Sharp on one side

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roweac

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Sep 9, 2017
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I have a little SOG Flare folder that I use as beater carry knife. I have been learning to sharpen and i'm using the WS Guided Sharpening system with very good results on everything but this knife. I get this very sharp on one side but not the other. I think I have somehow ground one edge further than the other and that is why but I am not sure how to fix it.

It will shave hair easily when using one side of the blade but will not with the other. Same with paper it will easily slice right through paper coming from the sharp side but I really have to push from the other. Do not have this issue with the other blades I have sharpened. I do have a bausche and lomb loupe that I use to inspect the edge and one edge does look different than the other but I am too much of a novice to know exactly what to do to rectify it.

Any advice would be appreciated.
 
You have a burr still. It’s on the side that won’t shave (I think). Go slow with super light pressure. The weight of the knife, on that side. If bad enough, it may flip and need to do other side. Easy and light to remove the burr and it’ll be sharp for ya.

Stropping would get it for you also. I use the white stones on my sharpmaker to remove them.
 
It's a burr leaning to one side. The side that's shaving is the side to which the burr's leaning, into the skin. In other words, the burr's doing the shaving. It won't shave when you try from the other side, because the 'sharp edge' of the burr is then leaning up and away from the skin & hair.

Make a few, featherlight passes on the hones, on the side to which the burr's leaning (& shaving). You should see some change in the behavior, as the burr either gets 'flipped' toward the other side (which will then shave), or you'll hopefully see shaving improve from both sides, as the burr gets abraded away, leaving a truly sharp & symmetrical edge behind.


David
 
Thanks guys, 10 or so very light passes on the fine ceramic honing rod that is part of the system and it certainly seems to have flipped sides. Cannot seem to remove it though. I have used the ceramic rods and even stropped some, ( I have the upgrade kit for the WSGSS). My first instinct is to just dull it and start over at a course grit. Any thoughts? And thanks again.
 
Do you have a sharpening stone at your disposal? Draw the edge through piece of wood. Or start over.
 
Yeah I have a stone that I cant identify (interesting side note, it looks like it has japenese symbols on it but i cannot find exactly what kind of stone it is on the interwebs anywhere, got it at a garage sale for 5 bucks), an Arkansas stone, and the WS system. I was just going to run it accross some wood really good or a brick.
 
OP, if you have the newer Worksharp Guided Sharpening system, there are included 6" diamond plates right? Just "de-stress" your edge, as Adam suggests. Set your edge directly perpendicular to the stone, right on the stone with the spine at a 90 degree angle to the stone, and LIGHTLY take 2 passes of the entire edge across the diamond stone. That will chop off the burr, then you'll basically need to resharpen, though you won't need to reprofile the entire edge bevel, will just need to re-apex.
 
With the diamond hone, you shouldn't even have to 'de-stress' the edge at all, to knock the burr off. Just follow the fine ceramic with a handful of extremely light passes on the diamond, at the same sharpening angle or very slightly above that. The objective being to keep pressure light enough to avoid flipping it to the other side, and instead just scrubbing it off from the side it's leaning to now. Start on the side to which the burr's leaning. If the touch is appropriately light, you'll be able to gently abrade the burr away in just a pass or three, without having to reset the edge at all. If done right, the burr will either abrade away entirely, or it'll become so thin & fragile, it'll be stripped away in the first cut or two in use. That's the beauty of a diamond hone, with a light touch. It'll cut & clean away burrs at the edge with minimal effort, if you trust it to do what it does best at the lightest possible touch. Developing the light touch for that will also help with other hones, and especially help in minimizing burring on the ceramics in the first place, which are created by, and made larger with, increased pressure.


David
 
Sounds like too much pressure to make it flip sides so easy. Light light pressure and I swap sides pretty regular to aid in avoiding it flopping over on me.
 
Thanks, since its a beater I will try again to remove that burr before I dull it, and start over.

Thanks for all the advice.
 
So on the fine diamond I did 15 passes per side as light as I possibly could. That seems to have done it. It seems to be very sharp and cutting evenly from both sides of the blade. Also the cutting edge no longer looks different and feels the same on both sides when I run my fingers across it. When I say light I mean I literally just used the weight of the blade. It was actually difficult because I felt like I was going to let the blade wobble off angle because I was holding it so lightly. Finished it off by stropping lightly. Question for you guys, how do you consistently do that last few very light passes when holding so lightly? Like I said it seemed difficult.
Thanks again for all the help.
 
roweac said:
Question for you guys, how do you consistently do that last few very light passes when holding so lightly? Like I said it seemed difficult.
Thanks again for all the help.
Click to expand...
Hi,
For microbeveling and/or double angle deburring,
You control power with your arm not your fingertips,
that is,
don't loosen your grip on the blade to get a lighter touch on the stone,
the knife doesn't magically float with control because you're barely using 2 fingers to hold it.
I tried that it doesn't work, you simply loose control, knife wobble or fall out of your hand.
some knives are heavier than others, both need a light touch.

Think like hand writing on a piece of paper with a freshly sharpened pointy pencil without your hand touching the paper , you control the lightness by your arm muscles not your finger muscles, if you press too hard you crush your pointy pencil point or you poke a hole in the paper.

For extra lightness practice put the paper over something squishy/unsupportive like carpet/towel/couch ... if you press too hard you poke a hole much easier.

If you have a food scale, a gram scale, you can put a number on it;
put the stone on the scale, put the knife on the stone,
and use just enough force to stabilize/balance the edge bevel on the stone,
look at the scale numbers, then take a stroke or two.
on your first try you should be able to get 100 grams/4oz
and with very little practice about 50 grams/2oz
remember not to loose your grip, control force with your arm not hand
to go even ligher like 20 grams and under,
all you do is stabilize/balance as light as you can (50 grams for me)
but then as you stroke forward lift up ever so gently like tickling the stone ...
the difference is about 1mm squish of your fingertips , thats what gives you balance/stable feeling versus tickle feeling
When I learned that in september 2015 my scale read 7-8grams


If no scale think like touching the pointy tip of a pencil or nail or pushpin with your fingertip, if you press too hard you're bleeding :) so just do your best to go light
... kinda like shaving your face, don't press hard you're only shaving hairs
 
roweac said:
So on the fine diamond I did 15 passes per side as light as I possibly could. That seems to have done it. It seems to be very sharp and cutting evenly from both sides of the blade. Also the cutting edge no longer looks different and feels the same on both sides when I run my fingers across it. When I say light I mean I literally just used the weight of the blade. It was actually difficult because I felt like I was going to let the blade wobble off angle because I was holding it so lightly. Finished it off by stropping lightly. Question for you guys, how do you consistently do that last few very light passes when holding so lightly? Like I said it seemed difficult.
Thanks again for all the help.
Click to expand...

That's when I pick up the stone in one hand, with knife in the other, to do the finishing touches. I hold the stone & knife such that the apex of the edge is facing me at all times, from both sides. With the knife itself, I grasp the handle mainly with the ring & pinky finger, exerting less grip pressure with the middle & index fingers; the ring & pinky finger are where most of the control comes from, in steadying the angle hold while still maintaining a light touch on the stone with the blade. You can practice this by holding with ONLY the ring & pinky finger, to get a feel for where the control should come from. Holding it as such, you can feel how it limits how much pressure you're exerting against the stone, with the edge of the blade. I always make the first contact on the stone with the spine laid back a bit (spine low, apex lifted above the stone), and then carefully pivot the spine up until I can see and FEEL the bevel come flush to the stone. Then, start the honing pass, maintaining that light, brushing touch with the control of the ring/pinky fingers. I do the opposite side of the edge by switching stone & knife between my two hands, which keeps the apex of the edge still facing me, and mirroring everything as it was done on the first side.

I ALWAYS finish as above, specifically for the light finishing touch it affords in cleaning up burrs from the edge.


David
 
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