S30V on a Sharpmaker

myright

myright

Gold Member
Joined
Jan 31, 2008
Messages
5,145
I've got a S30V Razel that I can't get sharp at all. I can't even nurse her back to be sharp enough to cut paper.

What am I doing wrong?

I will admit I new to sharpening and even newer to the sharpmaker. I got my BK9 shaving sharp, but could not get my Case canoe shaving sharp. So I known I've got to work on technique.

I can get a sharp edge on most things I've put on the Sharpmaker but that S30V is kicking my butt. Is there something I don't know that I need to do differently?
 
Yeah, I know most will say it's hard to sharpen because it holds it's edge so well, but there's got to be something I'm missing.

My Razel gets ALOT of use so I need her sharp.
 
Perhaps the most common mistake made by new sharpeners is one of 'pressure.' If you were able to get your first knife sharp enough, but those that followed wouldn't sharpen, my first guess would be that you began to use more pressure against the stones. I know I did that with some DMT diamond plates when they first came out, couldn't get an edge, destroyed the plates, etc., etc., etc.! Once I lightened my touch (and got new stones) my edges were easy to get. More pressure does NOT equal faster cutting!

Back off a bit, let the weight of the knife be about all the pressure you apply and keep the blade perpendicular to the rods. That's another area that people often screw up with the Sharpmaker... curving the blade instead of cutting straight down. Only curve if the blade is curved. Keep the blade edge perpendicular to the angle of the rod.

Hope that helps you. :)

Stitchawl
 
stitchawl said:
Perhaps the most common mistake made by new sharpeners is one of 'pressure.' If you were able to get your first knife sharp enough, but those that followed wouldn't sharpen, my first guess would be that you began to use more pressure against the stones. I know I did that with some DMT diamond plates when they first came out, couldn't get an edge, destroyed the plates, etc., etc., etc.! Once I lightened my touch (and got new stones) my edges were easy to get. More pressure does NOT equal faster cutting!

Back off a bit, let the weight of the knife be about all the pressure you apply and keep the blade perpendicular to the rods. That's another area that people often screw up with the Sharpmaker... curving the blade instead of cutting straight down. Only curve if the blade is curved. Keep the blade edge perpendicular to the angle of the rod.

Hope that helps you. :)

Stitchawl
Click to expand...

That is good advice, thank you.

I'll try again tomorrow with the rods freshly clean and extremly focused on pressure I am applying on the blade. I watched the DVD that the came with hit and maybe a got a bit lazy because it was one the last knives I was sharpening.
 
Check if you're sharpening the edge, mark the edge with a permanent marker and give it 5strokes to see if you are sharpening the edge or not.
 
Imo the best way to make sure you get a knife sharp is to do as much as you can with a coarse or medium stone. For example, you should be able to get any reasonable quality knife to easily shave arm hair using sharpmaker medium stones. I have no real talent at sharpening and I can do it no problem.

Start with using good pressure on the corners of the stone and lighten up as you go.
 
I had similar trouble when I first started using the sharpmaker. I switched from hitting both sides to working one side until I raised a burr and realized I was not nearly as close to the edge as I thought I was. Using a sharpie as mentioned is a big help as well.
 
If you have a really dull edge on a tougher steel to sharpen it might be better to send it back get it resharpened then use the sharpmaker to maintain it.
IMO keeping the knife sharp with regular sharpening touch ups on the sharpmaker makes it so much easier with steels like S30V than letting it get real dull and sharpening.
 
using a felt marker along both edge bevels is the key. in my experience almost all production knives and many of my customs, come with obtuse and unequal edge bevels, like maybe 30 degrees on one side and even up to 40 degrees on the other.
the Sharpmaker allows you to get either 15 or 20 degrees per side. so the first time you sharpen it, a LOT of steel needs to be removed. the black ink along the edge bevel clearly shows where on the bevel the stones are abraiding.
i worked on a Fight'n Rooster Sodbuster yesterday (most likely 1095 steel) and after 1 hour with the corner on the brown rods, traces of the black could still be seen right at the edge (i use a 10x magnifying glass), i.e. i was still not all the way to the edge.
i have also found that there is no benefit to proceeding to next step until the black mark is ENTIRELY gone. if i did not use the Sharpie pen, i would not know when i had finally got through the shoulders to the actual edge, and would have moved on to the next step far too soon, resulting in only a so-so final result.
once a blade has been properly sharpened on the Sharpmaker, subsequent sharpenings go quickly as they are really only "touch-ups". roland
 
marineni said:
I had similar trouble when I first started using the sharpmaker. I switched from hitting both sides to working one side until I raised a burr and realized I was not nearly as close to the edge as I thought I was. Using a sharpie as mentioned is a big help as well.
Click to expand...

+1

With some steels, S30V being one of them, it will take you *much* longer to get all the way to the edge than you think it should. The marker trick is your friend.
 
I've had the same problem.It works,but takes a long time.I just ordered the diamond tri-stones.I hope this will speed up the process.
 
I think the main problem is we are all use to the amount of time it takes to sharpen softer steels like 1095, AUS-8, and 440. It can be frustrating at first but keep cleaning your stones and spend the extra time. Here are two knives that I sharpened in the past few days, the first one is a kershaw cyclone with 13c26 steel, took about 45min to reprofile, sharpen, and polish. The second is a BM mini-rukus S30V, this one took 2+ hours to do the same.

cyclone
IMG_0384.jpg


mini-rukus
IMG_0389.jpg
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top