Old Fashion Sharpening???

J

Judge_Blackhawk

Joined
Jun 9, 2000
Messages
109
With all the gadgets out there in the world and all the quick fixes to the sharpening problems, is there anyone who is sharpening knives with good old fashion Arkansas stones?

I take it this would be called freehand sharpening,

I can remember my father and grandfather sitting out back and sharpening their knives with these great stones. I was not interested at the time to learn how to sharpen, I regret it now.

I have looked at all the gadgets and most seem neat but a skill is learned and mastered over time, there is really no skill or craft to sharpening a knife with a gadget.

If there are people out there with the craftmanship and skill to sharpen freehand, please give me some pointers and places to look on the web or library for informaiton.

Thanks
 
I have to admit I'm normally a gadget user because it saves time and yes effort. That is extremely handy when sharpening multiple knives, but I still sharpen freehand occasionally on a Norton Course/med. stone and finish up on a hard Arkansas stone. This is just to keep my practice up for situations like right now(trading my Lansky for a Sharpmaker with another forumite). Mykl

------------------
Just because I'm paranoid doesn't mean they're not out to get me.
 
Amen to freehand. Guides do have a place, though. For regrinding an edge, changing angles, getting huge dings out of blades, they work well enough. But to sharpen, to maintain an edge, nothing beats the stone. Circular counterclockwise motions, "slivering," working pressure to produce convex edges, all take time to learn but are invaluable knowledge. Freehand gets one used to "feeling" the grit and the stone irregularities, it enables the user to become one with steel and stone (speak that line in a Yoda voice).

We should all bow to the Trinity of S: stone, steel and strop.

Cheers,

RLR
 
Free hand with bench stones is the only way if you ask me. Arkansas are the best too. Ceramic stones are great for the finer grits, I would have gotten a surgicle black arkansas but they were alot more expensive than the fine white ceramic. I spent less to get a 1000 grit japanese stone, soft arkansas, hard arkansas,hard arkansas gouge slip,fine white ceramic, and a good sized strop, then you would spend on one of the "kit" sharpeners with just a starter set. And I can sharpen any size and shape of knife, and any and all of the chisels, gouges and other carving tools I have.

------------------
It'll feel better when it stops hurting.
 
I primarily freehand, but I have retired my Arkansas stones to the garage. They seem to cut the slowest of all the stones and work best with oil (messy). I do most of my rough work with medium-coarse synthetic aluminum oxide stones or a coarse diamond hone. Most of my fine work is done with an extra-fine diamond hone. I finish on ceramic rods (the only "fixture device I have)and strops. I may get a set of ceramic bench hones one day. I like the "bite" of an edge finished with extra fine ceramic rods. I also have some Japanese water stones. I have more than a dozen bench stones, and the ones I never use are my 3 Arkansas stones.

I do a lot of my work under running tap water in the kitchen sink. This totally prevents the hone from clogging with debris as I work. This makes the cutting quicker, rougher, lower temperature, and avoids abrading the stone with stone debris.

For rough honing I don't worry about stroke direction. I go back and forth to set the bevel. Finish strokes are mostly edge-first.


[This message has been edited by Jeff Clark (edited 06-21-2000).]
 
Well I have no sharpening skill,even though I had tried often.I'll take the Spyderco 204 anyday over a bench stone.It works extremly well and fast.Best of all,I wind up with a sharp knife and no scratches and damage all over my knife from using a flat stone.I don't know how many times I was pissed scraping a blade against a stone for an hour and coming up with a duller knife than when I started,no thanks,I'll be keeping my gadget.Chow,Ralph
 
I still use a stone and some oil and I get a really sharp edge too. It just takes practice and patience.
I have a friend who uses a system with rods and he can get a slightly sharper edge, but it takes him alittle longer.
Since I don't plan on doing vascular surgery anytime soon, I think mine's sharp enough.
 
Someone mention my name??
smile.gif
Im a big fan of freehand sharpening. I used to be a gadget guy, but Ive found large benchstones to be much faster and efficent at sharpening knives. I use a cheapo silicon carbide to rebevel and take out large dings, and a spyderco medium ceramic for general sharpening, I like the slightly toothy edge it leaves. A key to getting the best edge is to strop after your done. The key is practice.... and lots of it.
 
I have just recently taught myself how to sharpen using nothing but stones
http://www.bladeforums.com/ubb/Forum54/HTML/000513.html

Since that post I have sharpened everything I could get my hands on and brought them all to shaving sharpness. Shaved half my face with the Sebenza. Get rid of the " this is magic" Idea and start thinking about how you used to put a point on your ice cream stick after finishing the ice cream. Not much more to it than that. THere really is a great satisfaction to doing it using the stones. The rythmic stroking, the sound of the steel on the stone .. Do it. Practice and you will enjoy the hell out of it. I was one of those that LIKED cleaning my weapon in the service. I get the same satisfaction from my newly aquired skill of knife sharpening.


------------------
ALex

http://home.att.net./~a.boriqua
 
I used the Lansky for a while and then got a belt sander, 1x30. I used to go totally free hand with 2 Arkansas stones I got years ago, and did pretty well when I was about 12 or so. Now I use the belt sander to set the bevels and various stones to get it shaving sharp and then I strop it.
 
I've pretty well retired my stones for DMT diamond hones. Not as messy, don't develop 'wows', light, won't break if you drop them, easy to clean up and only need water as a lube.. I do cherish a 10" hard Arkansas I inherited from a great uncle, but rarely use it. Mostly I sharpen freehand, but once in a while use a Buck clamp to establish an angle. I finish with a wood-backed leather strop. One side is impregnated with a chromium dioxide honing compound from Lee Valley Tools, the other is plain leather. Hair popping results if the steel is any good at all.
 
Well, I use an EdgePro Professional, but I don't think it can replace freehand sharpening. Give me a good CNC mill, and I'll make a knife accurate down to a thousandth of an inch, but that wouldn't replace a handmade knife, now would it? I learned to sharpen on an Arkansas stone, and it really helped me to know what's going on when I sharpen, but the fact is that the EdgePro produces a better edge than anyone can by hand. Still, I can't stand my 204 - the motion just seems too unnatural, so I would certainly take a freehand stone over that.

--JB

------------------
e_utopia@hotmail.com
 
I like to sharpen freehand too. (Actually, that's the only way I sharpen) There are easier ways to do things, but freehand has its rewards and can be very satisfying.

The only Arkansas stone that I use on a regular basis now is the hard black one. I usually use Norton India stones first and finish with the Arkansas.

If you haven't seen it yet, this is probably one of the best sites about sharpening: www.ameritech.net/users/knives/index.htm
 
I love, love, love sharpening freehand. Got a couple of flat synthetic hones and started off with the clamp, then switched to freehand, and now it's what I do on slow weekends. Drives my roommate nuts, but hey. It's relaxing and therapeutic, and I'm the only girl on the block that can shave her legs with a sw- er, automatic..
biggrin.gif
 
Judge Blackhawk,

I used the flat stones for probably 20 years or so and can easily sharpen a knife with stones...most of the time. With the Edge Pro I can do it much quicker, and sharpen blades much sharper!! No matter how good one is with a stone, it is difficult to maintain the exact angle all the time...I've never seen anyone who could do it.
 
I have been using the same old flat india stone for 14 years now. I hit it one shot of WD40 then stone for 6 strokes, hit it on the black Arkansas for 4 then strop it on my hand a few times [carefully]. To test the edge I then slice the print off of a newspaper. Well, maybe. I did slice a ham so thin once that the inlaws never came back to visit again.
jf
 
I agree with the guys that get 'satisfaction' from the experience of sharpening on a stone. It's kind of a "zen" thing, really.
One thing I also enjoy is poking around flea-markets and finding an old, dished-out stone......probably one somebody had and used for a long time, then died and it got sold in an estate sale. Usually, these old stones are still very very good at putting an edge on a blade. When I'm using one of these old stones, I let my imagination drift a little and try to think of what the previous owner was like, what he was thinking about when he was using that stone, ......that kind of thing.......
Very satisfying.

------------------
Just because the river is still doesn't mean that the alligators have gone.
 
If you need some bench stones to get started. A good set to look at first is the tri-hone for about $30 at www.woodcraft.com . Its got coarse medium and fine. I think the medium and the fine are soft and hard arkansas, don't remember what the coarse is, something man made. Eventually you'll want either a surgicle black arkansas or a fine or ultra fine ceramic stone to go one step finer before stropping. At least if you want a really really polished edge. The tri hone is great for starting out though, I wish I would have found it when I started buying stones. I have all the stones I need now but their kind of a mismatched set in terms of size and everything.

------------------
It'll feel better when it stops hurting.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top