- Joined
- Jan 30, 2012
- Messages
- 233
Now before I get started I'd just like to say that I'm a traditionalist. I believe that it's very important to learn how to sharpen your knife the good old fashioned way. A bit of water, or oil, or even spit and one or more stones. The amount of stones depends on how fine of an edge you want and how refined you want it.
Having said all of that, let me get to the crux of my story.
My best friend got me a gift for Christmas that initially I was a bit skeptical about. He got me a Spyderco TRI-ANGLE Sharpener and in addition to that he got me a couple extra FINE honing stones for it.
Well, I was skeptical for about 45 seconds as I was sitting in his house and I asked him for one of his EDC knives that aren't badly sharpened but aren't hair whittling sharp either.
Well, I set the thing up and did maybe 3 passes on the rough stones and was amazed at the change in the knife. I didn't say anything to my friend I just handed him the knife and he tried it out on a piece of printer paper and was blown away. No snags, no issues, the knife just made slice after slice through the paper. I took the knife back from him and did a couple of passes on the flat side of the save stones and although that is supposed to take care of any extra metal I suggested he run the blade edge on a piece of wood. He then tried the paper again and the task became even easier.
We moved up to the white stones and the knife, mind you this is one of the Spyderco key-chain knives not sure which one, suddenly became a scalpel. I don't even know how to define the edge on that knife after we use the ultra fine finishing stones he also got for me.
I am blown away not only about the results that this Spyderco Tri-Angle system produces but also I'm just shocked at the hardness of the stones. I watched the included video and they said that it's basically as hard as saphire, which is pretty darn hard. I believe it's only one or two steps beneath Diamond on the hardness scale.
So I brought this thing home and naturally I touched up all my EDC knives and turned them razor sharp. I didn't go for the hair whittling sharpness level because at that point the edge becomes super delicate and damaging the edge becomes a constant concern.
Here's the part of the story that makes me giggle like a little schoolgirl.
I'd now use this Spyderco system on many types of knives and always ended up with fantastic results. So what was I going to try it with next? You guessed it, the somewhat mangled edge of my Tramontina machete.
Now getting the machete to the level I wanted took a little bit longer but not that much longer. Now my Tramontina easily makes ribbons of printer paper like all my other knives.
I used the wider 40 degree angle for the machete because I figured it's supposed to cut through thick branches and whatnot. Nevertheless, it's sharp enough to shave with and is the edge is strong enough to take on the bush in the great outdoors.
The only thing I had to do by hand on a regular finishing stone was the curvature towards the tip but that was a sinch and now the things is uniformly sharp.
As for the stones? After I washed them I couldn't find any wear on any one of them and that really shocked me. Those are some really amazingly strong/hard stones and it's a really sweet little sharpening system.
Let me finish that as much as I love this system I'm not about to let my traditional sharpening skills erode and I still recomend to everyone who has anything to do with knives that they really need to start out with the basics, i.e. a knife and a stone(s). I guess for a complete newbies doing his first attempt at sharpening they might want to use an inexpensive knife to practice on and for the most part. This is the best part, once you get the feel for using a stone for sharpening it will be with you the rest of your life. It's just like riding a bike in that respect.
Having said all of that, let me get to the crux of my story.
My best friend got me a gift for Christmas that initially I was a bit skeptical about. He got me a Spyderco TRI-ANGLE Sharpener and in addition to that he got me a couple extra FINE honing stones for it.
Well, I was skeptical for about 45 seconds as I was sitting in his house and I asked him for one of his EDC knives that aren't badly sharpened but aren't hair whittling sharp either.
Well, I set the thing up and did maybe 3 passes on the rough stones and was amazed at the change in the knife. I didn't say anything to my friend I just handed him the knife and he tried it out on a piece of printer paper and was blown away. No snags, no issues, the knife just made slice after slice through the paper. I took the knife back from him and did a couple of passes on the flat side of the save stones and although that is supposed to take care of any extra metal I suggested he run the blade edge on a piece of wood. He then tried the paper again and the task became even easier.
We moved up to the white stones and the knife, mind you this is one of the Spyderco key-chain knives not sure which one, suddenly became a scalpel. I don't even know how to define the edge on that knife after we use the ultra fine finishing stones he also got for me.
I am blown away not only about the results that this Spyderco Tri-Angle system produces but also I'm just shocked at the hardness of the stones. I watched the included video and they said that it's basically as hard as saphire, which is pretty darn hard. I believe it's only one or two steps beneath Diamond on the hardness scale.
So I brought this thing home and naturally I touched up all my EDC knives and turned them razor sharp. I didn't go for the hair whittling sharpness level because at that point the edge becomes super delicate and damaging the edge becomes a constant concern.
Here's the part of the story that makes me giggle like a little schoolgirl.
I'd now use this Spyderco system on many types of knives and always ended up with fantastic results. So what was I going to try it with next? You guessed it, the somewhat mangled edge of my Tramontina machete.
Now getting the machete to the level I wanted took a little bit longer but not that much longer. Now my Tramontina easily makes ribbons of printer paper like all my other knives.
I used the wider 40 degree angle for the machete because I figured it's supposed to cut through thick branches and whatnot. Nevertheless, it's sharp enough to shave with and is the edge is strong enough to take on the bush in the great outdoors.
The only thing I had to do by hand on a regular finishing stone was the curvature towards the tip but that was a sinch and now the things is uniformly sharp.
As for the stones? After I washed them I couldn't find any wear on any one of them and that really shocked me. Those are some really amazingly strong/hard stones and it's a really sweet little sharpening system.
Let me finish that as much as I love this system I'm not about to let my traditional sharpening skills erode and I still recomend to everyone who has anything to do with knives that they really need to start out with the basics, i.e. a knife and a stone(s). I guess for a complete newbies doing his first attempt at sharpening they might want to use an inexpensive knife to practice on and for the most part. This is the best part, once you get the feel for using a stone for sharpening it will be with you the rest of your life. It's just like riding a bike in that respect.
