I was pretty "pissed" yesterday when I tried to sand the guard and the blade's spine and ricasso .
I'm currently using sandpaper backed with an eraser for the guards and different round ss and brass stock and Micarta pieces for the spine and ricasso.
Since I only have quality paper from 400 grit upward, I always had to get quite high in gritsize (at least 240) on the grinder.
I just don't want to go that way anymore because i messed big time on several occasiones, with both using the platen and slack belt.
Those mistakes were not properly correctable.
Especially on the wood - metal transitions (like the guard area on this knife) it really sucks because very often the belt even on fine grits such as 400, eats uncontrolable into the different materials.
Sanding the guard extra on a fine slack belt rounds up all clear transitions that I want to remain crisp and clean and also takes of material where it's not supposed to.
So what tools and techniques and steps of grit sizes would you recommand (for both wood-metal transitions and metal only) in case I stop with a fine file (in german: Hieb 3) or a 60 grit belt?
The last pic on the ricasso shows such a case where I just can't help it with my posibilities so far. The spine and ricasso area although are fairly easy to sand, but for me it really gets complicated on guards and such stuff with all the clean curves and crisp edges, where i don't want to round or mess anything with sanding. If I had a deep scratch from a file or rough belt that I couldn't get out by hand with the fine paper, the only thing left to do for me, was using a fine belt and slack sand it out, but that just messed it up even more
.
So here the pics:
I hope I could express my problems in an understandable way. It was even complicated doing it in my own language
.
I'm looking forward to your tips and help.
Marcus
I'm currently using sandpaper backed with an eraser for the guards and different round ss and brass stock and Micarta pieces for the spine and ricasso.
Since I only have quality paper from 400 grit upward, I always had to get quite high in gritsize (at least 240) on the grinder.
I just don't want to go that way anymore because i messed big time on several occasiones, with both using the platen and slack belt.
Those mistakes were not properly correctable.
Especially on the wood - metal transitions (like the guard area on this knife) it really sucks because very often the belt even on fine grits such as 400, eats uncontrolable into the different materials.
Sanding the guard extra on a fine slack belt rounds up all clear transitions that I want to remain crisp and clean and also takes of material where it's not supposed to.
So what tools and techniques and steps of grit sizes would you recommand (for both wood-metal transitions and metal only) in case I stop with a fine file (in german: Hieb 3) or a 60 grit belt?
The last pic on the ricasso shows such a case where I just can't help it with my posibilities so far. The spine and ricasso area although are fairly easy to sand, but for me it really gets complicated on guards and such stuff with all the clean curves and crisp edges, where i don't want to round or mess anything with sanding. If I had a deep scratch from a file or rough belt that I couldn't get out by hand with the fine paper, the only thing left to do for me, was using a fine belt and slack sand it out, but that just messed it up even more

So here the pics:
I hope I could express my problems in an understandable way. It was even complicated doing it in my own language

I'm looking forward to your tips and help.
Marcus