Regular EDC maintenance

[smo1898]

What does everyone think is the best regular maintenance for a heavily used EDC. I use mine at work to cut cardboard, opening packages or breaking down the boxes, i often field dress small game and poultry with it, if its more convenient than finding my dedicated knife for this, and even whittle quite a bit just to pass time, plus more depending on the day (sometimes less). I love knowing my knife is razor sharp on a daily basis so i tend to use my polishing stone followed by a leather strop nightly. About once a week ill run it through a 2k, 6k, 8k stone system.
I was just wondering what everyone else did to maintain theirs. Also do you think I'm doing too much, too little or can you recommend a better way for me to keep up the maintenance on the knife.

 

[TravisH]

I don't keep a set 'schedule'.

Strop it after usage or as needed when cutting a lot.

But only sharpen it when the stropping stops being effective.

 

[collim1]

Rinse it in warm soapy water when it's dirty. Strop it on a loaded strop after any heavy use. That's it for me.

I probably resharpen my knives 1-2 times per year, but I am pretty easy on them. No chopping or batoning or cutting materials not appropriate for the knife I am using. A few swipes on a strop keeps them sharp for a long time.

 

[Ajack60]

As long as you're not sharpening the blade away, if it works for you, then it's not too much. Sometimes I use my knife heavily and have to put it on a stone. So it's all relative to what you want every day from your blade. I'll continue to use the working edge until it gets to the point of needing sharpening. That's probably worse than honing it every day to keep the edge up.

 

[Silvanus]

When my knives are used on really nasty stuff I'll do a complete disassembly. Every screw and removable part is cleaned, the pivot is re-lubed, and then I reassemble it. I'll buff the edge with 2000 grit sandpaper and strop if necessary. Under normal use at work, I'll do this once a week.

 

[savage99]

When my knives are used on really nasty stuff I'll do a complete disassembly. Every screw and removable part is cleaned, the pivot is re-lubed, and then I reassemble it. I'll buff the edge with 2000 grit sandpaper and strop if necessary. Under normal use at work, I'll do this once a week.

Wow I would most definitely start carrying a small fixed blade if I was getting my edc that dirty on a regular basis. Just sounds like a pain. Don't get me wrong I'll take my knives apart and clean/lube them but certainly not once a week

 

[HeavyHanded]

What does everyone think is the best regular maintenance for a heavily used EDC. I use mine at work to cut cardboard, opening packages or breaking down the boxes, i often field dress small game and poultry with it, if its more convenient than finding my dedicated knife for this, and even whittle quite a bit just to pass time, plus more depending on the day (sometimes less). I love knowing my knife is razor sharp on a daily basis so i tend to use my polishing stone followed by a leather strop nightly. About once a week ill run it through a 2k, 6k, 8k stone system.
I was just wondering what everyone else did to maintain theirs. Also do you think I'm doing too much, too little or can you recommend a better way for me to keep up the maintenance on the knife.

I have found nothing more convenient and long-term effective than a very hard-backed strop. Paper wrapped around the coarse side of a stone, or some ribbed aluminum trim, (or one of my Washboards) gives a great deal of room to customize the edge and restore/refresh an edge with a minimum of steps and time.

Since the surface you're actually work against is disposable, there's no need to clean it off or condition it, and is very convenient when removing somewhat larger amounts of steel than is normally the case with a leather strop. The density and surface character of the backing combined with the thickness of whatever paper you're using allows one to choose very thin paper and pronounced backing textures for working on V bevels with very little deflection or rounding - typically less deviation than most can hold freehanding anyway. A less aggressive backing and/or thicker paper/more sheets can be used to create a "softer" effect for convex or broad Scandi.

One can fix a great deal of edge wear and outright damage using this method, and do so in less time than it takes to describe the details.

Here are some pics, first two at 1000x showing some heavy edge wear from over a month and a half of use on a carbon steel Jarvenpaa Puukko. This is a more extreme example, normally I would take an edge that worn to a stone, but wanted to see if the paper method (over a Washboard) could make it happen. Second pic shows the effect of a hard mineral or similar scoring the edge and subsequent snapping off of the edge along the score line - this is a very common wear effect in my experience. By eye the edge didn't look too bad- throwing back light in a few spots but still working for EDU - could no longer shave arm hair.

and after a quick tune up, no stones involved, first pic at 400x (red blob is a 5-6u spec of toner), second at 1000x. Edge now tree-topping leg hair:

 

[Jason B.]

I have two types of edges I like to use. The first is a medium/fine waterstone in the 2k-3k range, good for kitchen knives and low alloy steels. Second is a Coarse DMT and a strop, makes some long lasting and wildly sharp cutting edges. I maintain my BM in 154cm this way, strop it after a day's use and maybe take it to the stone every other week. I am fairly hard on my edges at work and it holds up well.