Trizact loaded with white rouge. I grind edge up, but for sharpening, I go edge down.
Also, I go with the slowest speed possible.
 
Slack belt to X22 Norax then buff with cotton wheel with CrO rouge then shave some wood to take off thin wire edge. If I am not at home, I use a Diasharp extra fine (1200grit) diamond hone,then strop on board mounted veg-tanned leather.

I like a polished edge.
 
Troop said:
I grind edge up, but for sharpening, I go edge down.
Also, I go with the slowest speed possible.
Click to expand...

Same here, the last couple grits go edge-down. I take most of my blades right down to a zero edge, right when I'm starting to get a burr, on the slack belt as the last step before hand-sanding. I try use the finest, cleanest belts I have on hand. I have to be real careful because my grinder has one speed... fast.

I really like the convex edge "bevel" you get this way. I find it pretty easy to get knives VERY sharp this way. Not just a keen edge, but one that cuts efficiently. (That's not because of my enormous skill :rolleyes:, just because the technique works really well.)

You can vary how close it is to flat by playing with belt tension a little bit. Depending on the knife you can keep the whole side against the belt, or "roll" the spine away from the belt a little to make your edge more robust. You can put a little micro-bevel on it with a benchstone or what-have-you.

Now that I think about it, slack-belt pre-finishing is one of my favorite steps in making a knife. That's when the blade has actually become a cutting tool. You can test it in your favorite ways, see how it actually cuts, adjust if needed, and if you wanted to, you could say to heck with hand-sanding, wrap some tape or cord around the tang and be done. :)
 
I've been going between my grinder and my paper wheels... basically just using the slotted wheel to hone after setting the bevel on the slack belt. I had a good conversation with Richard J last month and we discussed the paper wheel system quite a bit, I'm going to get some better paper wheels and re-approach that method. It's hard to beat when done correctly.
 
I sharpen on the contact wheel, then clean up with a fine India stone, then polish on 5/0 emory paper.
 
I use a sharp 30 micron belt and go edge up just above the platen then knock the burr off with the buffer and pink compound.
 
tight slack belt , edge down through the grits . I also use ' X ' weight belts for the sharpening since they have a nice stiff backing . I use a medium felt wheel with honing compound to remove the burr .
 
Edge facing me on the smallest section of a rotary platen. For kitchen knives I use Norax to 400 grit then a cork belt with green compound as a strop. For a more polished edge I go all the way to about 2000 grit before the cork.

That said, after watching David Schott demonstrate an Edge Pro at IG's Hammer In last weekend I'm very seriously thinking of switching to one of those.
 
Sharpening was taught to me by Kurt Meerdink, 1" split slack belts, start at 120 and go up from there.
 
This is only my opinion as im fairly new at this but have sharpened knives for 30 pluus years. I feel now that a grinder unless moving very slow would heat up the blade to much and have to great of an oportunity to loose the temeper from the most important part of the blade. I watched the japanese masters and i and try there method but a much faster way. using various wet stones and then oil stones to finish off the blade. I want to get a paper wheel as i have seen the demo and talked to many that use the paper wheel and it is faster with less risk of burning the blade in comparison to other methods. An auto strop with rouge ive never tried but i do know works well on finishing and I too would like to learn another way of doing things. It takes me 20min to get the knife worked down and honed sharp enough to shave the hair off your dogs balls lol. kellyw
 
I did at one time but not any more. I do get the basic grind with a slack belt but some Mastersmiths told me that it is almost imposable for your customers to duplicate the edge put on the knife with a belt of a grinder(slightly convex) and they are the people that will be sharpening it from now on, so now I use a norton Fine India stone for sharpening.
 
Never.... I sometimes start with a wet grinding wheel and some blades like flat ground I go from file with sandpaper on, and go on to stones, natural Japanese water stones, ceramic stones, man made water stones, oil stones (Arkansas and Belgian stones)
well i love sharpening so got a few tools for it

DC
 
Rusty McDonald said:
...it is almost imposable for your customers to duplicate the edge put on the knife with a belt of a grinder(slightly convex) and they are the people that will be sharpening it from now on, so now I use a norton Fine India stone for sharpening.
Click to expand...

I understand your point. That's where micro-bevels come in. A convex edge with a micro bevel is very easy to touch up with a small stone or ceramic rod. That's how I use my personal knives. After several sharpenings, if the micro starts getting too far up the edge, anyone who can use a stone can learn to convex sharpen with a pad and sandpaper.

Naturally if a customer specified a regular V-edge, I would make them what they wanted.
 
Dan Pierson said:
....Edge facing me on the smallest section of a rotary platen. ... after watching David Schott demonstrate an Edge Pro at IG's Hammer In last weekend I'm very seriously thinking of switching to one of those.
Click to expand...

Dan those rotary platens really are the cats pajamas :D :jerkit:.

I missed Dave's edge pro demo, I was hammering out a blade at the time. I don't have a rotary but my flat platen has a nice 2" slack before the lower 4" contact wheel. I sharpen with edge down on the slack till I get a nice burr on either side using and old 400 grit, then use an old belt flipped over and conditioned with a yellow bar that I had gotten from a friend who managed the inspection dept. at a chrome platters.

After the belt work, I take out the Lansky, and establish my first edge of a of the final edge. I elongate the notch at the right angle of the metal rod so I can slide the stone holder from one end to the other instead of being locked into the factory notch. I use the course and medium stones with the stone located at the bottom of the metal rod, giving angle slightly less than the whole is marked. When I get that nice edge from the medium, I switch to the ceramic stone and mount it at the tip of the metal rod giving me the slightest angle change at the last .001 of the cutting edge. Than I use a strop board charged with the yellow compound for the last step. I use the Lansky because as mentioned earlier, not everybody can duplicate the original edge that you deliver to him or her. The result is that you get a nice polished cutting tip of the edge with a more course remainder for the more fibrous material you cut on a daily basis. :jerkit:
 
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