Help reprofiling a big thick knife...

O

OzarkCreekWalker

Joined
Jul 25, 2011
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I just got a Condor Hudson Bay Camp knife in the mail. I like it a lot, but the edge needs work. The only attempt to put any sort of grind on this thick chunk of steel is a small little dull convex edge. The edge on my old hatchet is better.

I want to put on a more effective edge on it, something that will really bite into wood when i use it for chopping. But I don't want to screw it up, so im seeking advice from you edge experts. This is 1075 steel we're talking about, so i don't think i can make it too thin of an edge. I have a belt sander with all kinds of grits, a wheel grinder, and some stones.

Ideas? Advice?
 
Hello,

The easiest and cheapest thing you can do is go to the hardware store and buy a multi pack of sand paper, the one with 220, 300, and 400 or something like that. Get a piece of hard wood, anything but pine works well enough, I use red oak. Cut the hard wood exactly 1 1/2" wide, the thickness isnt a big deal but 3/4" works well and about 18" long. So now you have a piece of wood 18" long x 1 1/2" wide x 3/4" thick. Get double sided carpet tape thats 1 1/2" wide. Lay a 11" strip of the carpet tape on wood slab, cut a piece of the 220 1 1/2" wide and lay it on top of the double sided carpet tape. Now you got yourself a cheap, fast cutting, low cost, changeable sharpening "stick". I shaped the extra 6" left on the stick into a comfortable handle. On the other side without the sandpaper I glued a piece of leather and made a strop. The 220 should be able to re profile 1075 in no time and then you can go as fine as you like, I like 600 for my choppers. Stay away from the power tools unless you really know what your doing. Its easy to really mess up an edge in no time at all. I have a bunch of stones, ceramics, diamond stones and I use the "sharp stick" more then all of them.

Good luck buddy,

Chris
 
I would suggest using your bench stones to sharpen along the current geometry for now. Reprofile the convex into a V bevel, but keep the same approximate angle. You'll save yourself work ( plus metal off the knife ) and chances are the edge angle on it is already okay for chopping tasks. I wouldn't try thinning it out unless it just doesn't chop well enough, but I doubt you'd see a great deal of performance increase at a lower angle given the types of forces require in chopping. The bigger thing to pay attention to will be keeping the edge from suffering impact deformation.
 
File it back a tad, touch it up with the stones. No big deal. It's not like you're dealing with hand-forged Damascus.
 
OzarkCreekWalker said:
I just got a Condor Hudson Bay Camp knife in the mail. I like it a lot, but the edge needs work. The only attempt to put any sort of grind on this thick chunk of steel is a small little dull convex edge. The edge on my old hatchet is better.

I want to put on a more effective edge on it, something that will really bite into wood when i use it for chopping. But I don't want to screw it up, so im seeking advice from you edge experts. This is 1075 steel we're talking about, so i don't think i can make it too thin of an edge. I have a belt sander with all kinds of grits, a wheel grinder, and some stones.

Ideas? Advice?
Click to expand...
i make my knives from 1075 and i have done some amazing things with it. depending on the heat treat, you can actually take it pretty thin with a convex edge. i make mostly chisel grind blades and i put a half convex edge on them and a chopper i made has an edge close to 17 degrees. a convex will sink a lot deeper into wood compared to a v edge.

if you want to send me your number i would be glad to give you a call and give you more tips. rje196021@gmail.com

here is a vid of the chopper i mentioned above that i sent out on a private passaround. (he's from missouri also)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8q_eMwRaHYg
 
Thanks for the tips guys,

richard j thanks for the advice and the vid. I think i'm going to end up keeping the convex edge, but raising the grind up and thinning it out a little too with a belt sander.
 
when i convex a knife, i never go over 400 grit. i made a chopper a few years ago and i'm going to stop at 120 grit on it. the finest belt i have is a 19 micron and its almost 20 years old.
 
richard j said:
when i convex a knife, i never go over 400 grit. i made a chopper a few years ago and i'm going to stop at 120 grit on it. the finest belt i have is a 19 micron and its almost 20 years old.
Click to expand...

I'm curious to know the reason for this.
Thanks. :)
 
Fear not the file. I have a very nice ESEE-5 but the blade is just so thick...by design of course...that I could get it sharp enough to suit me. Even if deployed for its designed purpose (downed aircraft egress), I would think you'd want a nice sharp edge on it for all the things you'd want to do before such a fateful day.

So I filed the heck out of that secondary bevel. I made it about a full centimeter thick on both sides with what I'd expect is about a 30 degree inclusive angle. Then I sanded it (not as thoroughly as I'd have like to and I suppose I'll get back to it) to remove the deep file scratches. The thing was pretty sharp after the sanding but I went ahead and put it on my Sharpmaker and gave it a 40 degree microbevel. I may do more work on it but that suits me for now...very, very sharp and yet I have not compromised the overall strength of the thing at all.
 
I use full sheets of sandpaper taped to a piece of aluminum sheet . As the sheets of sandpaper wear out it adds a bit of cushion and makes it easier to convex the edge.
 
Convex edges work great on axes and hatchets, for knives I like the more conventional flat or recurved edges.

If you have the ability to set an edge angle on the blade, using whatever method you wish, I would suggest the following. I use a Spyderco Tri-Angle Sharpmaker sharpener as it very easily sharpens the desired edge angle and is really easy to use and compact to store away when finished. This is the tool and method the Spyderco founder suggests, and he has sold and sharpened more knives than I can count. I'm not going to second guess the experts.

1. Make the back-bevel 30 degrees, 15 degrees on each side. This is the first bevel you sharpen. You may have to remove a lot of steel but that is okay. Use a file, diamond stone, sidewalk, whatever, but get 15 degrees on each side, making a full 30 degree back-bevel. The back-bevel thins the edge you that you can put a final bevel on it for many future sharpenings. Don't use an electric grinder as this may heat the blade up so hot that you lose the proper temper and once this happens your knife is shot.

2. After you have a reasonably sharp 30 degree back-bevel edge on the knife, sharpen a final primary-bevel at 40 degrees. 40 degrees will give you a very good sharp and long-lasting working edge for this knife. After you have sharpened a 40 degree primary-bevel that is the angle you sharpen in the future. It is a very good strong working edge.

Here is a link to a four part video about how to sharpen knives easily. No, I'm not a relative, just someone very impressed by the ease and effectiveness of this sharpening technique over many years of using the tool.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GB0r6GvESGg&feature=related

SpydercoCitadelBlackC117BKP92mm3.jpg


SpydercoCitadelBlackC117BKP92mm7.jpg
 
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get a small belt sander and youll do it in no time!Theres some Jerry Fisk sharpening videos on youtube, that i give you sugestion to watch!!! Also Richard J has plenty of useful and excellent advice!!! I reprofiled and changed geometries of many knives, and most knives come too thick! Also dont polish it too much, my toothy edges shave hair easily, but also cut everything else with ease!!!
 
the chopper i made had a 400 grit edge on it when i sent it out on a private passaround. it held the edge fine through a lot of abuse but it finally lost the ability to shave but not the ability to cut. if i had went with a finer edge, i'm sure it would have lost the ability to shave a lot sooner and the ability to cut. that is why i never go over 400 grit. to me its a waste of time to go any finer.
 
If you want to spend more time and money there are many other ways to go, but since you have a belt sander that is what I would use. I've had 3 Condors and all have been convex, but none were sharp out of the box even though they are supposed to be hand finished. They were all fairly symetrical and easy to bring to a hair popping edge with a belt sander without having to reprofile and/or thin the edge. It's been awhile but the last one was a Kumunga which has the same 1075 steel and 3/16" thickness as your Hudson Bay. I did thin it out some and I'm pretty sure I used a 320 or 400 grit belt to start then went to a 800 and then powerstropped it with a chromium oxide loaded leather belt. If you have any belts in the 200-400 range and the 600-800 range you should be good to go and the stropping is certainly optional for these brutes.
 
On my Condor Golok, a combination of filing followed by various grits of silicon carbide paper did wonders for performance.:)
 
Some of the Condors (Parang, for example) get really thick really fast. Since I bought mine to USE, I've been reducing the angle around the sweet spot. My target is to get it to a profile similar to my SFA (Small Forrest Axe). It's a work in progress, but I've done most of the work so far with an oscillating tool. The backing for the sanding attachment is soft enough to round out or convex my work nicely. I find that tool to be quite useful as a sharpener and polisher. Biggest negative I see is the cost of sandpaper is high compared to bulk sheets. It is also relatively slow, but I've had no problem with overheating the metal.
 
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