New Here. Been a Lurker. Want to say thanks and ask a couple questions

Z

Zamfir

Joined
Jun 20, 2014
Messages
17
Howdy!

I am Eric from Colorado. I really like knives but do not have a lot of them. I do like a sharp knife and have played around with a lot of different systems and am about ready to pick up a new sharpener.

I have used crock sticks, flat stones, sand paper, diamond oval sticks and the one I have been using last is a gatco diamond clamp system. I can get shaving sharp with it but it takes a while and I hate the flipping and the clamping does not work real well on some knives. I took a look at the wicked edge and that seems like what I am looking for. But.. Then I started looking into the different types of edges.. flat bevel, convex, compound bevel etc... I am guessing the wicked edge just like my gatco can only do flat bevel and compound bevel. The ken onion work sharp caught my attention and would be only convex.
It seems like the work sharp would be more work..ie take longer to sharpen due to belt changes where the wicked edge would be faster once the main profile had been established.

The other thing I am trying to understand is what angle to sharpen to. I understand the wider the angle the more durable etc..but my brother in law seems to think the angle really has to do with the knife itself. As in the spine and how it goes down to the edge and then the final edge.. As in if the knife gets wore down enough and resharpened a lot it eventually will not hold an edge unless you retaper the entire blade. I was not sure about that one. I had heard of full taper blades etc but most I see are not that style..dunno..few things..as you can tell..have been rolling around in my head before I make a larger purchase.

My main carry knife is a kershaw random leek that is s30V and I have a backup leek that is their normal steel. This is what I end up sharpening the most since it gets used the most for all kinds of things.

I have Trident kitchen knives I am slowly collecting.

Anywhoo..maybe somone can point me in the right direction here. I am sure all of this has been discussed before lol!

Thanks!
 
Welcome!!!
first off, the ken onion work sharp will be the fastest system for reprofiling an edge, but will not get a "hand finished" mirror edge. Most knives when send from the factory will be something around 30-40 degree inclusive, sometimes up to 50 inclusive. If you have a good eye, you could easily do different angles by hand, and also do different grinds by hand. Sandpaper on a mousepad will get a convex grind, and 1000+ grit sandpaper on glass will get a scary sharp edge.

Look at this chart for reference on what "inclusive" means,
attachment.php


As far as that "wear down to the spine" mumbo-jumbo;) I think that you'd need to sharpen your knives with a steel file in order for that to happen:p and even then, that would take years! Some members have had the same knives in use for longer than I've been alive, and they sharpen them no differently than the day they got the knife.

The key to sharpening is not to remove steel, that's called reprofiling. Sharpening is about aligning the edge to a very fine point. Think of stroping, you are "pulling" steel forward to the edge to "align" it.


P.s...
You live in Colorado and don't own a spyderco???:D:p
 
Look at the Spyderco Sharpmaker and the diamond rods for it...I have this combo and get shaving sharpness. Good luck.

Also, you need a Spyderco. Look at the Tenacious, Delica, or UKPK.
 
I own a wicked edge, edge pro and ken onion work sharp. I find myself using the edge pro more than anything. I can get my knives the sharpest with it. I use the KOWS on kitchen knives and other knives I want sharp fast. It works well. I haven't fallen in love with the wicked edge like others have, it works tho. What you should really do is learn how to freehand on stones. Some thing I have not been able to master.

P.s. Don't listen to your inlaws.....ever.
 
Welcome. You're off to a good start. Keep posting and reading. There are a lot of great and helpful people here as well as a lot of knowledge.
 
Zamfir said:
The ken onion work sharp caught my attention and would be only convex.
It seems like the work sharp would be more work..ie take longer to sharpen due to belt changes where the wicked edge would be faster once the main profile had been established.
Click to expand...

The whole "convex" aspect of the WorkSharp sharpeners is WAY overplayed in my opinion. There's really not much of a difference between an edge made on a stone and an edge made on a belt. As for "more work", from what I've read, the Wicked Edge is wonderful and precise, but it's still manual, so it's slow. I'd be willing to bet I could make a nice edge on a blade with the WSKO in around 1/3 to 1/4 the time it would take on the Wicked Edge. The WSKO is definitely fast, especially on very dull blades. BTW, the belt change takes around 15 seconds if you are moving slowly. So it's not an issue at all.

You wrote some things about edge angle and some ideas you had gotten from your brother in law. I believe the following statements are factual and not opinions:

1. The smaller the edge angle, the better blade will cut. This is limited by how durable (or NOT) the edge will be as you lower the angle.
2. Thin is sharp. Simply having a thin profile makes a blade perform well.
3. After many sharpenings a blade's cross section *near* the edge becomes thicker. Thick blades perform poorly. This is the inverse of "thin is sharp". "Thick is dull". Blades that are overly thick due to sharpening, or just because the maker made them thick, are improved by thinning the blade stock *behind* the edge. The Japanese knife fanatics are *always* talking about thinning this knife or that knife. It works.

If you start with reasonable angles, you'll get reasonable performance. Almost any blade can support a 20 degree per side (40 degree inclusive) angle. 15 per side (30 inclusive) works with many many many knives. Don't get too hung up on angles. Instead, learn the basics: Forming a burr, removing the burr, following the curve of the blade, and making sharp points. To start.

Brian.
 
Just because a blade carries an acute angle at the edge does not mean it will out cut a knife with a more obtuse edge angle. It depends greatly on whats above the apex in that the shoulder width dictates the how well the edge will cut. Its the apex itself that does the cutting, everything between the apex and the spine is a framework of support. If the shoulders are wide, above the apex, the possibilities are more limited than when you are working with a knife with thinner shoulders.
But back to the apex itself. If poor technique is used to bring the apex to its max. cutting potential, it matters little what the shoulders measure or what sharpening angles are used.

Many knife users like a convex edge on their knives and I agree they are easier to achieve, than true flat ground cutting edge; they cut well not because of there shape as some believe, but because there is a higher degree of success in making actual contact with the apex. The same blade with identical proportions will not cut better with a convex edge than it will with a true flat ground edge.
True flat ground edges are hard to achieve. Its impossible free hand on any equipment and cannot be accomplished using any material that is not completely rigid when moving the edge along the abrasive.
Keep in mind that when you make a change in angle at the edge one of two things will happen. If the angle is lowered by one degree on an edge that is set at 30 degrees, changing the sharpening angle to 29 degrees, you will be raising the shoulders up towards the spine. If you widen the angle by one degree on that 30 degree set edge; changing the angle to 31 degrees inclusive, you will be abrading the actual apex of the edge, the abrasive will not contact the rest of the edge. Any increase in angle, the edge will become more refined because the apex itself is being refined. This is how a micro bevel works; or the theory behind a faceted edge, where you use more than two angles to create the edge.
If you strop a true flat ground edge to any degree it will become a convex edge.
DSC02305.JPG
DSC02303-001.JPG

This is my EDC blown up 200 times. The yellow highlighter line shows the actual edge angle of the blade, which is 30 degrees inclusive. The knife sports a faceted edge which is a combination of the 30 degree starting bevel angle followed by an increase to 32 degrees, used for apex refinement and finished up at 40 degrees to strop the apex.
Looking at your edge progress by viewing it under a good loop will give more insight than shaving arm hair.
 
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Ohh wow! Lots of great replies! Thanks! So, the whole angle thing got me thinking..so when someone says sharpen your blade to 30 deg they are usually referring to inclusive correct? So that would mean 15deg on each side. I have the GATCO® Edgemate™ Ultimate Diamond Knife Sharpening System. I wonder if the angles they show on the clamps..ya know the slots on each side are the actual inclusive angle or the actual angle I am sharpening to on each side so my blade angle would really be double of what I think it is. anyone know? The Edge Pro seems like a very precise fancy version of the gatco I have. I can get a pretty darn sharp blade--well in what I know of a sharp blade being a newbie--but I dislike the working on one side and flipping all the time. Because of the success I have had with that I was thinking the wicked edge would do it in half the time since you were working with 2 stones and hitting each side. And it seems like it would be more precise than the Gatco thinngy I have. True?

So, on the Wicked Edge, the angles on each arm they show, are those inclusive angles or just the angles you are actually doing on each side? I have seen people say 15deg is the limit on it so does that mean it is limited to a 30deg inclusive angle? Whew.. sorry for all the questions but some of this stuff is starting to gel in my head and I want to be sure I am understanding it properly.

I do not have the time or skill to learn the art of going by hand. Maybe when I retire I can go after that skill. And boy is that a skill. I have tried a few times.



Through this forum I learned about the bur..HUGE thing to know about and that helped me tremendously. I am sure I am still only at the stage of being able to determine a rather larger bur but at least I knew I could switch sides and if I got the bur along the whole edge again I can switch to the next finer stone.

I have looked at my edges through a mantus scope and that was cool. I do need to pick up a good loup. Heading to Amazon after this post!

I have never stropped before. I was looking at that. it makes sense that would create a micro convex bevel since it is squishy. Interesting. So is that a good thing then to have the micro convex bevel?


Sounds like there is a lot of trial and error in finding the angle that works for you. I am going to have to re-read the last post about having the triple bevel and try and understand what that circle is to the left of the angle drawing.
Everyone has different tasks and different blades for the tasks. Getting late and my brain is getting squishy and I am rambling..lol. excited to finally join this forum rather than lurk. Thanks again!
 
The dark circle is a doodle that I made while I was working on the drawing. I used to drive my teachers crazy when I was in school. It is a good way to process ideas.
 
Zamfir said:
So, on the Wicked Edge, the angles on each arm they show, are those inclusive angles or just the angles you are actually doing on each side? I have seen people say 15deg is the limit on it so does that mean it is limited to a 30deg inclusive angle?
Click to expand...

The angles on the Wicked Edge (as well as the Gatco) is the angle for that side, not inclusive.
 
Ahah! Thanks for that information. So for my kershaw random leek s30V EDC what is a good INCLUSIVE angle to sharpen it to? Same question with my wusthof trident classic kitchen knives. I have always been confused with angles people have talked about. Now I get it and more importantly understand what my current sharpener system deals with.

Here all this time I thought I had a certain angle but it has really been double that! So my knives are currently sharpened to 44 deg single bevel I guess.
 
Zamfir said:
Ahah! Thanks for that information. So for my kershaw random leek s30V EDC what is a good INCLUSIVE angle to sharpen it to? Same question with my wusthof trident classic kitchen knives. I have always been confused with angles people have talked about. Now I get it and more importantly understand what my current sharpener system deals with.

Here all this time I thought I had a certain angle but it has really been double that! So my knives are currently sharpened to 44 deg single bevel I guess.
Click to expand...

Now you got it:thumbup:

For the leek, you could do whatever you want, everybody prefers a different edge/angle. What would be most common is somewhere between 30-40 inclusive, but I've seen people on here with angles in the 20's (inclusive).

I personally hand sharpen my knives so I couldn't tell you my exact angle, but I know it's between 30-40 inclusive because I can touch up on my sharpmaker just fine. If its between 30-40 you should be fine for most tasks unless you wanna shave your face with it:p

As for kitchen knives, I use my edc's for a kitchen knife:cool: but I think for a "standard kitchen knife" you might wanna go 15-20 inclusive, however I may be wrong. Ask around in the "kitchen cutlery & tools" section.
 
An edge of 20 inclusive is very acute and makes a great slicer. With something this thin a micro bevel at the edge will help maintain the edge longer without lessening the cutting ability of the blade.
A kitchen knife that is thin in cross section can be sharpened using a 30 degree edge bevel with fine results. When a blade is thin above the edge there is little resistance when cutting and therefor a more obtuse edge angle can be used.

Below 20 inclusive your getting into straight razor territory and an angle that flat is not necessary when it comes to kitchen prep work.
 
Zamfir said:
Ahah! Thanks for that information. So for my kershaw random leek s30V EDC what is a good INCLUSIVE angle to sharpen it to? Same question with my wusthof trident classic kitchen knives. I have always been confused with angles people have talked about. Now I get it and more importantly understand what my current sharpener system deals with.

Here all this time I thought I had a certain angle but it has really been double that! So my knives are currently sharpened to 44 deg single bevel I guess.
Click to expand...

Another thing to think about is that angles of over 40 degrees inclusive tend to decrease performance of quality steels, both in cutting and edge holding.
 
singularity35 said:
Another thing to think about is that angles of over 40 degrees inclusive tend to decrease performance of quality steels, both in cutting and edge holding.
Click to expand...

Yeah, it had been confusing me why my edc had not been holding an edge as long as I thought it should. I am excited to actually put a true 30 on it to see how that works! Here all this time I thought I had tried 30 and that sucked...but really now I know it was 60! Kept going smaller and stopped at what I thought was 22 but it really was 44, that is when I switched to the random leek which is the different steel than the normal leek. That is holding better but I never was down to where I thought I was at.
 
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