I glubbed up - S35VN Espada XL tip slight dent/bend. Vanity issue. Absolutely green to strops/hones/sharpening, limited tools, more on the way.

[Hashishiin]

While attempting to practice the "wave" feature with the Demko Plate on my newly acquired Espada XL in S35VN, stupidly, in a tight space, I lightly, but enough, hit a low-hanging metal lamp on the tip and ever so slightly bent the direction of one side, seemingly, askew. This damage is luckily ever, ever so slight, appearing by those I have asked to look (admittedly non-knife people) to be a "completely fine, normal" tip. But, you know, having seen it myself before, it has an ever so slight curvature to it and is not as acute. It luckily again is a ding, not a chip, so the idea of re-aligning it with a strop or hone has come to mind.

Again, it is very miniscule, but this is my most expensive knife to date and I really find it to be beautiful and would like it to be perfect. I found myself not carrying it as much as I thought I would not because of it's size, but because of my worry over scratching the bolsters. I really do find Navaja-style knives to be a thing of beauty.

A person who told me to strop, when I had a similarly miniscule edge damage/denting from dropping an S45VN PM2 on wood from about a foot up, was scolded heavily by another person for recommending that I strop that steel, but if my recall is right, they also thought S45 was a lot harder than it is - think they said almost 70? That isn't right. I am not so worried about that as it is a "worker" far more than this Espada. I know S35VN is not the same, though, and have heard of folks stropping it to perfection. My strop is recently acquired, I have an 1100 grit diamond hone that I still have not determined the function of (realigning or actually taking material off) and an Opinel pocket stone. I am about to purchase my first real 1000 grit stone, but have yet to practice on the strop or hone, as they are very recently acquired. I have some cheap and budget knives to practice on first, whether that mean cheap BudK knives, or a Mora, so I will not jump straight to my expensive knives.

So, would one be able to strop or hone an S35VN tip, not chipped, but bent or dinged slightly so askew? Thank you so much for any input. If anyone wants to chime in on the effectiveness of those things for S45VN, feel free, too, as I'd like to spruce up the PM2 edge, but I definitely have my panties in a bunch over the Espada, probably excessively, honestly. I am self-admittedly likely making a mountain out of a molehill, just want it to be perfect, and I am preparing to start learning skills in this regard.

 

[Obsessed with Edges]

Stropping isn't going to fix a bent tip on a blade of any steel, unless the 'bent tip' is little more than an extremely thin burr not seen except under magnification. And even then, some burrs are tough enough to withstand simple stropping, if they're very thick at all. Stropping with compounds typically used this way isn't nearly aggressive enough to fix that much damage, all by itself.

Fixing a bent tip is usually best done by regrinding the tip on a stone/hone. Softer steels of maybe mid-50s HRC or lower hardness might be bent back straight, by applying pressure. But even then, bending it back to fix it will likely leave the steel weaker - it may look OK, but could be prone to breaking off later. Hardened steel usually gets damaged by multiple bends, via a work-hardening effect that leaves the metal more brittle or fragile. It's usually better to leave it alone if it's not too ugly, or grind it out.

Might be good to post a picture of the damage, for more constructive feedback. Depending on the scale of it, some means to fix it may be overkill. Smaller damage might be fixed by a gentler grinding approach at a finer grit or with minimal passes on the stone.

 

[scottc3]

Welcome to BF.
Pics of Espada XL would be nice. Is the bend in the edge only, located near the tip? Can't imagine how much force it would take to bend tip of that 4mm /0.157 inch thick blade...
Spyderco's s45vn spec is close to 59-60-ish Rockwell hardness.

My strop is recently acquired, I have an 1100 grit diamond hone that I still have not determined the function of (realigning or actually taking material off) and an Opinel pocket stone. I am about to purchase my first real 1000 grit stone, but have yet to practice on the strop or hone, as they are very recently acquired. I have some cheap and budget knives to practice on first, whether that mean cheap BudK knives, or a Mora, so I will not jump straight to my expensive knives.

Hashishiin, Good planning here-
Read stickies at top of Maintenance page, go watch some videos of folks sharpening and stropping freehand.
This skill set requires you to memorize angles. Use a plastic cheapo protractor / compass, and glue a block of anything so it will stay upright as a reference while stropping; Chunk up your memory by practicing to stay constantly inside 5 degree for each stroke to start. Your goal is to be within a degree or 2, with the ambition of getting to zero degree change per stroke.

A few words about stropping-
What brand / model strop did you get? Did you get any compound to put on the strop? What is strop made of and what is the material behind it, the backing? Did you get directions with strop?


Sure won't hurt PM2's s45vn to strop it, which will clean up edge of tiny imperfections like dings. You will be pulling blade towards you, across the strop, with edge pointing way from you, starting at front of strop, at whatever angle you choose (I would suggest shooting for 20 degrees).
The blade tip points right then left or visa versa, the blade spine is up in the air and nearest to your hand. When you come to the back of the strop nearest you, completely lift blade off strop, and place it again on the strop where you started. This technique is called "trailing edge", and prevents you from cutting your strop accidentally. When using your stones, your stroke will be "leading edge", where your pushing edge into your stone until the final finishing strokes.
Yea, just so you know, you can use trailing or leading edge strokes to help you accomplish a variety of sharpening tasks.

Observe angled portion of blade above the edge called the bevel, and edge called the apex, with magnification if possible (phone camera, magnifing glass, loop), and test sharpness before starting, and then again as you go along every few minutes (3?) by cutting phone book, news / magazine print, etc. Your first goal is to slice easily thru paper from tip to bottom of blade smoothly. Any dings in edge will catch and not cut causing blade to stop slicing at that location on blade.

 

[Jason B.]

Steel has elastic limits, if you bend beyond the elastic limits the steel will permanently set to a bend. If you try to bend it back you risk at minimal making it weak, but its more likely to snap off. As David has mentioned it's best to leave or grind out, with the later being something left to experienced professionals. If it's minor like you say its usually as simple as a factory style resharpen on a belt grinder.

On a side note: when you wave a large Cold Steel knife lift until the plate starts gripping the pocket seam then twist the whole knife outward by rotating your wrist. The pretension on the wave plate combined with the twisting torque kicks the knife out with minimal movement.

 

[scottc3]

Obsessed with Edges, kinda assumed damage was just apex ding not a bent blade by how OP describes it. Figured getting to work with strop is what needs to happen first, and its hard to damage anything stropping.

 

[sickpuppy1]

I personally would tend to tap the knife like a drum stick the opposite way of bend to try and bring it back normally. That's just me.

 

[Hashishiin]

Obsessed with Edges, kinda assumed damage was just apex ding not a bent blade by how OP describes it. Figured getting to work with strop is what needs to happen first, and its hard to damage anything stropping.

Gearing up to post pic but wow some of you guys are absolutely wonderful with excellent advice, especially you, man. My strop is a Hutsuls brand with green compound, by the way. Intending to get some white, too. And I will go read the stickies, you are saying to strop at a much steeper/more acute angle than you'd sharpen, yes? I am just learning angles, bevels, microbevels, shoulda seen how long it took to get grinds through my head properly, haha.

 

[Hashishiin]

Obsessed with Edges, kinda assumed damage was just apex ding not a bent blade by how OP describes it. Figured getting to work with strop is what needs to happen first, and its hard to damage anything stropping.

Need to wait until my girlfriend comes with better camera in about an hour for the pic, guess it is a good thing that the damage is so small it cannot be picked up with what is a decent-enough but not great Samsung phone camera. The ding is a mm or less, doesn't encapsulate the whole tip-edge by even half.

 

[scottc3]

Yes stropping at steeper angle is fine, and I'm hoping Spyderco did not go above 20 degrees per side, or 40 degrees total, inclusive, of both sides. Stropping will help you get a detailed idea of PM2's edge along its length as it slices paper.

 

[scottc3]

Did you get double sided paddle or 3x8 inch single sided block?
Do read Hutsuls step by step how-to pdf. Looks nice, 0.17 thick leather on unknown wood with non-skid pads.

 

[DocJD]

While attempting to practice the "wave" feature with the Demko Plate on my newly acquired Espada XL in S35VN, stupidly, in a tight space, I lightly, but enough, hit a low-hanging metal lamp

The XL Espada is a huge folder , really a folding short sword .

It demands respect and room to maneuver .

I confess to badly denting the full serrated edge of my brand new XL Talwar , within minutes of unboxing , playing knife fighter .

Still a very large knife but not compared to the largest Espada .

Hit it against an oak beam , inside the house . Damaged the beam some, also , and the wife was not amused .

I'm interested to see your photos and how you repair the bend .

I've managed to hammer / peen out minor bends but the results were not always pretty .

 

[Hashishiin]

Did you get double sided paddle or 3x8 inch single sided block?
Do read Hutsuls step by step how-to pdf. Looks nice, 0.17 thick leather on unknown wood with non-skid pads.

I will read the step-by-step, thank you, finally got the pictures! It is still nearly un-noticeable so I think I can strop it. It's about 1/5 of the edge, the ding on the tip. Does not reach whole tip. Check it out.

https://imgur.com/a/it4DnSq

https://imgur.com/a/DlJKX9Q

https://imgur.com/a/LFnnnF0

Can you guys even see it? May need to take pic through magnefying glass. Sorry for all the prints, this thing is a print collector

 

[Hashishiin]

The XL Espada is a huge folder , really a folding short sword .

It demands respect and room to maneuver .

I confess to badly denting the full serrated edge of my brand new XL Talwar , within minutes of unboxing , playing knife fighter .

Still a very large knife but not compared to the largest Espada .

Hit it against an oak beam , inside the house . Damaged the beam some, also , and the wife was not amused .

I'm interested to see your photos and how you repair the bend .

I've managed to hammer / peen out minor bends but the results were not always pretty .

Oh yes, I'm only practicing in the living room now, with my cut-proof glove on my right hand as I've had it come juuust a bit too close to chomping on my fingers a few times! Feel your pain, I once bit myself like a guillotine with my new XL Voyager tanto. Found a guy selling a bunch of CS and snatched some up, I tell ya. It does command respect, that is for certain!

Damaged my fridge, put the tiniest little hole in the aluminum on the backswing once playing William Fairbairn with an Ontario SP-1. I think every enthusiast has a similar silly story

Posted pics, I still do not know if you all can see the ding I'm talking about, which is a good thing. I may need a magnifying glass, cause I'm intent on fixing this no matter how small, ha

 

[Hashishiin]

Yes stropping at steeper angle is fine, and I'm hoping Spyderco did not go above 20 degrees per side, or 40 degrees total, inclusive, of both sides. Stropping will help you get a detailed idea of PM2's edge along its length as it slices paper.

That is the thing that is troubling me - angles and micro-bevels. The Spyderco PM2 is ground wonderfully to my eye, I can post some pics of that, too. But, can you guys even see the Espada damage?

 

[Obsessed with Edges]

That is the thing that is troubling me - angles and micro-bevels. The Spyderco PM2 is ground wonderfully to my eye, I can post some pics of that, too. But, can you guys even see the Espada damage?

Seems like I'm seeing a little downward 'hook' at the very tip (looks sort of like a hawk's bill to me), and maybe some other distortion along the bevel just aft of the tip. I'm only seeing it with the image at very high enlargement on my computer's screen. I'm referring to the very first image in your post, BTW. A zoomed-in crop of what I assume to be the issue is below:

I'd still say a stone would do much better to fix this, restoring the tip to as crisp and pointy as it should be. It'd likely be done very quickly as well, as the damage seems very small. It's the sort of thing that a few passes on a hone would erase that damage easily. By the scale of it, I'd likely use something like a Fine (600) diamond hone at a light touch, if I were doing this myself. Trying to fix it with a strop (with compound) will likely round off the tip a little bit, and likely convex the bevels near the tip as well. The 'hooked' tip will tend to dig into a strop, which will lead to rounding/blunting of the tip.

 

[Hashishiin]

Seems like I'm seeing a little downward 'hook' at the very tip (looks sort of like a hawk's bill to me), and maybe some other distortion along the bevel just aft of the tip. I'm only seeing it with the image at very high enlargement on my computer's screen. I'm referring to the very first image in your post, BTW. A zoomed-in crop of what I assume to be the issue is below:

I'd still say a stone would do much better to fix this, restoring the tip to as crisp and pointy as it should be. It'd likely be done very quickly as well, as the damage seems very small. It's the sort of thing that a few passes on a hone would erase that damage easily. By the scale of it, I'd likely use something like a Fine (600) diamond hone at a light touch, if I were doing this myself. Trying to fix it with a strop (with compound) will likely round off the tip a little bit, and likely convex the bevels near the tip as well. The 'hooked' tip will tend to dig into a strop, which will lead to rounding/blunting of the tip.

Thank you for zooming in, yes, that is the damage! Hmm... well, I am about to purchase a proper stone, and, besides that, I have an 1100 grit diamond pocket hone as mentioned in the OP. I am totally new, so do you think I should get an idea of what I am doing on these things before attempting the fix on this knife? I am very glad that the damage is small, and I am glad that it basically can function as a normal tip, it is just that I KNOW it is damaged and it bothers me, haha.

 

[Obsessed with Edges]

Thank you for zooming in, yes, that is the damage! Hmm... well, I am about to purchase a proper stone, and, besides that, I have an 1100 grit diamond pocket hone as mentioned in the OP. I am totally new, so do you think I should get an idea of what I am doing on these things before attempting the fix on this knife? I am very glad that the damage is small, and I am glad that it basically can function as a normal tip, it is just that I KNOW it is damaged and it bothers me, haha.

If the 1100 diamond hone is a flat hone, you might even use that. This damage looks small enough, it should work OK. A flat hone can be laid down on a table/bench, and the bevel of the blade can be laid flush to the hone, just a little aft of where the damage is. Then draw the edge down & across the hone, keeping the bevel flush and the tip oriented in a trailing direction - that means the sharpening motion is away from direction in which the tip points, so the tip is effectively 'following' or 'trailing' the rest of the blade. Use a dark ink marker (Sharpie pen, for example) to darken the bevel at the tip of the blade first. Then watch where the ink comes off, after you make each pass on the hone. If the 'hook' at the tip is turned to one side or the other, focus only on the side to which it's turned. Ultimately the goal will be grinding that 'hook' out of the edge, and hopefully leaving a clean, flat bevel behind, blending it into the rest of the bevel.

You might practice the above on another inexpensive blade first, to get a feel for how the technique works. I'd strongly suggest that, in fact. Most any knife, especially the cheaper ones, can always use some improvement at the tip to make it as pointy as possible.

 

[Hashishiin]

If the 1100 diamond hone is a flat hone, you might even use that. This damage looks small enough, it should work OK. A flat hone can be laid down on a table/bench, and the bevel of the blade can be laid flush to the hone, just a little aft of where the damage is. Then draw the edge down & across the hone, keeping the bevel flush and the tip oriented in a trailing direction - that means the sharpening motion is away from direction in which the tip points, so the tip is effectively 'following' or 'trailing' the rest of the blade. Use a dark ink marker (Sharpie pen, for example) to darken the bevel at the tip of the blade first. Then watch where the ink comes off, after you make each pass on the hone. If the 'hook' at the tip is turned to one side or the other, focus only on the side to which it's turned. Ultimately the goal will be grinding that 'hook' out of the edge, and hopefully leaving a clean, flat bevel behind, blending it into the rest of the bevel.

You might practice the above on another inexpensive blade first, to get a feel for how the technique works. I'd strongly suggest that, in fact. Most any knife, especially the cheaper ones, can always use some improvement at the tip to make it as pointy as possible.

It is indeed flat, so it would be viable. The damage is almost so that the tip "squashed" inwards, towards the knife, ever so slightly. I think, if I can just figure out how to hone the edge of this tip up, make a knife pointy, I can do this. Thank you so much for all the tips! It is very helpful. Yes, I have a few daggers that are pretty cheap and need to be made pointier, so I think I will attempt on those before trying the espada.

Also, when you say "away from the direction the tip points", do you mean push away from the way it points with the damage, right? Or away from the natural pointing angle? I was looking at the damage and it appears as though the main damage is on one side, the one you magnetized, and the blade is dented in a downwards-away "hook" way that you noticed.

 

[Obsessed with Edges]

It is indeed flat, so it would be viable. The damage is almost so that the tip "squashed" inwards, towards the knife, ever so slightly. I think, if I can just figure out how to hone the edge of this tip up, make a knife pointy, I can do this. Thank you so much for all the tips! It is very helpful. Yes, I have a few daggers that are pretty cheap and need to be made pointier, so I think I will attempt on those before trying the espada.

Also, when you say "away from the direction the tip points", do you mean push away from the way it points with the damage, right? Or away from the natural pointing angle? I was looking at the damage and it appears as though the main damage is on one side, the one you magnetized, and the blade is dented in a downwards-away "hook" way that you noticed.

Away from the natural, normal point of the blade, is what I mean. This would also be the way the tip would normally be sharpened, even if it wasn't damaged. It's the safest way to sharpen the tip, without the risk of the tip digging into the stone/hone.

 

[Hashishiin]

Away from the natural, normal point of the blade, is what I mean. This would also be the way the tip would normally be sharpened, even if it wasn't damaged. It's the safest way to sharpen the tip, without the risk of the tip digging into the stone/hone.

You are awesome, thank you so much for the advice, I am confident that it will be able to be repaired, now. Once I get my stone, a little practice in on the strop, hone and stone, I'll be able to touch it right up, I hope.