Improvised/Primitive Sharpening

FortyTwoBlades

FortyTwoBlades

Baryonyx walkeri
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What creative methods have you ever improvised while out in the field and separated from your actual sharpeners? I've actually found good success doing fine honing using wood dotted with prick-marks and rubbed with fine dust or silt. Was able to hone a gut hook for a friend once by carving a piece of wood to the right shape to fit and then using that method.
 
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Bottom of a ceramic mug for sharpening other peoples knives when at their house. Actualy a pretty fine way of touching up the edge if the steel is soft.
 
The finest silt from the lake bottom (not very fine) applied to a flat piece of wood.

I often use ash from the fire on a smooth piece of wood or birch bark for a strop.

I have a fine silt stone about the size of a puck, smooth on one side and has a 1/2" divot in the other to double as a socket for my bow drill.
 
edge of glass worked wonders.

I like your idea of crushing up something and using that on wood. I'll have to remember that.
 
I was watching an episode of Alone on the History channel and one guy used a smooth rock from a river. I thought it was pretty ingenious and might have to try it when I get near a river.
 
There is always the back side of some leather belts, your jeans (with or without some dusting of fine abrasive) some leather sheaths, if they have flat faces, and I use the palm of my hand. I strop often in my hand and in too many years to remember, I have never cut myself though I have improved the edge of my knives and chisels. An old boat builder (in Lubec, Maine - Benjamin) showed me the palm trick - looked at me with a cocked eye brow when I asked for a piece of leather to strop my chisel and then showed me his gnarly palm :). Worked for me ever since (my own palm that is) :rolleyes:. You did ask for "improvised" methods.


Ray
 
I've been thinking that this might constitute a good reason to take a GEOLOGY course at a local community college. Because there are several rocks and minerals that would rate high on the Moh's Hardness Scale and would ultimately make for good sharpening media.

Two of them I know that are still used a lot by many knife aficionados are Novaculite also know as "ARKANSAS STONE" and I've had guys in the survivalist movement tell me that obsidian is also a good stone to hone knife blades with.

Now I'm not sure how some of these natural stones would work on many of your newer supersteels but I would have to believe that there are several rocks and minerals that are still harder than most steels. Well I know for a fact that diamond will cut any steel but I'm not sure where you would find enough industrial grade diamond in the wild.
 
There are a lot of types of sandstone loaded with quartz, about a 7 Mohs, same as Novaculite. These have been used by cultures for sharpening going way back. Many rocks work well, but many will also not break down quickly enough to sharpen well and will glaze and load on hardened steels.

Primitive means work best on "primitive" steels - carbon steel at mid 50 RC and down. Many primitive means struggle mightily on better grades of stainless, thou stuff like 420hc and even some of the Sandvik if not too high RC sharpens up nice.

Looking for likely candidates I try to find stuff with a nice fine grain and not too hard. Helps if its already fractured fairly flat. Wet it down and rub with another stone, if you get a small amount of "mud" without the stone disintegrating is a good sign. The natural I found up at Letchworth Gorge works great on my hatchets and other carbon steel.


Edit to add:
the booklet I linked to above includes some incredible research into older/improvised sharpening methods employed by everyday and tradespeople, and in enough detail to recreate a lot of what is covered. It should really be a sticky and should also be required reading for any true sharpening nerd.

https://bosq.home.xs4all.nl/info 20m/grinding_and_honing_part_1.pdf
 
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That's a pretty great little booklet, HeavyHanded! I agree, it's sticky-worthy material.

Regarding non-sandstone forms of stone that are often good as a sharpening medium, a lot of shales are well suited to the task.
 
I used the curbside to sharpen my buck 482 ,my co-worker and I were talking about this subect ,so I deliberately dulled my edge on same curbside and tested that it would not cut some rope we had on hand,then I started honing??? like you do on a leather strop,and it worked great was able to cut the rope easily,but definitely now had a serrated type edge.I've also use a standard river rock to fine tune a SAK that I was carrying with surprisingly decent results(catching fingernail)sorry guys thats about all I got.
 
I once used a piece of very fine-grained sand/siltstone, found on the ground during a morning walk, to reset the bevels and refine and strop a Case stainless folder's blade ('54 pattern trapper's clip blade). Just wanted to see if I could make it work. The stone was fairly small (pocket-sized), and when used with water, formed a very fine, muddy slurry. Felt great under the blade. I used some of the slurry, applied to an inexpensive paddle strop of bare cowhide, to clean up the burrs afterward. It finished out with something akin to a 220-320 grit edge; very aggressive paper-slicing, and easily passed my 'usual' phonebook paper-slicing test for edge readiness. That was essentially my first truly 'improvised' complete resharpening challenge to myself, using entirely 'as found' materials at hand, and it made me pretty happy. :)


David
 
I tried M4 once on a red brick, and another time on a river rock just to see if I could. I wouldn't want to do self surgery with it, but satisfied it came out good enough for other possible emergency stuff like processing game, cutting clothing, rope, leather boots, etc.
 
jpm2 said:
I tried M4 once on a red brick, and another time on a river rock just to see if I could. I wouldn't want to do self surgery with it, but satisfied it came out good enough for other possible emergency stuff like processing game, cutting clothing, rope, leather boots, etc.
Click to expand...

CPM M4? or Reg m4? My CPM m4 edc knife collection is growing..
 
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