Need help with sharpening on my Hapstone M3 (Sharpening journal)

Wow. Thanks for the compliments.

I have a cheap knife I have not sharpened yet.
I think I'm gonna document my sharpening process with it and edge progression/issues along the way in this coming weekend.
Then, I will make a new thread as you suggested.

I've thought about doing this and procrastinated it for a long while.
Your comment and knowing that at least one member would appreciate it are encouraging.
 
I think that would be an excellent idea. I can't be the only one struggling and your posts have helped me tremendously. Your descriptions make sense, they're concise, and applicable. Also your photo's and illustration were helpful as well. I'm very appreciative of your guidance and willingness to take the time to read my posts and answer them.
 
Okay Miso, the only problem I’m having is the heel. If you see in the pictures when I tried with the corner of the stone the secondary bevel enlarges, but I’m still not getting to the apex. What is the problem here? Is the angle at the heel to acute or obtuse? Do i just keep working the heel? Is this corrected time over many sharpening?





 
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Not saying this is the only solution, but one way that some people deal with that is cutting a small sharpening notch.

I've used a small round diamond file to cut a sharpening notching in a couple small folders.
 
Two possibilities, I guess.

1. You failed to grind the very heel because the stone only ground the boundary between the heel and ricasso (and the area just in front of heel). In this case, try grind the boundary by applying lateral, rather than downward, force to it.

2. You have actually already ground to the apex. You might have raised a huge burr there, which lingers and prevents you from making the heel sharp.

Just my 2 cents.
 
Bluemantra Bluemantra I was looking at Edge Pro videos for myself today, and stumbled across one that IMO looks like an interesting way to resolve this problem on "Edge Pro-like" sharpeners including Hapstone, if you don't want to cut a sharpening notch.

In this video, it seems the TLDR; version is:
* Line up the problem area near the plunge grind so it's directly in front of and parallel to the sharpening pivot.
* SLIGHTLY angle the stone toward the plunge line and grind with VERY LIGHT strokes, stopping to check often, until the uneven area is ground down even with the rest of your edge. (Be careful here, the risk is not angling the stone, which could cause you to cut a recurve into the heel area of your edge).

 
maximus83 said:
Bluemantra Bluemantra I was looking at Edge Pro videos for myself today, and stumbled across one that IMO looks like an interesting way to resolve this problem on "Edge Pro-like" sharpeners including Hapstone, if you don't want to cut a sharpening notch.

In this video, it seems the TLDR; version is:
* Line up the problem area near the plunge grind so it's directly in front of and parallel to the sharpening pivot.
* SLIGHTLY angle the stone toward the plunge line and grind with VERY LIGHT strokes, stopping to check often, until the uneven area is ground down even with the rest of your edge. (Be careful here, the risk is not angling the stone, which could cause you to cut a recurve into the heel area of your edge).

Click to expand...

thanks for the tip. I have seen this guys YouTube channel and find his videos among the most helpful for using guided sharpeners like the edge pro.
 
Just occurred to me an additional thing that might help while doing this: use Sharpie on the uneven spot near plunge grind, as well as the rear-most portion of your edge. Then use super light strokes at first while angling the stone, checking for Sharpie removal, with the goal being to hit ALL of that uneven spot, and ONLY that uneven spot.
 
So I sharpened my Manix 2 for the second time tonight and really tried to focus on the heel area. I feel like I’m making progress. I think the key for me as a beginner is not trying to do it all in one sharpening. So I think maybe in two or three more sharpening’s I will have the heel blended and even with the rest of the bevel. Just wanted to post my progress for others struggling with the same issue.



 
Thanks Gents, any tips on how to prevent the micro scratching at the edge of the blade? Seems it is from the slurry of the stone on the metal.
 
Masking tape is the best way. And cleaning of the slurry periodically. I use the Diamond Matrix stones so I get next to none. Also, the lighter the pressure, the less slurry you make.
 
I have the matrix stones too, but it seems right at the edge there are faint scratches that seem to come from the stone. Do you tape all the way right up to the edge?
 
miso2 said:
I think many production knives come with 18~21 DPS edges, including Spyderco.
So if you try to sharpen them at 15 DPS, you are going to remove a lot of metal.
Also, it is typical to have uneven primary bevel and therefore to end up with uneven edge bevel width.


Just a few more tips.

1. You need to make sure that the edge is receipt paper cutting sharp at each stone, even from the coarsest, from the tip to heel after deburring on the stone as much as possible using very very light strokes.

2. Also make sure that your stones hit the blade at the same angle using an angle cube. Some stones may be thinner or thicker than the others. Then, you may not hit the apex at every stone. I can kind of see that finer stones might not have reached the apex on Coldsteel.

3. For the Coldsteel, you hit the ricasso and therefore raise the stone there. This may make the heel area unreachable for some stones. Try adjusting the blade position on the stage to see if it helps.

4. If you rounded the tip, you might have slid the stone too far off from the tip. Stop the stone when the tip reaches the midline of the stone.


Finally, do not sharpen your fav knives until you are sure about the system.
I have ruined good knives at the beginning myself.
Just use cheap knives for practice.



Edit: When you do the Sharpie test, you should use a fine stone like #600. Coarse stone may be able to scratch the Sharpie near the apex even at a shallower angle than the true angle.
Click to expand...

I own many Spyderco knives and ship with a 15 degree per side edge for sure.
 
Bluemantra said:
Okay, I spent 3 hours sharpening one knife tonight and I’m just frustrated. It was a factory edge spyderco. I used sharpie to confirm the angle was at 15 degrees. One side the heel and the tip were way off from the belly of the blade. It took an hour or more maybe to get it to where I thought it was perfect. The tip gave me the hardest time. I was using a CKTG 140 grit diamond plate. I started with a Venev 240, but that would have taken to long. One side ended up with a larger bevel than the other. When progressing up through the grits the tip didn’t get sharp and the heel is hazy compared to the belly. I have the run the length of the edge with every stroke because if i just focus on the heel and tip the blade gets missshapened and not longer looks factory, which happened again. Why can’t I get the heel and tip. I’ve sharpened a knife every night this week. Same problem. I feel like to do it right I would take off WAY to much metal.
Click to expand...

Don't waste your time with the sharpie method on Spyderco knives I own many Manix 2's PM2's Military's and a Shaman plus many more,they ship with a 15 degree edge just use an angle cube and set the angle to 15 degree's and sharpen them really good and use a 20x loupe to check the scratch pattern,for the most part the edge may be off by .5 of a degree at most and won't take long to set the edge.

Also with the sharpie method you can be off as much a 1 full degree and still remove the magic marker and that's why I never use the sharpie method.

Try using these picture's to help you get an even bevel,the problem is with some knives they need to clamped in at an angle to avoid missing part's of the bevel.

Once you find the sweet spot I recommend you make a template out of thin cardboard from a cereal box and trace out the clamp and knife while the knife is still clamped in the clamp that way the next time you can just put the template on the blade and set the knife in really quick and your done.

ny3srbz.jpg


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ny3srbz
 
Wade thank you for your post. I did see someone on YouTube talk about drawing a line from the tip to the heel and making that line parallel with the clamp and centering the blade equal distance from the tip to the heel as in your photo. And it worked flawlessly to get an even perfect bevel tip to heel. The problem I ran into on my Manix was that I wasn’t able to get the stone in the heel area to the plunge without hitting into the ricassio and marking it up. So I had to move the blade so that the plunge line and ricasso was parallel with my sharpening stone, but since changing to that method my results have not been as good. So how do you get into the heel area on your Manix 2 and Shaman Spyderco knives using the method in your photo?
 
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