Freehand grinding breathrough!!

the higher (toward the spine) the bevel goes, the easier it is to feel the flat. my grinds go to about 1/8" of the spine on most knives. you can still go higher.
 
Vincent Price said:
Finally had that freehand grinding breakthrough I have been looking for. Experienced the 'flat' that I thought I was feeling but wasnt. It may look like a turd to some but to me it it's a freehand success.
https://imgur.com/gallery/6HOSQzQ
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Looks good to me! Just be careful - when I hit that I called it a "Zen" moment .... but got so in to it I forgot to keep track of where my fingertips were - and took a fair amount off of several fingernails ( https://www.bladeforums.com/threads/i-need-a-manicure-or-how-to-save-your-fingernails.1694998/ ) :-)

Just a couple thoughts: on the straightness of the shinogi - I think a lot of people get that really, really clean during hand sanding .... so if not really clean coming off the grinder, that is somewhat typical??

On the plunges - others have recommended, and I have found really, really useful, a little device called a file guide. several of the supply houses sell these (some with carbide surfaces to protect from abrasion), some hardened. Lots of videos out there on how to make them (I made my own ... not even hardened - I just grind it to align the edges when it wears - basically a throw-away thing for me.
 
Grind lines can be cleaned up as you bring grind up higher. Lines should get sharper as you move to finer grits and are easier to get real clean post heat treat on a lot of steels.

Flat grinds, especially shorter ones like a scandi, are/were much harder for me freehand than hollow grinds.
 
How else do you trim your fingernails? When you can hit that Zen moment and get a toenail trim you are the master.
 
In remember getting fingerprinted a long time ago for some government stuff and the fellow said they were unusable because sanded smooth places and cuts, so I would have to come back in two weeks to get them taken again. I told him that in two weeks they would be different ... the smooth places would probably be larger and the cuts would be on different fingers.
 
Stacy E. Apelt - Bladesmith said:
In remember getting fingerprinted a long time ago for some government stuff and the fellow said they were unusable because sanded smooth places and cuts, so I would have to come back in two weeks to get them taken again. I told him that in two weeks they would be different ... the smooth places would probably be larger and the cuts would be on different fingers.
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I can never unlock my phone by fingerprint unless I go on a 2 week vacation
 
I had the same issue with a fingerprint scanner for a garage door opener I installed. I had to replace it with a keypad.
 
Back to basics This might help: Lock your elbows at your side swing your hips and follow the edge curve...
Running the belt off the side a 1/4" or so will make for a nicer plunge Repeat for the other side
Get the plunge close and then walk it in slowly
 
Stacy E. Apelt - Bladesmith said:
In remember getting fingerprinted a long time ago for some government stuff and the fellow said they were unusable because sanded smooth places and cuts, so I would have to come back in two weeks to get them taken again. I told him that in two weeks they would be different ... the smooth places would probably be larger and the cuts would be on different fingers.
Click to expand...
funny enough, I got fingerprinted for a security clearance quite a while ago. They tried three times before giving up .... the patterns on my fingers are so shallow and soft they just smudge. to this day, anything that uses fingerprints to open (Iphones, biometric safes, etc), just do not work for me. they either fail to register the initial print, or one or two days later they stop recognizing them, and no "open sesame" . A pain....
 
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