Field sharpening stones

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Jimmyjanx1

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Jan 12, 2016
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I am new to sharpening and I need a good/easy field sharpening stone I've been looking at the work sharp guided field sharpener. Anybody have any others or any comments on the work sharp?
 
The work sharp field sharpener will work great for touching up your blades in the field.

That being said unless your going out for along time, using knives with a junk steel that won't hold an edge, or are careless and striking objects that'll damage your knife you likely won't need to sharpen in the field. Your knife may lose its razor edge thru use but should hold a sufficient working edge until you get back home to sharpen. Typically all I have to do when it is touch em up on a strop at the end of the day. I don't think I've ever actually sharpened a knife in the field.
 
The Fallkniven DC4 is an excellent little stone for field sharpening. It is two sided, with diamond on one side and some kind of aggressive ceramic on the other. Sharpen on that, strop on the inside of your leather belt and get back to having fun :)

Edit: I just saw the "guided" bit. I have also been quite happy with the DMT Aligner. It's basic but effective and comes with high quality DMT diamond hones.
 
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I take my sharpmaker with me hunting and camping and pretty much everywhere. If you pack it up right, it's completely silent in a backpack. It's not guided but it's not freehand either.
 
1. Find out your knifes factory angle.
2. Saw a piece of wood under half that angle
3. Buy some cheap 2 side stone soak it in oil and place it on the wood
4. Try to slice a piece of the course side of the stone, keeping your blade 100% vertical
5. Repeat step 4 on both sides of the blade, untill you feel the knife becomes sharp
6. Repeat step 5 on the fine side of the stone
7. Glue a piece of leather to a piece of wood and charge it with polishing paste
8. Strop the hell out of that edge
9. Don't cut yourself
10. Clean of the hairs you shaved from your leg, and clean of the pieces of paper you sliced.

This poor-man sharpening kit works like crazy and costs :

Cheap stone : € 3,95
Piece of leather : € 5?
Wood € 0

For example, spyderco uses a 30 degrees angle, so I sawed the piece of wood under 15 degrees. Works great!

f11dd4c6f46c8a74ee591c3d5b3f2f99.jpg
 
Jimmyjanx1 said:
I am new to sharpening and I need a good/easy field sharpening stone I've been looking at the work sharp guided field sharpener. Anybody have any others or any comments on the work sharp?
Click to expand...

Is this just for smaller knives or for everything - hatchets, machetes etc? For genuine field sharpening I use a Norton two sided Crystalon puck. When camping I'll use it with a bit of water, smear the mud that forms on a flat piece of wood and you also have a strop. Fits in a back pocket.
 
iMarcoU said:
1. Find out your knifes factory angle.
2. Saw a piece of wood under half that angle
3. Buy some cheap 2 side stone soak it in oil and place it on the wood
4. Try to slice a piece of the course side of the stone, keeping your blade 100% vertical
5. Repeat step 4 on both sides of the blade, untill you feel the knife becomes sharp
6. Repeat step 5 on the fine side of the stone
7. Glue a piece of leather to a piece of wood and charge it with polishing paste
8. Strop the hell out of that edge
9. Don't cut yourself
10. Clean of the hairs you shaved from your leg, and clean of the pieces of paper you sliced.

This poor-man sharpening kit works like crazy and costs :

Cheap stone : € 3,95
Piece of leather : € 5?
Wood € 0

For example, spyderco uses a 30 degrees angle, so I sawed the piece of wood under 15 degrees. Works great!

f11dd4c6f46c8a74ee591c3d5b3f2f99.jpg
Click to expand...
Not exactly suitable for a field sharpener thou
 
iMarcoU said:
When there is a will, there is a way.

And otherwise you can always buy a lansky blade medic, can't go wrong for 5 bucks, just don't expect razor edges.
Click to expand...
I'd carry some simple wet dry in various grits with a mouse pad rather then a big set up...It weighs practically nothing and will get a knife wicked sharp.
 
I made a couple blocks like this, only I angle one side @ 15 degrees, the other at 20. I've got one block for a full-sized DMT hone, and another for 4" field hones (with a taller shelf, so I don't keep whacking the table, or whatever surface the block is resting on.) Works well, although I'm not great at holding the knife perfectly vertical.
 
For field sharpening Work sharp offers the best product compared to all of these.
hands down.

Best price
Abrasive cutting speed
Grit progression
Features

It can be used by beginners or pros

Just do it.

I know Shapton makes field size combo glass stones but that would be overpriced, overkill for what a new dude would want.

Something cheap that make dull things sharp that doesn't limit your growth as you learn to sharpen better
 
Bobby3326 said:
Typically all I have to do when it is touch em up on a strop at the end of the day. I don't think I've ever actually sharpened a knife in the field.
Click to expand...

I just carry a leather strop loaded with Mother's Mag Polish. I like the strop better than a stone because you don't have to worry about getting the angle perfect- it's pretty forgiving, and Mother's isn't going to take too much off the edge anyway. Even if you manage to thoroughly dull your knife, a few hundred strokes on the strop while sitting around a campfire sipping bourbon is pretty relaxing and effective. I forgot my strop on one camping trip, and rubbed some fine volcanic rock dust into the thigh of my denim jeans, and that made a pretty good strop. Not as shiny as with Mother's Mag Polish, but still sharp.
 
Like most everyone here, I have a variety of sharpening tools from homemade to the high end of expensive. I was on the lookout recently for a comprehensive do-all field sharpener. Currently the worksharp field sharpener has impressed the heck out of me for ease of use and variety of grits. It's had no problem sharpening several knives and has a 20 degree angle set up, which works on almost all production knives. If you want a different angle, just freehand it. They're pretty small, i keep one in my truck and my hiking/camping bag.
 
I prefer a field strop, which is a leather belt, and a honing steel. I don't like sharpening in the field
 
I, too, have been on the great field sharpener quest. First of all, something I didn't initially understand: I was also trying to find a portable guided system, but then I realized that your knife already has an angle guide built in if you learn to match the existing edge angle on the stone. This is an important skill for successful freehand sharpening anyway, so the sooner you learn how to do it, the better off you'll be. Then, you'll only need an angle guide to initially set a bevel angle when reprofiling. Even there, you'll eventually get good enough to know, within a few degrees, what your hands are doing, and you'll realize that consistency is much more important than one or two degrees here or there.

I have tried the following: Eze-Lap 36F, Fallkniven DC4, DMT credit card hones, and Spyderco Double Stuff. Of all those options, I have found the DMT credit cards to be the most versatile and most useful. They weigh nothing and take up zero space. You could carry all three grits if you felt like it.

The only other thing I might try soon is a DMT Duo-Fold in coarse/fine. It would be a little easier to use on large blades than the credit cards, and those two grits should really deal with any possible situation I would encounter in the field.
 
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