How did you learn to sharpen?

I was always told to buy a cheap knife.to practice on.

It took a few years to get it. Some people sooner, some longer.
 
I was eleven, and it was Christmas, my mom and dad got me a Smith's Tri-hone. My Dad was always really good at freehand sharpening, and could get a very sharp edge with nothing more than his dished out (looked like a Norton Crystolon, but I sort of doubt it was one, probably a generic carborundum he claimed his parents gave it to him along with his first pocketknife when he was 8, he's 50 now) he gave me a crash course, after much frustration, and after more frustration I got to were I could pop hairs, I then started sort of collecting knives, and my Dad gave me an old, Lansky that he said he never learned how to use, and I messed with it when I was 14 or so, I had a Smith's ceramic rod set somewhere along the way, with a diamond stone, and after that several different Arkansas stones, and DMT and EZE-LAP Stones, I've sort of settled on man-made oilstones, like Norton India, and Crystalon stones, but use whatever really. Recently I've been playing with waterstones some, but haven't got were I feel just real comfortable with them yet. Also I'm fond of Spyderco's stones, and strops, and Flexcut Gold Compound a habit I didn't learn from my dad.
 
Bonearzt said:
I'd just like to know how you all keep a steady consistent angle on your blade when freehanding?
I try all sorts of ways to keep the blade steady, just can't seem to get it right....
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Practice is good. But practicing without knowing what you are doing will not bring you success. In fact, practicing bad technique is simply bad. It will never take you further if you simply ingrain bad habits.

I'll give you these tips:

1. Use two hands. Your off hand fingers should be pressing on the blade, right on the edge bevel. Try this without grinding and see if you can feel when the bevel is flat on the stone. This is HUGE. It's way more important than you might think. Try it.
2. Watch the height of the spine above the stone. This is your primary visual cue to your edge angle. Feel is more important, but sight is good too. :)
3. Watch videos of the guys that get good results. HeavyHanded has a series. Knifenut1013 is MrEdgy81 on youtube and he has some fantastic videos that talk about edge angle holding and the techniques for doing so. I learned a LOT from watching and listening to him.

*Then* practice. :)

Brian.
 
Fred.Rowe said:
I think the best way to learn how to sharpen is to learn first what sharp is. Handle a lot of sharp pointy things that are very sharp and then work towards this. It may seem an odd approach but there is something to this.
A short story: my brother standing in my shop, working on a small sheepsfoot, for an hour. He twirled and twisted and stroked the stone; he tested the edge and stroked some more. At the end of an hour, he handed me this Sharpened blade saying " now this is what sharp is about " I took the knife from him and I could have run either the spine or the edge across my wrist with the same results; a red mark and thats it. That thing was stone cold dull. That was my introduction to sharp and I new this knife was not sharp; so what is sharp, now I know. :) My brother did not know what sharp is. :(
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I've been saying this for years, learn what sharp is. If you have an edge that you think is sharp look at it under a magnifying loupe so you can actually see the bevels and the apex of the edge.

After you learn what sharp is then you have something to compare your results to.

Then practice, practice, practice, . I'm self taught and I sharpen for therapy mental and physical. Been doing this for forty years and through trial and error, research and discussions with knife makers and sharpeners I've got to where I can sharpen pretty much anything with an edge.
 
I'm still learning, but if it wasn't for blade forums and all the guys on here I'd be lost.
 
I've been able to make passable edges for a long time, learned on some very soft steel knives that am pretty sure came with old camping cook sets, and could just get them to shave arm hair sometimes. At some point I started to realize all the knives I was coming into contact with were really dull or just poorly edged at the factory, so really only sharpened with very coarse stones. Was at the woodworking store looking at dado blades when I stumbled across some Arkansas stones and slowly got into the finer stuff but was painfully slow at it.

Working on the very coarse stones gave me a great education in concepts like tactile feedback, grind path, burr removal, dealing with swarf and stone debris etc. Joining the forum really got me experimenting with different techniques and stone types. A couple of wrist surgeries made me re-learn a lot of my mechanics - having to retrain myself made a big difference in how I look at what exactly I'm doing, specifics, not generalities. Am not gifted at holding angles and once I accepted that I was able to come up with a whole battery of methods to reduce slop - combined they work pretty well.
 
When I was a kid, there was a big natural whetstone (it was a traditional Japanese natural sharpening stone).
I started to sharpen Higonokami pocket knife with that stone, with a scandi-grind style edge.
I've learned what is burr and how sharp a blade gets with that pair.

I was sharpening western style blades with soft Arkansas stone some twenty years ago.

Now I'm using waterstones of various grits. The blades are plain carbon steel, common stainless like ATS34, and some are HSS (M2 and M4).
 
I was shown how to use a stone in grade school wile in boy scouts. after that its been a lot of practice and messed up edges.
 
I am about to learn from YouTube videos pretty soon...kinda new to collecting knives...but I'm hooked already.....wish me luck :)
 
For some reason I could sharpen a knife free hand as a 12 year on a 1"x3" carborundum stone with whatever oil was handy, 3and1, my mother's cooking oil but mostly just spit and get it shaving sharp. No big deal. Not sure if was soft steel but most knives were either Cases, my Boy Scout Knife (not the one with the spoon and fork) or a fixed blade I wish I still had I bought at an Academy Military Surplus for maybe $8.00 that was made in Solinger Germany. I was one of the best knives I've ever owned.

Now I have to study YouTube tutorials and use special gadgets to get the same results. Mankind is digressing.
 
When my grandmother sold the dairy farm in FL and moved into town in the 1920's, she brought a big old sharpening wheel that they had used on the farm. Laid it flat out in the backyard of the house in town. When I was 5 she gave me an old kitchen knife and told me to go learn to sharpen it on that wheel. I did, and I've carried a knife ever since... 61 years of carrying and using now.
 
I'm just getting into sharpening, and it's extremely satisfying to put a razor edge on my knives. I use a Gatco diamond guided set, then a ceramic stone, then a 3000 grit polishing pad that polishes and strops the blade. I'm awaiting a Stropman strop, so that will be my next step into getting beautiful edges, but I'm pretty happy with where I am now considering that I've been doing this for only 3-4 months.
 
Self taught.

Sometimes i can be very pleased with myself about a certain knife i just sharpened that worked out rather well in my own opinion, and then i remember seeing the work of a few Japanese sword polishers from centuries ago in musea (and one wakizashi in real life)
That's when i know i'm not even a mediocre student of sharpening.
But i try to keep learning, not in the last place from the good people on this and a few other forums.
 
trial and error...mostly error. I spent a lot of time looking up metallurgy and understanding what made steel work in a knife. From there I was able to figure out how to work my way around problems. I also spent many hours dulling a crap knife to sharpen it again.
 
My Dad wasn't one to show me certain things, especially concerning firearms and such, including knives. I think my Mom was a huge blocker of this type of info from my Dad. Pop's didn't ever discourage me from purchasing my own gear, when I was 14 I got my first pocket knife, my second knife of any kind, it was a mirror polished micarta handled Gerber, not sure what type of steel. I could sharpen my Western fixed blade with the pretty fine Arkansas stone I had--but couldn't get a good edge on that Gerber. Eventually I learned on the dished out 'customer use' stone at the local Ace hardware store. Could get a shaving sharp edge on that well used stone, that sat on the counter in a wooden holder, with a can of oil. Later, when working at an Archery shop for a couple of men who I really respected, one of which had been a salesman for a industrial abrasives company called Tru-Kut, who taught me to use a single cut file to work up the burr on my blades, and then finish the edge with my Arkansas stone or some crocksticks. I got to where I could get a really sharp toothy edge with just the file, and this was all freehand, which really taught me the value of a coarse stone or file or whatever, and how to hold angles. I got to where I could put a shaving edge back on broadheads that had been dulled through practice or whatever. That time at the Archery shop proved to be a valuable education which has carried through with me to today, and was one of many life lessons I learned from those two men.
 
I was given a Smith's Arkansas stone set by my uncle when I was young and shown the simple technique of one stroke per side until a burr formed the light strokes to remove it. It's the same principle with most every sharpening technique just tweaked in some way.

The idea a piece of steel could be ground on rock and made amazingly sharp fascinated me and drove me to ask more questions than I could find answers for. About the time internet became available I started searching to see if I could find out anything I could about sharpening and discovered the "experiments on knife sharpening" which I followed like a bible. After a while I found BF and it was a answer to to all my unanswered questions along with making new ones, the difference this time was there were other like minded folks to help answer the questions.

Like many I was self taught, learning from my mistakes along the way. My turning point became when I started getting asked to sharpen for others in which I got a LOT of practice. Over time I accepted that it had manifested into me becoming a professional sharpener that had a knack for making things sharp and the ability to explain it.

I guess I could say sharpening has come natural for me and I have advanced my ability through always questioning if it could be done better.
 
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