Is sharpening overrated?

Personally I know no knifemaker who intentionally puts a 40 degree inclusive edge on any knife blade. I live east and this practice may be going on in other locations but I'm not familiar with it.
I posed the question a few year back on BF asking if purchasers of knives would like to know the edge angle of the knife they'd bought. I got some interesting comments, mostly from makers. One well known gentleman said, "I just sharpen it until its sharp and have no idea what the sharpening angle is". Now if you don't like the delivered edge this poses no problem. If you like the original edge, as delivered then where do you start without messing up the edge?

For the average sharpener the use of a belt machine is not recommended, but for someone who sharpens for a living or for a knife maker IMHO there is no substitute for a belt machine. As stated above, if you can't keep the edge cool, don't use a belt machine. Edge damage happens in a heart beat.
We've put our heads together in the shop and are thinking about building a few of these VS wet belt machines for people who want to step up to a machine that can reprofile or set an original edge in minutes, without heat build up and the resulting edge is magnificent.

How ever you sharpen your knives, have fun doing it, lifes short, Fred

[video]https://youtu.be/lCBUa4CAE4c[/video]
 
stropping is needed for maint.of your knifes,unless you just like using a dull knife!but once you do learn how to properly sharpen your knifes there really is no going back,mind you i have learned all this on the forum hear,once no long ago i was sending all my knifes to other people to have sharpened! no i don't think its overrated.
 
Small belt grinder is the way to go.Belts are cheap too, for all major regrinds and reprofiling .You can touch up and sharpen your edge on almost any stone or ceramics after you have proper grind and blade is reprofiled.You get razor sharp and whittling edge almost every time! Many people just overcomplicate sharpening with too many gadgets , expensive stones etc.Norton crystolon stone coarse-fine is the only stone you actually need to get really sharp edges.
 
Glad somebody said it. It is waayy over thought and over spent on stones. But some folks want that and their spending keeps knife supply companies in business. DM
 
lonestar1979 said:
Small belt grinder is the way to go.Belts are cheap too, for all major regrinds and reprofiling .You can touch up and sharpen your edge on almost any stone or ceramics after you have proper grind and blade is reprofiled.You get razor sharp and whittling edge almost every time! Many people just overcomplicate sharpening with too many gadgets , expensive stones etc.Norton crystolon stone coarse-fine is the only stone you actually need to get really sharp edges.
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If small is good, Big is great. You just cannot have to big a machine to sharpen on.
20150707_011934.jpg
 
I see a bit of irony in commenting that people have too many gadgets, then recommending a belt grinder.
 
I'm posting the first of a four part video series by an old fellow who started in the knife business by selling knife sharpeners at gun and sports shows. He and his wife traveled from show to show in an old bread truck. After sharpening tens of thousands of knives, many not very well made, he got into the business of making good knives at fair prices for those people who used a folder in their daily tasks.

Here is this video starting with the history of cutting edges. I hope you enjoy it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GB0r6GvESGg

Most of my sharpening is done on my wife's kitchen knives. They are decent knives but seem to require a little more attention than does my M4 steel folder.

The author of the following article is my knife guru, Master Bladesmith Mr. Joe Talmadge, and he has some very good advice about knives and their sharpening. I think for those starting to learn about knife steel and sharpening that working with kitchen knives is the best way to do it. You might get a slice of apple pie for your effort.

http://zknives.com/knives/articles/knifesteelfaq.shtml
 
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Gaston444 said:
If you reprofile from 20° per side towards 10-12° per side on a 9-10" stainless blade, with an Extra-Coarse 6" Dia-Sharp that has already sharpened one such knife by the same amount, then from the wear on that hone you are looking at 4-5 hours of hard work for a poor result, instead of just one or two hours for a great result... It's that simple, and a hard earned lesson for me...

And I do mean that: Those five hours of work will result in an uneven, assymetrical and inferior result compared to the one-two hours if you use a brand new 6" Xtra coarse...

Since I am lazy and want flawless results quickly, especially with a hard steel like S30V (RJ Martin 10.5" Blackbird) or with D-2 (like the 10" Lile "Mission" I did recently) I always buy two extra-coarse Dia-Sharp 6" hones for each new big knife ($36 per hone: $72 in total for one knife): One hone per side(!) to bring it down from the ridiculous 80° inclusive that the pristine 30 year old pre-dot Lile came with (fortunately on a beautifully thin 0.028" edge bevel shoulder thickness)...

The two Xtra-coarse hones I used for the 10.5" RJ Martin were so worn-out from taking off 8° per side (beautiful job though) they subsequently ruined the 9" Farid 440C FB prototype I tried to sharpen later on with the same two hones...: I sent it for a full re-grind at RazorEdgeKnives, and learned my lesson well: Two new X-tra coarse for each new big knife from now on...

I have no understanding how 20° per side can be considered even remotely useable... Who cares if it shaves: This is not sharpness...: On Randalls 10° per side is virtually bulletproof, and refuses to chip almost no matter the abuse: I have to admit some Custom makers have not proved so solid with the same angle on the same 440 stainless steel, even with thicker edges... Unfortunately again, most Custom makers do a much better job of symmetry and finish than Randall's medieval-level precision (the only thing Randall does fairly well is keeping the edge centered and paralell to the spine: That's about it, very rough otherwise except for the sheath and handles)...

I did buy two new 6" Extra Coarse Dia Sharp hones for the Lile Mission in D-2, from which had to take off over 25° per side, but on a thin edge, and I am glad I did, as the result is good and that thing "ate" the two hones just about dead, one per side, with a good 3 hours...

I hate sending in knives to professionals (they often lose a small bit of length under water-cooled power grinders, which aggravates me no end as often knives are already way under the specified length straight from the factory -especially Randalls!-: I also dislike it when there is a lot of dead space at the tip fo the sheath: Where does the endless shortening end?...).

Taking off 10 or 20° per side, by hand, on a 10 inch stainless blade is a grim job...: $70 of hones on a $1500 knife is a bargain to make life easier...

Gaston
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Hahaha that's brutal. I've had the same one for 5 years. I've sharpened and repaired and reprofiled countless knives and axes with it.

Are you using it dry? Also how much pressure do you use? Do you move the blade back and forth?
 
Fred.Rowe said:
If small is good, Big is great. You just cannot have to big a machine to sharpen on.
20150707_011934.jpg
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That thing fuel injected? :D

Yes, we on this forum love to argue endlessly about knives and sharpening, but it is bladeforums after all. There are many ways to skin a cat or sharpen a knife, and I don't believe in one size fits all with all the different steels that we have today. Variety is the spice of life!
 
Fred.Rowe said:
Personally I know no knifemaker who intentionally puts a 40 degree inclusive edge on any knife blade. I live east and this practice may be going on in other locations but I'm not familiar with it.
I posed the question a few year back on BF asking if purchasers of knives would like to know the edge angle of the knife they'd bought. I got some interesting comments, mostly from makers. One well known gentleman said, "I just sharpen it until its sharp and have no idea what the sharpening angle is".
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Your statement is just totally amazing: 40° inclusive is the industry-wide standard... How can you not know that?

Any knife-sharpening instruction sheet will always show lifting off the knife by 20°, including those that come with Randalls for the past 50 years at least...: This is straight from Randall's own site:

knifedrawing3.gif


You do realize that this is a 40° inclusive edge?

http://www.randallknives.com/knife-care/

You do realize that "inclusive" means aggregating both sides?

Apparently Jimmy Lile doesn't, because on two of his $1800 knives I got, they came factory-new with 40° per side, so 80° inclusive...

I have NEVER seen a large fixed blade knife out of the box that was under 30° inclusive, so you can bet most knives you have seen in your life were at least 40° inclusive, and most were way, way over that... TOPS are typically 50° inclusive for instance...

It just amazes me to see many people in the field assume a 20° edge means it is a 20° angle that is cutting... It is exactly twice that... Maybe that is why so few complain about sharpness?!

As to the belt grinder issue, I've found on some blades the belt-ground edges just seem weaker (rolling chipping etc on merely chopping wood), and because of temper issues I feel like never trusting them for knives worth in the thousands. I do things cold... Sure they say the temperature never gets high "enough" on a grinder, but it does get high in the last microns of the edge for sparks to form, and everything does flow from there, especially at the thinnesses I go for...

I also don't use guided sharpeners because I find they don't go well around barely curving bellies like daggers, and my preferred single edge knives: Deeply curved bellies do seem to work better, but not shallow ones: I can adjust freehand better on shallow bellies, and I can also keep a constant angle by scrapping paralell to the edge with coarse diamonds (I go diagonal on slightly finer grits because paralell grit lines do weaken the very end of the edge.)

As to diamond hones lasting for years, well in a nearly dead state you can still "sharpen" with them, sort of, but you will still do better with fresh ones, which will lose half their "initial bite" in about two hours of sharpening... I'm sorry but that's just the way they are, no matter what utter bullshit people say about them lasting forever... Yes the "second half" will last a long time, but you shouldn't want to use the "second half", because by then the work is slippery and utter crap: Stones are completely different, in that they can be "brought back" by mere cleaning, but worn diamond hones are crap tools that will give crap results.

I've been using the same stones for decades (but not for the coarser re-profiling, just finishing)...: As long as they don't lose their "flatness", they can be brought back by scrubbing with SOS and cleaning their "pore". Some even use sandpaper to re-flatten them... They do last because the grit "recovers" upon rough cleaning/scrubbing, while the diamond hone once slick will stay slick.

Sometimes it is nice to have a bit of water on the diamond hone to not have to clean it too often: It floats arounds the particles and "self-cleans" for a while... No effect on its short longevity...

Diamond hones stay flatter, and initially bite way better, but once worn they are gone, and should be replaced. Anybody who says diamond hones last forever compared to stones doesn't do any heavy reprofiling by hand, and generally doesn't have a clue... It's exactly like saying sandpaper lasts forever...: I think marketers started out claiming this nonsense when they first came out 40 years ago, and it has stuck ever since.... The diamonds are merely held in place with melted aluminium... Rest assured the diamonds get broken off the micro-meter thick aluminium coat, until they are hardly there anymore... Utter, utter nonsense...

Gaston
 
Gaston444 said:
I've been using the same stones for decades (but not for the coarser re-profiling, just finishing)...: As long as they don't lose their "flatness", they can be brought back by scrubbing with SOS and cleaning their "pore". Some even use sandpaper to re-flatten them... They do last because the grit "recovers" upon rough cleaning/scrubbing, while the diamond hone once slick will stay slick.


Gaston
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This. I've been using stones bought at auctions in boxes of tools, bought at flea markets, some stones I inherited which are older than I am, and some I've bought new. Sometimes you may even want to soak a stone for a day or two in plain water,scrub it, then let it dry out, to clear the pores. Also, there's "flat"..and there's "flat enough". I have stones with visible "bows" in the center from years of use that will sharpen smaller blades or thin ones like fillet knives just fine, it just depends. In a pinch I've flipped a ceramic coffee mug over and used the exposed, non-glazed rim to keen up an edge while camping. Hand sharpening really isn't hard. You can start with the old "circular method" like Buck used to put on the little paper they put in their knife boxes, it'll get you started. I still do it, depending on time constraints. I find hand sharpening to be kind of "zen". Just go slow and easy. If it gets to the point where stropping isn't doing it, and then hand honing isn't doing it, I just bite the bullet and run the knife through a cheapo pull through carbide "vee" sharpener- for one or two light passes, that will generally put you back on steady ground.
 
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Diamond sharpeners don't use aluminum!
The diamonds are held in place by electroless nickel plating.
 
Gaston444 said:
Diamond hones stay flatter, and initially bite way better, but once worn they are gone, and should be replaced. Anybody who says diamond hones last forever compared to stones doesn't do any heavy reprofiling by hand, and generally doesn't have a clue... It's exactly like saying sandpaper lasts forever...: I think marketers started out claiming this nonsense when they first came out 40 years ago, and it has stuck ever since.... The diamonds are merely held in place with melted aluminium... Rest assured the diamonds get broken off the micro-meter thick aluminium coat, until they are hardly there anymore... Utter, utter nonsense...

Gaston
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I only wanted to write toward this. While Bill, stated how these are held in place...
I think this is exactly how they are worn down. And it doesn't take very long. They are expensive and lack longevity. DM
 
Bill DeShivs said:
Diamond sharpeners don't use aluminum!
The diamonds are held in place by electroless nickel plating.
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This ^

The better brands WILL last many years if used with a moderate amount of pressure. The diamond abrasive at freehand speed and moderate pressure will not fracture down very much, and once the proud ones achieve a level plane with their neighbors, the pressure per unit drops way off. If abused they will last not long. I have several examples that are 10 plus years old and still going strong. If heavy reprofiling is needed, use a more coarse hone.

As for their being an industry wide standard of 40° for inclusive angles, that is a delusion. What of Buck's "Edge 2000" program? Maybe Buck doesn't qualify as an industry player.
 
HeavyHanded said:
This ^

The better brands WILL last many years if used with a moderate amount of pressure. The diamond abrasive at freehand speed and moderate pressure will not fracture down very much, and once the proud ones achieve a level plane with their neighbors, the pressure per unit drops way off. If abused they will last not long. I have several examples that are 10 plus years old and still going strong. If heavy reprofiling is needed, use a more coarse hone.

As for their being an industry wide standard of 40° for inclusive angles, that is a delusion. What of Buck's "Edge 2000" program? Maybe Buck doesn't qualify as an industry player.
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+1
I have diamond plates from both EzeLap and DMT that are 5+ years old and still work perfectly fine. If you need to replace a diamond stone after each reprofile job then it's either the wrong tool for the job or you are doing something wrong(e.g. to much pressure). I have a feeling the some people don't understand the break in period that diamond stones go through and they think the stone is wearing out. The key to long lasting diamond plates is to use a light touch and if the stone is not cutting fast enough you need to resist the urge to use heavy pressure and instead use a coarser stone, an Atoma 140 or XXC DMT will reprofile dozens of knives with no trouble at all.
 
fsatsil said:
+1
I have diamond plates from both EzeLap and DMT that are 5+ years old and still work perfectly fine. If you need to replace a diamond stone after each reprofile job then it's either the wrong tool for the job or you are doing something wrong(e.g. to much pressure). I have a feeling the some people don't understand the break in period that diamond stones go through and they think the stone is wearing out. The key to long lasting diamond plates is to use a light touch and if the stone is not cutting fast enough you need to resist the urge to use heavy pressure and instead use a coarser stone, an Atoma 140 or XXC DMT will reprofile dozens of knives with no trouble at all.
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That's it - less pressure and more speed if one's technique allows.

I have recently discovered that the coarser stones can actually glaze somewhat and be helped out with a light rubbing on a silicon carbide stone with water or oil.
 
This thread gives me a headache. One thing for sure, light pressure is where its at with diamond plates. What a shame to wreck them time and again. The guy should buy stock in dmt, eze lap, and atoma.

Russ
 
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