Leaf Jumper K390 (Serrated)...Sharpening Tips?

Blues

Blues

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In all the years I've been accumulating Spydercos, and I have a bunch, but probably not nearly as many as many of you...I've never bought a serrated model.

Now I have and do sharpen my wife's serrated paring knife (from another quality brand) on the Sharpmakers I've owned for decades, but I was curious if any of you with Spyderco serrated knives in a high end steel like K390, might share any tips before mine arrives later this week.

I have all the ceramic, diamond and CBN rods, (and more bench stones than an ordinary human requires), but wanted to pick up tips from those of you who are old hands with Spyderco serrations so I can keep my new addition in tip-top form.

A couple of questions:

Do the K390 serrations work well with the brown ceramic or do we require diamond / CBN to work with them?

Do you work the reverse (non serrated) side on the flat or corner of the rod, (I've always used the flat)...and do you use the Sharpmaker's set angle of the rod, or lay it relatively flat to avoid creating a bevel on that side while removing any burr? (Or, alternatively, just strop off the burr?)

Thanks, fellas. I have a few other Spydies in K390 from large to small, but as I say, this is my first go with the serrations, so I appreciate your thoughts.
 
I’ve struggled with the Sharpemaker on K390 Serrated using the stock ceramic. My son has had a couple (Delica and Leafjumper) go completely dull using at work with Edison. Of course he gives them to me for revival. I ended up with tapered diamond rods to sharpen both knives on scallops and stock diamond SM rods for flats. Wasn’t pretty in the end but both got very sharp. Got the idea from a Michael Christy video. Detail on sharpening starts @ 6:30
mark.
 
I’ve always used the corner for the serrated side and the flat for the flat side. I always start with the brown rods. Sal says the serrations will get smoothed and somewhat rounded with his recommended sharpening technique.
 
I have a lot of respect for the videos I've seen from Michael Christy over the years, but what he lays out in the video above is more work than I'll probably want to invest in the operation.
 
I set up the SharpMaker with the corner in on the left stone and the flat in on the right. I do alternating heel to tip and tip to heel strokes on the left to ensure I'm hitting both sides of the scallops, and I tip the blade to put the flat of the blade flat on the stone when I do the back, but scratches don't bother me. On the rare occasions (like maybe once a year) that I need to sharpen my K390 SE Police4, I run through diamond, then CBN, then brown and white ceramics and sometimes even break out the ultra fine rods.

Serrations are ground all at once on a shaped wheel. All the scallops are parallel. You need to pay attention to all three axes when sharpening serrations. Roll and yaw obviously affect the edge angle, but for serrations, the pitch is critical. Find the blade pitch that aligns the centerline of the scallops vertically and keep it there. If you get the point too high or too low, the rod corner won't ride in and out of the scallops, it will bridge across them, grinding away the points and leaving the rest of the scallop untouched. Some rounding of the points will occur and actually helps make the teeth less prone to snagging, but too much and you don't have serrations any more.
 
Blues said:
I have a lot of respect for the videos I've seen from Michael Christy over the years, but what he lays out in the video above is more work than I'll probably want to invest in the operation.
Click to expand...
I agree. The video gave me the info for using the tapered diamond rods! Yablanowitz stated the exact problems , you can encounter, sharpening K390 serrations on the Sharpemaker. I couldn’t get my angle right and was missing bottom of scallops. The tapered diamond rods solved the problem for me personally.
 
DA170 said:
I agree. The video gave me the info for using the tapered diamond rods! Yablanowitz stated the exact problems , you can encounter, sharpening K390 serrations on the Sharpemaker. I couldn’t never get my angle right and was missing bottom of scallops. The tapered diamond rods solved the problem for me personally.
Click to expand...
Yep. I can definitely see where the issue would lie. Thankfully, they're on sale for an extremely reasonable price, (I went to National Knives, a site supporter and a true gentleman), so the world won't collapse around me if I muck it up a bit.

I bought it primarily on the spur of the moment from curiosity, and its being handy for tasks in the garage and around the property, from getting trash ready for pickup to odd jobs.
 
You may find this of interest. His first serrated knife, and a gift from Sal...

...you can jump ahead a few minutes to get to his testing and sharpening.


 
Blues said:
You may find this of interest. His first serrated knife, and a gift from Sal...

...you can jump ahead a few minutes to get to his testing and sharpening.


Click to expand...
I’ve had decent success (Sharpmaker) with serrated LC200N, VG10, And H1 using the 3 strokes on scallops and 1 on the flat method. My son’s dull K390 laughed at me …even with Diamond rods. Guess it showed the holes in my technique! 😏
 
I expect K390 will present a challenge with the ceramic rods when I first attempt it. My diamond and CBN rods will probably feel too aggressive as I don't use them much. So, time will tell.

Still hoping some others will share thoughts.
 
If you are going to use a tapered rod, I suggest a magnifying loupe, 10X - 12X, so you can see what you are doing to the edge. My suggestion would be to sharpen the teeth how I show on my video.

For the record, I do not recommend a tapered rod.

But I would still suggest the Loupe.

sal
 
Thanks, Sal.

I've got a loupe, and I don't plan on the tapered rod. (The only one I have is connected to an old Meyerco Sharpen-It from way back when.)

Not sure which video you're referring to, if it's not the one I've linked below, can you provide a new link?

(If you are referring to this one, then I've already found and viewed it.)
 
DA170 said:
I’ve struggled with the Sharpemaker on K390 Serrated using the stock ceramic. My son has had a couple (Delica and Leafjumper) go completely dull using at work with Edison. Of course he gives them to me for revival. I ended up with tapered diamond rods to sharpen both knives on scallops and stock diamond SM rods for flats. Wasn’t pretty in the end but both got very sharp. Got the idea from a Michael Christy video. Detail on sharpening starts @ 6:30
mark.
Click to expand...

I miss this guy. Always enjoyed how he free hand sharpened with the stone in hand, feels the most natural to me to.
 
Responses like that from Sal just make me love Spyderco even more (if that is possible).

Blues- I hope you get that blade as sharp as you like them! Serrated blades can sure be handy for lots of chores like cutting frozen paracord, zip ties, roots, etc.
 
Blues said:
You may find this of interest. His first serrated knife, and a gift from Sal...

...you can jump ahead a few minutes to get to his testing and sharpening.


Click to expand...

That was as painful to watch. So many mistakes in his technique, he'll have that edge ruined in no time. You can see how the points start snagging on the white rods because he is dropping the point during his stroke instead of keeping the pitch constant.

That reminds me why I don't watch YouTube.
 
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