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S30V edge chipping !

Spyderinked

Spyderinked

Joined
May 10, 2012
Messages
118
OK, heres the deal. I have been honing knives with my Lansky stuff since 1993. I have sharpened about a JILLION knives of many a make and quality, and have become very proficent with the Lansky system. I also use the Spyderco SharpMaker, as well as the Work Sharp powered tool for kitchen knives.

Tonight I reprofiled my Para 2 S30V, with the Lansky to 34 deg. inclusive. Started with the Extra coarse diamond, then went to the med. stone, then to the fine diamond, followed by the ultra fine ceramic, and stropping on my leather strop. The edge turned out great,hair popping sharp, nothing new, no big deal, Except, I looked at the finished edge with my new 20 power loop.
CRAP! There are 3 big chips, and 2 or 3 sawtooth sections on the otherwise sweet edge.
What have I done wrong ?
Thanks for the help in advance, Dan.
 
34* incl is well within sustain angle limit for s30v. In this case, most likely that either carbides pull-out and or grain fracture occured during burr/wire removal process prior to leather strop. I've seen this plenty of time for other steels as well because I am too quite impatience with kissing/praying with low pressure strokes hope the burr/wire go away. Since then I've developed an unconventional deburr technique but it's not for every body. Conventionally, be gentle while grinding with diamond stones, avoiding hidden fracture or partial carbide pull out, then low pressure strop on fine diamond to remove burr before proceed to UF ceramic.
 
I'm betting the marks (chips, etc.) are remainders of the scratch pattern from the XC diamond. If you went straight from that one, to the medium (skipping the coarse?), it's likely those deep cuts didn't get fully cleaned up & refined by the medium hone. S30V is tough to work, and if using a grit too fine to remove heavier scratches, it'll take a very long time. I've usually avoided even using the XC diamond hones (I also have & use a Lansky diamond kit, as well as Gatco & DMT equivalents), because of the extra work needed to clean up those scratches. Really hard to completely get rid of them, especially on very abrasion-resistant steels like S30V.

A side note, I've also noticed it's sometimes very easy to leave a deep gouge or two on edges, if the narrow Lansky hones are inadvertently tilted to one side or the other. The edge of the hone 'digs in', and leaves an ugly gouge on the blade edge. Don't know if that's an issue here, but it's often possible.

Edited to add:
If the steel is actually chipped (pieces fractured out), as opposed to just dinged/dented, it may also be damage from the XC diamond. Some steels, if hardened to higher RC, can be chipped by real coarse diamond hones. I haven't heard of this on Spyderco's S30V, however, so I wouldn't ordinarily suspect that first.
 
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You both have called my style correctly. I use the XC diamond, because I am lazy! Also I am none too gentile while using it.
I will take a more gentile touch to removing the burr in the future, I will also use the Xc diamond less, and the coarse diamond, and coarse "stone" more, and take a bit more time, and not be in such a hurry.
This is the same advice I was given in the past, that led me to not have such a hard time with G 10.
Thanks, Dan.
 
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