HHT 4 cts 204p

N

nick_30

Joined
Aug 21, 2011
Messages
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I have got a 562 in this steel and am trying to get to that level but am having some issues getting there.
First, I have noticed tiny, tiny, t.i.n.y little glints of light reflecting off the edge in about 5 spots near the middle of the edge. I have taken it back to the stones 3 times and they keep coming back and only show up at about the 1000 to 1500 grit stage. Stroping does not help.
My process was as follows
100 grit reprofile dmt
140 dmt
300 dmt
400 wet sand with kme alum. Blank
600 wet sand with same
1000 wet sand
1500 wet sand
4m strop
1.5m strop
And I usually finish with .5 and .01m strop(waiting on roo strops to come in)
This is new steel to me and I have heard it can be fussy to get to this level. Am I spinning my tires here?
I am also going for a perfect mirror finish here as well as being HHT 4 level. Any help with this steel will be greatly appreciated
 
Are you consistently HHT 2 or 3 along the whole edge?

Edit: And do you have a microscope or loupe you could take pictures with?
 
It is a HHT 1 right now, and no I don't have a looking glass for pics

I should also add that when slicing phone book paper it seems to catch or be a more corse sounding and feeling cut then what I have experienced before with other edges
 
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Nick, I would suggest first off that you bump it down to the 1k level and remove the burr and see if the flat spots are still there. Keep going to a lower grit until you have ground them completely gone. After you have taken the grit down to the needed level and removed the burr and have a clean edge, you can progress up. One thing I do a lot is "destress" the edge by grinding 90° into the edge w/ a 1k stone or something. This gives you an even platform to start from.
 
I run the edge down on a piece of wood, that should take care of the burr right. I thought stroping also took care of that as well.
I have not thought about the 90 degree thing though. Would I still have to do that if the knife has never been used and was only profiled and sharpened on a kme

Btw. I have bumped it back down to 1000 grit 2 times and it still shows up. In the same spots as well...weird end huh?

Also, I don't think they are flat spots. They seem more like carbide tear out or very micro chips or something. My guess would be in the 30 micron range as we can only see 25m and bigger. I looked at them at 3x I believe
 
This is the best I could do. Magnifier with the small extra power spot, and knife in one hand, holding the phone in the other trying to get the light just right.
I will add the is only on the lock side of the blade, not on both sides.
It is the three little bright spots. There is more but that is what I could get in the pic

20160212_222051_zpswkz6hnsw.jpg
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I can't tell what we are supposed to be looking at in the picture... could you circle it and repost?

I thought you were meaning if you looked down directly at the edge you had some light reflecting off of the apex but you are meaning looking at it from the side?

I'm thinking that it's some sort of chipping or burr that isn't fully being removed or ground away... but you need a more powerful microscope to see for sure probably.

As far as the burr... no wood will not always remove the burr, it will only do so in limited circumstances (steel type, ht, the way you grind, etc all play a role). I meant removing the burr on the stone itself. And just to be clear when I said 90° into the stone I meant grinding off the apex and starting over w/ the low grit stones. =)
 
If you look at the blade in the pic, there are 3 little glints about 3/4 down the pic from the left (closer to the right side of the pic) .


That is what I figured you ment about the 90
degree thing.

You know the funny thing is, I have NEVER had a problem with a burr in all the years I have been sharpening. I really don't think it is a burr problem.

I had kinda the same thing happen on my 560. A bad spot would come up someti.especially when sharpening it. Always in the same spot. I thought it was just a spot in the metal from ht or part of their process bit would get work out from a lot of grinding on it. Almost like a soft spot
 
It looks like the area near the tip hasn't been fully apexed yet... the primary bevel doesn't reach all the way to the edge.

It also looks like in the center of the belly is over sharpened, and is starting to flatten out and even get a little recurve in it. When that happens, your stones and strops won't contact well, so it'll be hard to remove small burrs. I think you're spending too much time or pressure in one spot.

I would resharpen the whole belly, and concentrate on sharpening the entire belly in one stroke, if that makes sense. In other words, don't work just one section of it.
 
That isn't the belly or the tip. It is in the middle of the blade. The magnifier makes the image look curved threw the phone camera
 
nick_30 said:
That isn't the belly or the tip. It is in the middle of the blade. The magnifier makes the image look curved threw the phone camera
Click to expand...

Haha. Ok my bad.

So is that area toward the bottom of the picture actually apexed?
 
Yes, it is positively apexed. I am very sure it has been apexed. I will take a pic of the hole blade so you can get a better idea.
 
Cool thanks.

I zoomed in on your earlier picture, is it these three white spots?

c4fd5d1ecde2d9dcb72b6a96828b3647_zpssq6fotqr.jpg


If so, it looks to me like they are the same direction as your scratch pattern, so maybe an area that just hasn't quite been smoothed out. At the level you're striving for, very small things show up. If possible, I would go back to maybe the 600 or 1000 level, but stroke it in a different direction, to see if it cleans things up, then finish as normal.

Looks great otherwise though.
 
Those three little dots look like dust or debris to me. I'm guessing they aren't though, because you'd just wipe them off. Can you see any reflections when you look straight down at the blade in that area, under strong light? Does the edge catch in phonebook paper at those spots?

Brian.
 
I think it's difficult with the tolerances they work with but...
if they reappear constantly could the edge be hitting something on the inside of the knife??
It happened to me with a dragonfly near the tip and with a fallkniven U2. the Spyderco was dulling slightly because last 1/4 of the edge hitted the FRN, and the fallkniven in the middle of the edge against the metal on the lock bar
check it out, maybe.
mateo
 
cbwx34 said:
Cool thanks.

I zoomed in on your earlier picture, is it these three white spots?

c4fd5d1ecde2d9dcb72b6a96828b3647_zpssq6fotqr.jpg


If so, it looks to me like they are the same direction as your scratch pattern, so maybe an area that just hasn't quite been smoothed out. At the level you're striving for, very small things show up. If possible, I would go back to maybe the 600 or 1000 level, but stroke it in a different direction, to see if it cleans things up, then finish as normal.

Looks great otherwise though.
Click to expand...

Yes, there is like 5 to 8 of them, but yes, those are them.

No, they are VERY hard to see, extremely small. But in just the right light, at just the right angle, only on the lock side can you see them.

And yes, it does catch a tiny bit on that spot on PB paper.

No. It doesn't hit anything, just checked, it is a zt thought so they are usually pretty good about that.

Question: I am using very thin double sticky tape on a kme aluminum blank with wet sand cut to size. I have tried both trailing and leading edge strokes. I have found it does better with leading strokes but am not sure if that is the correct way.
 
Then I would say that those spots are softer due to overheating at factory sharpening and I'll try what Josh said:
razor-edge-knives said:
One thing I do a lot is "destress" the edge by grinding 90° into the edge w/ a 1k stone or something. This gives you an even platform to start from.
Click to expand...

Mateo
 
nick_30 said:
Question: I am using very thin double sticky tape on a kme aluminum blank with wet sand cut to size. I have tried both trailing and leading edge strokes. I have found it does better with leading strokes but am not sure if that is the correct way.
Click to expand...

Different methods work better for some than others, but I get better results edge leading also. I would try alternating the scratch direction.
 
I have tried different directions, same thing.
Also. I totally understand about the softer spots, I have dealt with that before but this is the second time it has been profiled. First at 20 dps and this time at 17dps

The funny thing is, I was able to obtain a HHT 4 with a hand convex edge on my 560 before I turned it into my EDC pretty easily. I would think this would be easier since it is guided but I also know that convex edges are generally more forgiving for angle deviation
 
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