Help with Bear & Sons Farmhand

[tranders]

I have the small Farmhand model in 1095. I can put a decent edge on it with a medium carborundum stone,but when moving to a fine ceramic and then strop it seems the edge goes away. Any ideas?

I don't have any problems getting my other knives sharp(Opinel,Svord,Case,Buck,etc.).

thanks for the help!

 

[Obsessed with Edges]

I have a 'Moore Maker'-branded folder that was made under contract by Bear & Sons, also in 1095 steel. If your knife's blade steel is similar to mine, it may be an issue of the steel being a bit too soft to hold onto a fine edge. I never could get mine to hold much of an edge past a relatively coarse finish. You might have better luck focusing on refining as much as possible with your carborundum stone, then lightly strop with something like green compound on leather, or bare leather. Anything much more aggressive on the strop would likely over-polish the edge, with essentially the same result you're currently seeing (fine edge going away).

At the very least, you might put the ceramic aside, and attempt refining with something that's not quite as hard, like an Arkansas stone (black hard or translucent). Ceramics are much harder than those, and may tend to over-polish as well as generating more troublesome burrs on softer steels. A hard Arkansas finishing stone may be able to take it finer, but it goes about it more gently than a ceramic will. Just the same, if the steel is indeed too soft, it still may not hold a finer edge very long, no matter how that fine edge is applied.


David

 

[tranders]

Thank you for the explanation. That makes perfect sense.