maximum rockwell hardness for steeling vs. ceramic?

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FireDragon76

Joined
Jan 21, 2016
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What is the maximum hardness for a kitchen knife to be steeled, and at what hardness should a ceramic hone be used instead?
 
First, remember that the listed HRC can be off.
But I'd say 58-59 max for steels.
Spideyjg isn't wrong though.
 
General rule of thumb German, other western made, or cheap blades, a good steel. Japanese or unknown, ceramic.
 
Remember that when you're steeling, you're folding the already deformed edge back and forth. While it gets sharper, it also further weakens the steel at the apex, and your edge holding gets less and less. Using more force and more passes increase the issue. So I've gone to a ceramic stick exclusively. Light pressure to decrease stressing the edge - a round stick has a small area of contact to the blade, and this increases the relative pressure you're applying. Because it's abrasive, some of the weakened metal gets removed. I use only edge in movements to decrease any burr formation, and alternate starting from the tip or heel to minimize the scratch pattern. This seems to be the fastest way keep up a shaving edge that's fairly durable. I think it's still necessary to cut away the apex when doing actual resharpening/rebeveling, so you know you've removed all of the old tired edge.
 
Also, many sharpening steels are hard-chromed, so the surface will probably be harder than you're knife anyway, unless it's closer to 70 hrc. From that viewpoint it's really a preference issue which kind of stick you use.
 
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