I know nothing about sharpening serrated blades!

R

Raisedinal

Joined
May 2, 2003
Messages
1
Hello all, I was advised from the Benchmade company to check here about information on sharpening my serrated portion of my blade. Benchmade, as many may already know, offers their Lifesharp service where they will sharpen, inspect and tune your knife for the life of the knife as long as you pay s/h! Being that I enjoy my knife and is the first time I spent a fair amount on a knife I want them to do my first sharpen. BUT they don't sharpen the serrated portion at all and suggested I check here on sharpening the serrated portion of my blade! I'm not sure what I am asking but I need it sharpened and I don't trust my sharpening skill enough to learn on my favorite knife!

Please help!
JT
Raisedinal@yahoo.com
 
Spyderco Sharpmaker 204 works great on serrations, and is very easy to use if you are not a sharpening expert. I use it on the serrations on my Benchmade 942 whenever they need sharpening.
--Josh
 
Buy a cheap serrated kitchen knife and use it for sharpening practice. Serrated knives are primarily ground (sharpened) on one side of the blade. Do most of your sharpening on that side and try and match the angle of that grind. Buy some sand paper with fine silicon carbide abrasive (such as 3M Wet or Dry Paper). 180, 240, 320, and 600 grit would be a good variety. Find some type of round rod that matches the shape of the serrations in your blade. For example you might have a long thin screwdriver with a shaft that would work or you might buy some metal rods (such as welding rods).

Fold or wrap some of the abrasive paper around your rod. You probably only want a single layer of paper over the rod. Start with the 180 grit and work on a single serration at a time. Stroke the blade up and down the rod while holding the angle to match the existing sharpening grind. You want to remove enough material to eliminate the dull areas at the tips of the serrations without losing the shape of the serrations. If your rod is too small in diameter it will remove more material from the bottom of the depression than you need and less from the sides (where you do need to take away material). You will get fastest results if the rod is slightly thicker than a perfect match, but you will start to make your serrations shallower. So try and match that rod diameter well.

When you finish one depression go on to the next. When you have finished all of the depressions go to a finer grit and do another 5 strokes or so per depression. Procede this way until you get to the 600 grit. At this point you want to remove burrs from the edge. Switch to the other side of the blade and at about the same angle as you used on the other side do about 5 strokes per depression STROKING WITH THE EDGE FORWARDS as if you were shaving the abrasive off of the rod. Then do a few strokes in a similar manner alternating left and right sides of the blade. As you do this be less careful to stay in the depressions. You are not removing much material and you want to be sure some of your sharpening is working on the tips of the serrations.

After you find you can do a good job on your cheap kitchen knife go ahead and sharpen your Benchmade. It will be more difficult since it has a thicker blade and is made out of a harder alloy.
 
You can use a Sharp Maker, or a better option would be an EZE LAP Tapered Diamond Rod.

Stroke the sharpener up and down each serration being careful to 1) Maintain the same angle, and 2) not to use the portion of the rod that is wider than the serration. Be sure to raise a burr. (You wshould be able to easily feel the burr on the back side of the serration.

Turn the blade to the back side of the serration and lightly run the rod down the length of the blade to "flick" off the burr. You will probably need to do this a few times.

Now take a piece of very fine grade emery paper and wrap it around your sharpening rod. Lightly stroke up and down each serration to "polish" the serrations. (This will give you a slightly toothy polish.) Finally thurn the blade to the back side of the serrations. Again with the very fine emery paper wrapped around the rod, lightly run the rod down the length of the blade to "flick" off the burr. If you wish you could then strop the back side of the serrations with leather.

I always sharpen the serrated portion of a knife first. That way if I screw up and cause the rod to run down the edge of the blade, I haven't messed up that edge.

I prefer to keep the serrations slightly toothy to help in tearing-type cuts.

I hope this helps,

Pam
 
The Sharpmakers seems to be the easiest by far to me. Lots of good suggestions, and I don't like serrations anyway, but the 204 makes short work of it.
 
Raisedinal:
Hello all, I was advised from the Benchmade company to check here about information on sharpening my serrated portion of my blade.
Click to expand...


Originally posted by Marauder
Hey Raisedinal,
I would suggest you check John Juranitch's site "The Razors Edge"
the URL is... http://www.razoredgesystems.com/sharpservices.htm
They offer sharpening services for a nominal fee.They also say...
"If you have any questions regarding our sharpening service please call us at 800-541-1458."
YMMV:)

Marauder:D
Click to expand...

From the razor edge web site:

We cannot sharpen double edged knives, serrated knives, serrated scissors, swords, axes or machetes.
Click to expand...

I don't think razor edge would sharpen Raisedinal knife. At least not the serrated part.

BTW: I really like the razor edge items.
 
Pretty pricy for sharpening (or is that the standard pricing nowadays) when you can just do it yourself :P Is there any real difference from them doing it and doing it yourself?
 
I have sharpened several of my Benchmade combo edge knives with the sharpmaker. Just sharpen the serrations on the corners and proceed as normal on everything else. It's a great system for $50 bucks and it comes with an instruction manual and video.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top