How sharp do you prefer your everyday carry blade to be?

How sharp do you like your edc knife to be?

  • Sharp enough to tree top arm hair

    Votes: 24 11.5%

  • Sharp enough to shave arm hair and cut paper

    Votes: 151 72.6%

  • A nice working edge that holds up

    Votes: 38 18.3%

  • If it’s sharp enough to cut I’m content

    Votes: 3 1.4%
  • Total voters
    208
  • Poll closed .
I set the blade at about a 30° angle on my thumb nail. if it slides across the nail perpendicular to the blade, it is not sharp enough. If just the weight of the blade is enough to cause the edge to catch and not slide, I'm good to go.
 
Shave cleanly arm hair, and phone book paper with toothy edge between 400/600 grit
 
I can get all my knives to split standing phone book paper with the extra fine rods on my Sharpmaker at 20dps. Since that's the only system I use, that's what I get and it works for me.
 
I like to be able to shave arm hair cleanly, every once in a while I can get hair popping but not often. Still learning the art of freehand sharping.
 
For nearly all regular user knives, I went with "shave arm hair." That's perfect for most of my knife usage and is a good return-on-investment considering that it usually doesn't take a ton of time, or many different sharpening stones and grits, to achieve that. Occasionally, for fun and to keep building the freehand sharpening skills, I will take a couple hours if necessary and multiple grits, to get an edge to the point of 'hair whittling.'

One thing you find out is that there are noticeable degrees of "shaving sharp." These gradations of shaving sharp are defined pretty well in the Sharpness Chart in the Maintenance forum. With most knives I try to get a degree of shaving sharpness that is slightly better than "scraping shaving" as summarized in the chart. In other words, something where the correlated apex width is somewhere in the range of 0.2 to 0.3 micron, and the shaving capability of the blade is that it can shave with very little friction. It's often worth the small investment of extra effort that it takes to get that additional degree of sharpness. It can be noticeable in cutting performance for certain tasks. For instance some kitchen knives that I use to make pressure cuts or chop with, seem to benefit from that higher degree of 'shaving sharp.'
 
I sharpen my edc daily. I sharpen to shaving sharp at least. That's always been my standard.

I usually like a fine edge that can cleanly cut a paper towel with no dragging/catching/ripping. But if I need to 'field sharpen' I sharpen with just a course Stone.
 
flip888 said:
I sharpen my edc daily. I sharpen to shaving sharp at least. That's always been my standard.

I usually like a fine edge that can cleanly cut a paper towel with no dragging/catching/ripping. But if I need to 'field sharpen' I sharpen with just a course Stone.
Click to expand...

What do you use your edc for? That’s quite a bit of sharpening :confused:
 
I'll sharpen my work knife maybe every three to four weeks to hair shaving sharp because I can. But will only last a day due to what it gets put through. Cutting through rolls of geo cloth and nova pipes daily. Just gets a clean an oil and a strop each night.

I sharpen free hand with stones. I am looking to change to something to reliably reproduce a desired angle everytime.

What is it to tree top arm hair?
 
Depends on the knife, steel and use but a 320 to 600 stone gives me a durable edge.
I never go finer than that anymore. It's to much effort and doesn't last as long.
 
bobshoy said:
I'll sharpen my work knife maybe every three to four weeks to hair shaving sharp because I can. But will only last a day due to what it gets put through. Cutting through rolls of geo cloth and nova pipes daily. Just gets a clean an oil and a strop each night.

I sharpen free hand with stones. I am looking to change to something to reliably reproduce a desired angle everytime.

What is it to tree top arm hair?
Click to expand...

Tree topping arm hair- hold your knife above your arm high enough so that your blade edge can make contact with the top of your arm hair. Then run your blade parallel to see if it is sharp enough to cut through your arm hair without touching your skin.
 
Pointy81 said:
...How sharp to you like your edc blade edge to be?
Click to expand...
I like to have a sharp working edge on my edc knife that will generally cut paper and cardboard without tearing. This would be my SAK generally. But I generally carry a second folder that I prefer it to be as sharp as I can make it which generally is shaving sharp. I usually stop sharpening at this point as I'm not obsessive about sharp other than I want my knife to cut easily.
 
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I went with "sharp enough to shave arm hair and cut paper". I almost chose "sharp enough to tree top arm hair" but the reality is, while I like to start out that way, the knives I carry and use regularly usually don't stay that way for very long. When they need a touch up I use the medium or fine rods on the Sharpmaker until I can easily cut phone book paper and shave arm hair. That's plenty sharp for my needs.
 
One of the first tests I do to test my sharpness is shave a bit of arm or leg hair(occasionally I'll trim up my neck). If it can do that easily, I'm happy. I do everything freehand so my edges will never be perfect and that's ok with me, I don't need them to be perfect. I need them to slice stuff cleanly.

Only a few times have I gotten a knife to top the hairs on my arms and while it was neat as hell, I don't need that level of sharpness on a knife I'll be cutting a load of cardboard with in an hour or so.
 
See my signature below (good enough etc.).
M4 . . . (I'm having an emotional moment . . . fighting back a tear . . . face contorted with gut wrenching joy . . .
. . .
. . . )
Oh . . . K . . .
so . . . I try to sharpen it . . . you know . . . good enough right ?
Once it comes off the Edge Pro it is all hair whittling; very often I approach my arm to test the edge to see if it will at least shave off a hair and . . . all the hair on my arm leaps off onto the floor and runs under the china cabinet then they all try to hid under one another (which never works).
So you see what I'm up against. I just want a simple working edge but I get "ALL THIS".

Then . . . then . . . after ohhhhh I don't know a week, several weeks, well OK to be honest it is often a month the poor dear needs a little sharpening. You know she's just not up to her usual push cutting of hard, abrasive, rubber products self. Still pretty shave sharp but you know . . . could use a bit of powder on her nose . . . a touch here and there.

So what do I do ? I don't want to start that whole panic again with the hair and the hiding . . .

So I figures I'll just go minimal you know . . .
I get out the Spyderco Ultra Fine Ceramic Triangle Rod and just give the M4 a few super light strokes . . . maybe a little corner of the rod where she has been especially tested. Then some flat of the rod just to pamper her and say I LOVE YOU.

What do I get ?
OH OK show off then M4 I suppose you deserve it after all you've been through, what . . . and me not paying much attention to you for weeks.

What do I get ?
Tree topping.
Isn't she a gem ? I don't deserve this !
You might think I'm kidding >>>>LINK

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I want to open it, hold it next to something, and see cuts manifest in the object.
 
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