First free-hand hair whittling edge

Orion's Belt · Sep 18, 2012

A few minutes ago, I got my first free-hand hair whittling edge. I started with DMT coarse, then went to DMT extra fine, then to my home made strop with metal polish and bare leather. The edge still seems to be really aggressive even though it whittles hair. Free-handing is so gratifying!

The knife is a Spyderco Military in S30V.

Vanguard.223 · Sep 18, 2012

Neat deal for sure!!

cziv · Sep 19, 2012

My first, one and only hair whittling edge was the Spyderco Military with the same aggressive edge (that doesn't look like it would be that sharp). I'll never forget it, I was really proud of it. I finished on the DMT X-fine like you and stropped it.

Steel130 · Sep 19, 2012

Very nice, I too recently got my first free hand hair whittling edge. I had been doing it for awhile on a guided system. But wanted to take up free hand sharpening as well. Congratulations man!

Orion's Belt · Sep 19, 2012

Oddly enough, I seem to get sharper, more consistent edges free hand than with my Edge Pro.

cziv · Sep 19, 2012

Orion's Belt said:
Oddly enough, I seem to get sharper, more consistent edges free hand than with my Edge Pro.

You probably won't believe this but my sharpest edges come from free handing small swipes on DMT diafolds. Forget bench stones & jigs, my little diafolds really put the juice to my edges! YMMV

These are single sided - I have the dual sided X-coarse through XX-fine.

MTHall720 · Sep 20, 2012

Congratulations! Makes me want to seriously go for free handing. Do you have the continuous surface DMT or the Duosharp?

MTHall720 · Sep 20, 2012

cziv said:
You probably won't believe this but my sharpest edges come from free handing small swipes on DMT diafolds. Forget bench stones & jigs, my little diafolds really put the juice to my edges! YMMV

These are single sided - I have the dual sided X-coarse through XX-fine.

I've never seen the DiaFold. Would they do well with larger folders as well as up to 7inch fixed blades?

Orion's Belt · Sep 20, 2012

MTHall720 said:
Congratulations! Makes me want to seriously go for free handing. Do you have the continuous surface DMT or the Duosharp?

They are the Duo-Sharp pocket stones. I'm going to buy some Dia-Sharp continuous surface bench stones.

cziv · Sep 21, 2012

MTHall720 said:
I've never seen the DiaFold. Would they do well with larger folders as well as up to 7inch fixed blades?

Pull the player to 4:17 of the video to see how I touch up a Ka-Bar for e.g. - it'll do it but more swipes.

[video=youtube;gr6DqrwWTpo]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gr6DqrwWTpo[/video]