Does the sharpmaker JUST put a toothy edge?

[bubblewhip]

What I'm finding with the sharpmaker is that it puts a remarkably sharp but mostly toothy edge on my knives. Granted it's better than the 1000 grit stone I use in terms of actual sharpness, but it feels very toothy. Even on PM steels like CPM S30V I feel like it's stripping out the softer carbides and leaving a very hard and toothy vanadium carbide edge. Is this natural? Or is this what people mean by a "fine edge?"

 

[Jason B.]

You probably have a burr or some other imperfection with your edge causing this feel. Ceramics leave a very smooth and extremely sharp edge, they do like to form pesky burrs though, easier than other methods .

Are you finishing with the medium, fine, or ultra fine?

 

[Heiheit]

You probably have a burr or some other imperfection with your edge causing this feel. Ceramics leave a very smooth and extremely sharp edge, they do like to form pesky burrs though, easier than other methods .

Are you finishing with the medium, fine, or ultra fine?

This. Burrs always "feel" like a sharp edge, but in my experience, a very sharp knife will "feel" smooth. Do you have a strop as well? The strop will remove the burr and you should end up with a good, sharp edge.

 

[Phillip Dobson]

I can easily get a hair-whittling polished edge by following up the UF rods with a strop. That's about as non-toothy as I can get.

 

[bubblewhip]

I only use the fine rods to finish and don't have a strop with compound yet. What I feel is that I can feel the individual teeth on a blade, it's far more prevalent in vanadium steels like S30V and even AUS8 style blades.

 

[aarya]

Maybe you're using a bit too much pressure? I've never used a sharpmaker though, so i wouldn't know. But i do know that on whatever method i use to sharpen my knives, i'm more likely to get a toothy edge if i use more pressure than less.
What you might be creating is micro-serrations. That's my thoughts anyway.

 

[Jason B.]

I only use the fine rods to finish and don't have a strop with compound yet. What I feel is that I can feel the individual teeth on a blade, it's far more prevalent in vanadium steels like S30V and even AUS8 style blades.

It is a misconception that vanadium steels will be more toothy, yes they can get sharper with a coarser stone but compared at the level of a fine ceramic they will pretty much all feel the same in a way.

 

[ChapmanPreferred]

The way I get a toothy edge on the Sharpmaker is to only use the Diamond rods and then buff the edge with a paper wheel.

I do sometimes feel like the shoulder of the bevel gets a rough or a slight burr that I choose to remove. That is usually when I had to resort to the Diamond rods to save time on sharpening.

 

[me2]

I get a smooth edge off the fine white ceramic flat surfaces. My stones are years old though, so they may have some wear. The standard fine white stones will whittle hair and treetop hair on my arm. Look up Jeff Clark and find his Sharpmaker deburring procedure. The high pressure from the triangle corners can form a burr very easily, which is difficult to remove unless you've had a lot of practice. A hair shaving, but toothy edge comes off the corners of the medium stones.

 

[robot37]

I've gotten nothing but very highly polished and smooth edges out of the Sharpmaker. The more I use it the more I stand behind it. I always finish up the edge with the UF rods.

Not sure how you're detecting a toothy edge at such a microscopic level, especially with CPM steels which have a much finer grain and very even alloy distribution.

Also, not sure what a "softer carbide" is. Maybe it's like saying sapphires are softer than diamonds? Hardness of the carbide has less to do with what gets ground off by the ceramic rod than the bulk wear resistance of the steel substrate which suspends the carbides.

 

[Broos]

Look up how big the carbides you mention are. Answer that, and you might be able to prove or disprove your theory on that basis alone.

I guess it would help to have some idea of what size irregularity a finger can feel, too. Interesting that we talk all the time about how edges feel, but I have no idea, and do not recall it ever being discussed.

I think I can tell the difference between a 1000 grit waterstone edge and a 5000 waterstone edge, but I have never tried a blind test to confirm I can. These are differences way beyond 0.5 to 5 microns or so, which is what we say a sharp edge should be.

 

[THG]

You probably have a burr or some other imperfection with your edge causing this feel. Ceramics leave a very smooth and extremely sharp edge, they do like to form pesky burrs though, easier than other methods .

Are you finishing with the medium, fine, or ultra fine?

I agree. Ceramics have always given me a smoother edge, but if you have any sort of burr at all, it's going to flop it, and your edge will seem very dull. Ceramic doesn't get rid of burrs as easily as diamond in my experience.