SAK Sharpening

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Vivi

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When you sharpen your SAKs do you keep the bevels the same, make them more obtuse or more acute? For the longest time I simply left them as they were, using high grit stones, strops or butchers steels to touch up the edge. Recently I've been taking the edges down to a more acute angle and the cutting performance has seen a large increase in efficiency.
 
Vivi said:
When you sharpen your SAKs do you keep the bevels the same, make them more obtuse or more acute?
Recently I've been taking the edges down to a more acute angle and the cutting performance has seen a large increase in efficiency.
Click to expand...

I try to get rid of the hard shoulder between the blade face and the edge bevel - and use a rolling motion to end up with a (semi) convexed edge -
please see my previous thread for more details -

Convexed Edge

EdgeBevel.jpg
Scientist_ConvexDtl1.jpg


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Vincent
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I'm making most of my SAKs more acute when sharpening them. Mine allso looks kind of like the one in the pic above, though not convex.

It's like you said "the cutting performance has seen a large increase in efficiency" But then my SAKs don't really cut anything "heavy" duty (Thats what some of the other tools are there for).
 
I just follow the factory edge on a med Arkansas stone then steel it on a fine crockstick. When it cuts hair off my arm...it is sharp enough!
 
Vivi said:
When you sharpen your SAKs do you keep the bevels the same, make them more obtuse or more acute? For the longest time I simply left them as they were, using high grit stones, strops or butchers steels to touch up the edge. Recently I've been taking the edges down to a more acute angle and the cutting performance has seen a large increase in efficiency.
Click to expand...

Do the more acute bevels hold their sharpness as well?
 
Yep. I find the edge develops a small burr at either angle, reducing the edge hasn't seemed to affect durability in things like wood, cardboard and in the kitchen on a cutting board.
 
Digi, your attitude seems to be really common. I've gotten about 10-15 SAKs in trades in the past few months and not a single one of them had been sharpened.
 
Vivi said:
When you sharpen your SAKs ...
Click to expand...

I grind the primary on them down to full removing the edge bevel and then sharpen back very low, <10 degrees or so per side. Since the SAK's have a bunnh of tools for the harder work, I optomize the blade for precision cutting.

-Cliff
 
I've been working on grinding some to flat, but you know my sharpening stone predicament by now I'm sure. I'm doing some work this weekend so I'm going ot order some stones with the money I make.

Even with just taking the edge as much as I have I'm kind of surprised at edge stability. SAK steel is pretty soft for a knife blade.

The nice thing about many SAKs is multiple knife blades. So you can grind one to flat and leave one closer to factory edge for more abusive work. But like you say, you can pry with the screwdriver, scrape with the awl etc, so the blades are better suited how you describe.
 
They are soft enough to file readily which is faster. They are a bit on the softer side, you can get that steel up to 59/60 HRC. However even at the low hardness is has the optimal carbide structure for fine edges unlike the really coarse steels like 154CM.

-Cliff
 
Would that be one of the reasons SAKs seem to be easy to get a fine, sharp edge on?
 
Yes, essentially the higher the hardness/carbide fraction ratio the easier it is to get a steel very sharp.

-Cliff
 
I always try to keep the same angle edge on SAKs...

this stops the edge rolling over into a horrible convex edge, which I hate.

SAK steel has to be the easiest to sharpen of most commonly used steels.

I can usually sharpen them by eye, giving them a little touch on a fine stone or a fine diamond and then check the edge by eye, to make sure it is even all the way along...

I find that if you keep the edge angle the same as it comes new, the edge will hold better than if you change the angle.
 
Like UnknownVT, mine end up convexed.

In my case, it happened sorta by accident; I was in the habit of stropping slightly-dulled edges on my SAKs (like most of my slipjoints) back into shape on some box cardboard or a notepad, and rarely ever did a full sharpening. I noticed that the stropping had removed the sharp shoulder off the bevel, since the steel is so soft, and that seemed to make 'em slice easier.

So one time when I had a SAK that needed a real sharpening, I tried the mousepad-and-sandpaper thang, and liked the results so well that I do 'em all like that now.
 
When sharpening freehand I use an angle that is less than 15 degrees per side (How much less I am not sure.) I have done this for a long time. The instructions for Case knives say to sharpen at between 10 & 15 degrees per side and I figure a SAK is not that different. I have cut up all kinds of things, mudflaps, small game, semi-frozen Italian sausage, etc. with a SAK sharpened at this angle and never had problems with the edge. Now that I have a Spyderco Sharpmaker, I often use the 30 degree back bevel slots instead of freehand sharpening.
 
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