New Queen Canoe working me

[Greymoor]

I fellas.

I received that Winterbottom Queen Canoe with the D2 blades the other day. The main blade had a small grind and was not very sharp. The secondary blade was pretty sharp. So out comes the sharpmaker to rework the main blade.

After 3 hours I had finally reached a decent level of sharpness, not great mind you, just decent. If I did not have the diamond hones for the sharpmaker it would have been much longer. This is my first D2 knife and it is very hard. I just could not get this stuff to raise a good burr.

My question to this august body is, "what methods do you use to sharpen D2 or other ultra hard steels?"

I best get some advice before I go to round two of in search of the scary sharp blade.

 

[knifeaholic]

Hi Greymoor;

I am currently going through the same thing with a new Q D2 whittler and a large 4 blade congrsss, both in D2. The congress must have had a better factory bevel since it took some effort but no more than on most much softer knives. I use a Norton coarse India stone, followed by a Norton fine India, followed by a hard arkansas stone.

The whittler has taken a lot longer, at least on the main blade. I'm thinking that I may need to add a step with a soft arkansas stone in between.

Overall the congress is "scary sharp" without too much trouble, snd the whittler is getting there. I never had much luck with using the triangle sharpmaker, always thought it was because the angle is too steep. I do better "freehand" on regular flat stones.

 

[ferguson]

I bought one of the Queen D2 canoes with the cherry jigged delrin. I have butter knives that came sharper. However, I have a 2x72 belt grinder, so it only took a couple of minutes to put on a good edge. Man that D2 is nice. Holds a great edge. It's a great value in a slipjoint. I just wish they would take the 2 minutes or less at the factory to sharpen them. I bet it's H*** reprofiling that stuff by hand.

Enjoy them,

Steve

 

[lambertiana]

I stick to DMT, it would take too long with an Arkansas stone. I seem to be able to get the best edge with the fine DMT, whereas my Buck BG-42 gets the best edge finishing on the EF DMT.

I have reprofiled a few of the Queen D2 blades to an almost completely convex edge. It is a bear to do by hand. I start with extra coarse DMT, then go through coarse, fine, and extra-fine DMT. I finish with 600 grit sandpaper followed by 2000 grit sandpaper.