Moving from sharpmaker to freehand

S

Spawndn72

Joined
Oct 17, 2016
Messages
6
I currently use a sharpmaker but would like to move to and learn freehand.
I think the first step would be to get a coarse grit stone to reprofile edges and set bevels and then finish up on the sharpmaker since the sharpmaker is not very good at reprofiling. Then I would add stones as I get more proficient.

I would like quality stones capable of sharpening pocket knives, kitchen knives, etc and don't mind spending money on things that are going to work well and last. What would be a good coarse stone to get?
 
I am learning too, and like you, started with a Sharpmaker and wanted to move to freehand. I just had a thread about the most minimal freehand sharpening setup that the pro sharpeners in this forum would recommend, you may find this to be informative:

https://bladeforums.com/threads/wha...-that-still-lets-you-get-a-good-edge.1518561/

There are a number of ways you could jump in, here are 3 that I am trying, and that emerged from that and other threads I've been involved with:

1. The most basic and low-cost: get a 2-grit dual-sided Norton stone. Seems like there's wide consensus this is a good starting point. There are at least 3 varieties of these you could start with:

2. Go with a 2-stone system. I recently just decided to try this and ordered 2 stones from FortyTwoBlades online store here, total combined cost $47.50: http://www.baryonyxknife.com/bprshst.html. I just ordered the stones yet so I can't give a review at this point.
  • Get one for heavy profiling work. I got the American Mutt.
  • Get one for everything else. I got his new Artic Fox bench stone.

3. Get a diamond stone system with several grits. I have DMT bench stones in extra coarse, coarse, fine, and extra fine. You could get away with just coarse and fine to get started.
  • There's a never ending debate on whether to get their interrupted surface stones, or their continuous ones. I have the interrupted and they work. If I were buying today, I would get the continuous surface ones though.


And of course, there's the whole other range of stones that I have not yet tried or gotten into: water stones, other materials. But I think the above options are good reasonable cost starting points, you can try your hand at freehand sharpening, improve your skills, and get pretty good results with any of these setups. If your experience is anything like mine, the main thing is not the stones you are using, but your own techniques. It's the indian, not the arrow. :)
 
Spawndn72 said:
I currently use a sharpmaker but would like to move to and learn freehand.
I think the first step would be to get a coarse grit stone to reprofile edges and set bevels and then finish up on the sharpmaker since the sharpmaker is not very good at reprofiling. Then I would add stones as I get more proficient.

I would like quality stones capable of sharpening pocket knives, kitchen knives, etc and don't mind spending money on things that are going to work well and last. What would be a good coarse stone to get?
Click to expand...

That is pretty much what I did. I started freehand, screwed up many knives. Started to use the sharpmaker which gave me two important things: 1) The idea how sharp a blade actually can get and 2) the mechanics behind sharpening. From there I used coarser stones for reprofiling to 10-15 dps and use SS for the 20 dps microbevel. I still do that at times and the sharpness is still outstanding. The links above to the recent discussion is a good one.
 
Another option is to get HeavyHanded washboard at www.washboardsharpening.com. The only risk is cutting into the sandpaper. The feedback to learn 'feeling the bevel' is enhanced, which is the plus point.
If anything, his tutorial and videos is a great resource.

Don't forget to study the stickies on this sub forum, especially the one started by Magnanimous. Lots of good tips useful for free handers.
 
Been doing a ton of reading and I ended up buying a Shapton Pro 320X. I am going to try to fix a few really badly nicked up kitchen knives with it and then finish sharpening them on the sharpmaker. If that works well, I will probably get a Shapton 2k next.
 
I was going to recommend a shapton ceramic stone as well. I'm a sushi chef and this is what I use for my japanes kitchen knives and they work fantastic. They don't require soaking like normal whetstones and the remove metal at a faster rate, allowing quicker sharpening. I have 1500 grit for shaping and sharpening and a 5000 for polishing. Stones, imo, are not the best for a lot of knives though because the handle or heel area of most knives, except japanese kitchen knives, gets in the way of sharpening the heel area. I've scratched some handles and bolsters using stones where a sharpmaker or something similar would have worked better imo. You cant get the right angle and make contact with the entire blade a lot of times.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top