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- Jan 14, 2007
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- 1,760
Im quite sure im not the first person to have this epiphany, but we have stickies for sharpening and steels, but nothing for the number one most asked question here:
"Sharpener Recommendation?"
Considering newbs dont usually read stickies, this might be pointless, but here is my take:
FIRST, FAMILIARIZE YOURSELF WITH SHARPENING THEORY BY READING THE STICKIES.
Now, learn what NOT to use. Gernerally, most types of cheater handheld sharpeners are the pull through variety, and have one preset angle to use. The ones with ceramic rods will work for mild touchups as long as your blade bevel is more acute than the sharpener's angle. DO NOT EVEN GLANCE AT ANYTHING WITH CARBIDE CUTTERS. Sure, they will get your knife able to cut, but by literally ripping metal off the blade, leaving a jagged and weak edge. STAY AWAY.
GUIDED SHARPENERS:
Spyderco Sharpmaker: again comes with preset angles, but more versatile and rods can be used freehand. Comes with medium and fine abrasives. Can get CBN or diamond rods for heavier work, but still really not ideal. Nevertheless, this sharpener is excellent as a learning tool, and has a cult following for good reason.
Smith's, Lansky, and some others sell similar rigs.
The other style involves a base you clamp the blade in, with stones that are fed into the angle setting of your choice. The nicest choices are the Wicked Edge and the Edge Pro. Smiths makes a basic, lower end kit.
While ive never used the nice ones, i had a Smiths at the beginning of my quest about fifteen years ago. Even as a newb, i immediately noticed the unavoidable effect of geometry variation. This is most apparent with larger blades. The further from the clamp the edge is, the lower the angle becomes. It defeated the purpose. Not a fan. YMMV.
The Edge Pro does not have this problem, i am told.
FREEHAND SHARPENING:
Bevel Setting/Reprofiling: A coarse benchstone of high quality is usually needed. The larger it is, the easier and more enjoyable the job will be. Norton makes nice stones for this at a great price. DMT, Smiths, and some others make diamond stones, with DMT being the most universally used, for good reason. Natural stones can be had as well, but generally only work without frustration on simpler steels. Unless you know your steels, and are sure you will never own more exotic blends, Diamonds are the safest bet. Just remember to use VERY LIGHT PRESSURE, or you can scrape the diamonds off the bonding agent and ruin your expensive stone. Used properly, however, these will last for years and years.
Honing/Refining: Here now the choices widen. While a bench stone is always easiest, you can get rods and steels and such. Again, DMT and Smiths offer products with progressively finer grits. Ceramics work excellent here too, with Spyderco offering a very nice variety of benchstones, pocket stones, and rods. Ceramics have no problem with complex steels.
Medium, fine, ultrafine for this.
FIELD SHARPENING: There is an abundance of small, portable sharpeners of all kinds. Gatco, Lansky, DMT, Spyderco, Smith's and others offer these. Emerson and Kershaw offer a sweet oval diamond rod. Most are small pocket stones, or diamond or ceramic rods. The purpose of these is maintenance. Usually used to hone at a slightly higher angle than the actuall cutting edge, they will keep the knife sharp in the field for a long time, barring any actual damage or neglect to hit it before it gets too dull. Once you get back to civilization, you can reset everything on your heavy equipment.
STEELING/BURNISHING:
There is some controversy here, but needs to be noted. Some swear by it. The purpose here is similar to above. The edge is periodically swiped on a smooth piece of steel or glass to re align it. This isnt about removing metal. Here, you are basically "squishing" the steel back to sharp. The key here is to use something HARDER than your blade. Narrow ceramic rods accomplish this effect, too. But a TINY bit of metal is also removed. I advocate this route because i believe the slight abrasion reveals fresh metal that isnt stressed. Good quality grooved steels do about the same thing, but the macro shots ive seen compared to ceramic show a more ragged edge from the filing effect. For TRUE steeling, SMOOTH is your friend.
STROPPING:
Much like honing, this is used to maintain an already decently sharp edge. Like a straight razor at the barber, the blade is pulled in alternating strokes away from the edge. This re aligns and burnishes. Leather, cardboard, denim, a hand, are all used for this.
Most folks charge the leather with polishing compound to facilitate more refinement and polish. Any plain leather or legal pad backing on a hard surface works here. Bark River, Stropman, Knives Plus, and more offer excellent pre made strops and compounds.
ODD BLADE SHAPES:
One of the biggest difficulties for newbs is how to sharpen a recurve or hawksbill. Here, you need something with a smaller radius than the curve so you can get inside the blade. Rods are ideal here, but some blade shapes can successfully be sharpened on the corner of a benchstone. Any of the above mentioned companies offer solutions for this. The same abrasive concepts apply to profiling, honing, etc.
Serrations: Again, you need something that can fit between the teeth. Stone corners, triangle cross section (Sharpmaker) rods, and very narrow, pointy rods work here. DMT, Spyderco, Gatco, and others offer solutions here.
A note: There are 2 main ways to sharpen serrations. Some advocate using a tapered rod as sort of a file, and painstakingly treating each serration on its own. I do not. Eventually, the teeth become longer and thicker as you grind down the hollow bevels between, which affects efficient cutting. And it takes FOREVER. Spyderco recommends pulling the blade perpendicular to the rod, so the metal removal is uniform across the teeth. This will not be as pretty, but is MUCH faster, and produces a better result. Google the Sharpmaker instructions for this.
Convex edges: Can be done on a stone, but most advocate various grits of wet/dry sandpaper over a soft backing like a mousepad. You strop away from the edge at a slightly lower angle than you want the end apex to be, progressing from coarse, like 320 or lower grit, on through fine, 1000 or higher. Medium pressure. Then strop on loaded leather to finish and maintain. The give of these surfaces conform around the edge a bit, producing a strong, sharp, and nearly foolproof cutter.
JAPANESE WATERSTONES: These are a popular alternative to conventional stones. They are soaked in water before and during use. They break down and create a slurry, aiding the proccess and exposing fresh abrasive.
While very nice, and the go-to for pros, im not advocating them here for a few reasons.
They are very expensive and have to be replaced, maintained, etc. Also messy.
I see them as advanced equipment, NOT IDEAL FOR MOST NEWBS.
And mainly, i honestly have no experience with them (MANNN I WANT SOME THO!). Perhaps Jason B. And others can weigh in here.
NOW THAT YOU HAVE THE KNOWLEDGE TO MAKE AN EDUCATED DESCISION, GO SHOPPING.
Here are a couple examples of base minimum kits:
DMT Extra Extra Coarse, coarse, and extra fine were a favorite with a former forum member. Add a strop and youre golden.
JDavis882 has a YouTube channel on knives. He reccommends an excellent beginner kit. Go there and look for it, and check out his other stuff too. Hands down one of the most informative sources you will find anywhere.
My personal kit: Norton Crystalon Coarse/fine 8 inch benchstone for reprofiling. I boiled the oil out with soapy water, and now it performs much better dry. Then on to my discontinued Spyderco Profile rod set. Medium and fine. These were excellent, but good luck finding em anymore. However, the sharpmaker rods are the same thing, and work just as well. I then strop on plain leather. This produces an edge that pops hair and slices paper effortlessly. Ive ben able to whittle hair with more time spent, but dont really have a need for that level of sharpness. I have a coarse/fine DMT Diafold and a Gatco TriSeps for field touchups. Tho i have and want much more stuff, this serves me well. However, when my Norton wears out, its getting replaced with a DMT. the coarse side wears away quite fast, and needs to be flattened, or "lapped" quite often. I do this in the most ghetto way possible, on a sidewalk lol! I did this once out of desperation and found out it actually works perfectly fine! They sell equipment for it, but ill stick with my sidewalk!
So there we have it. The rabbit hole is infinite once you enter, but hopefully someone will find this helpful (or i now have carpal tunnel for naught haha). There is always more to add, so this will be a work in progress if it stays popular.
I would like to see this as a sticky. If you guys and the Moderators agree, please make it so!
Thx.
"Sharpener Recommendation?"
Considering newbs dont usually read stickies, this might be pointless, but here is my take:
FIRST, FAMILIARIZE YOURSELF WITH SHARPENING THEORY BY READING THE STICKIES.
Now, learn what NOT to use. Gernerally, most types of cheater handheld sharpeners are the pull through variety, and have one preset angle to use. The ones with ceramic rods will work for mild touchups as long as your blade bevel is more acute than the sharpener's angle. DO NOT EVEN GLANCE AT ANYTHING WITH CARBIDE CUTTERS. Sure, they will get your knife able to cut, but by literally ripping metal off the blade, leaving a jagged and weak edge. STAY AWAY.
GUIDED SHARPENERS:
Spyderco Sharpmaker: again comes with preset angles, but more versatile and rods can be used freehand. Comes with medium and fine abrasives. Can get CBN or diamond rods for heavier work, but still really not ideal. Nevertheless, this sharpener is excellent as a learning tool, and has a cult following for good reason.
Smith's, Lansky, and some others sell similar rigs.
The other style involves a base you clamp the blade in, with stones that are fed into the angle setting of your choice. The nicest choices are the Wicked Edge and the Edge Pro. Smiths makes a basic, lower end kit.
While ive never used the nice ones, i had a Smiths at the beginning of my quest about fifteen years ago. Even as a newb, i immediately noticed the unavoidable effect of geometry variation. This is most apparent with larger blades. The further from the clamp the edge is, the lower the angle becomes. It defeated the purpose. Not a fan. YMMV.
The Edge Pro does not have this problem, i am told.
FREEHAND SHARPENING:
Bevel Setting/Reprofiling: A coarse benchstone of high quality is usually needed. The larger it is, the easier and more enjoyable the job will be. Norton makes nice stones for this at a great price. DMT, Smiths, and some others make diamond stones, with DMT being the most universally used, for good reason. Natural stones can be had as well, but generally only work without frustration on simpler steels. Unless you know your steels, and are sure you will never own more exotic blends, Diamonds are the safest bet. Just remember to use VERY LIGHT PRESSURE, or you can scrape the diamonds off the bonding agent and ruin your expensive stone. Used properly, however, these will last for years and years.
Honing/Refining: Here now the choices widen. While a bench stone is always easiest, you can get rods and steels and such. Again, DMT and Smiths offer products with progressively finer grits. Ceramics work excellent here too, with Spyderco offering a very nice variety of benchstones, pocket stones, and rods. Ceramics have no problem with complex steels.
Medium, fine, ultrafine for this.
FIELD SHARPENING: There is an abundance of small, portable sharpeners of all kinds. Gatco, Lansky, DMT, Spyderco, Smith's and others offer these. Emerson and Kershaw offer a sweet oval diamond rod. Most are small pocket stones, or diamond or ceramic rods. The purpose of these is maintenance. Usually used to hone at a slightly higher angle than the actuall cutting edge, they will keep the knife sharp in the field for a long time, barring any actual damage or neglect to hit it before it gets too dull. Once you get back to civilization, you can reset everything on your heavy equipment.
STEELING/BURNISHING:
There is some controversy here, but needs to be noted. Some swear by it. The purpose here is similar to above. The edge is periodically swiped on a smooth piece of steel or glass to re align it. This isnt about removing metal. Here, you are basically "squishing" the steel back to sharp. The key here is to use something HARDER than your blade. Narrow ceramic rods accomplish this effect, too. But a TINY bit of metal is also removed. I advocate this route because i believe the slight abrasion reveals fresh metal that isnt stressed. Good quality grooved steels do about the same thing, but the macro shots ive seen compared to ceramic show a more ragged edge from the filing effect. For TRUE steeling, SMOOTH is your friend.
STROPPING:
Much like honing, this is used to maintain an already decently sharp edge. Like a straight razor at the barber, the blade is pulled in alternating strokes away from the edge. This re aligns and burnishes. Leather, cardboard, denim, a hand, are all used for this.
Most folks charge the leather with polishing compound to facilitate more refinement and polish. Any plain leather or legal pad backing on a hard surface works here. Bark River, Stropman, Knives Plus, and more offer excellent pre made strops and compounds.
ODD BLADE SHAPES:
One of the biggest difficulties for newbs is how to sharpen a recurve or hawksbill. Here, you need something with a smaller radius than the curve so you can get inside the blade. Rods are ideal here, but some blade shapes can successfully be sharpened on the corner of a benchstone. Any of the above mentioned companies offer solutions for this. The same abrasive concepts apply to profiling, honing, etc.
Serrations: Again, you need something that can fit between the teeth. Stone corners, triangle cross section (Sharpmaker) rods, and very narrow, pointy rods work here. DMT, Spyderco, Gatco, and others offer solutions here.
A note: There are 2 main ways to sharpen serrations. Some advocate using a tapered rod as sort of a file, and painstakingly treating each serration on its own. I do not. Eventually, the teeth become longer and thicker as you grind down the hollow bevels between, which affects efficient cutting. And it takes FOREVER. Spyderco recommends pulling the blade perpendicular to the rod, so the metal removal is uniform across the teeth. This will not be as pretty, but is MUCH faster, and produces a better result. Google the Sharpmaker instructions for this.
Convex edges: Can be done on a stone, but most advocate various grits of wet/dry sandpaper over a soft backing like a mousepad. You strop away from the edge at a slightly lower angle than you want the end apex to be, progressing from coarse, like 320 or lower grit, on through fine, 1000 or higher. Medium pressure. Then strop on loaded leather to finish and maintain. The give of these surfaces conform around the edge a bit, producing a strong, sharp, and nearly foolproof cutter.
JAPANESE WATERSTONES: These are a popular alternative to conventional stones. They are soaked in water before and during use. They break down and create a slurry, aiding the proccess and exposing fresh abrasive.
While very nice, and the go-to for pros, im not advocating them here for a few reasons.
They are very expensive and have to be replaced, maintained, etc. Also messy.
I see them as advanced equipment, NOT IDEAL FOR MOST NEWBS.
And mainly, i honestly have no experience with them (MANNN I WANT SOME THO!). Perhaps Jason B. And others can weigh in here.
NOW THAT YOU HAVE THE KNOWLEDGE TO MAKE AN EDUCATED DESCISION, GO SHOPPING.
Here are a couple examples of base minimum kits:
DMT Extra Extra Coarse, coarse, and extra fine were a favorite with a former forum member. Add a strop and youre golden.
JDavis882 has a YouTube channel on knives. He reccommends an excellent beginner kit. Go there and look for it, and check out his other stuff too. Hands down one of the most informative sources you will find anywhere.
My personal kit: Norton Crystalon Coarse/fine 8 inch benchstone for reprofiling. I boiled the oil out with soapy water, and now it performs much better dry. Then on to my discontinued Spyderco Profile rod set. Medium and fine. These were excellent, but good luck finding em anymore. However, the sharpmaker rods are the same thing, and work just as well. I then strop on plain leather. This produces an edge that pops hair and slices paper effortlessly. Ive ben able to whittle hair with more time spent, but dont really have a need for that level of sharpness. I have a coarse/fine DMT Diafold and a Gatco TriSeps for field touchups. Tho i have and want much more stuff, this serves me well. However, when my Norton wears out, its getting replaced with a DMT. the coarse side wears away quite fast, and needs to be flattened, or "lapped" quite often. I do this in the most ghetto way possible, on a sidewalk lol! I did this once out of desperation and found out it actually works perfectly fine! They sell equipment for it, but ill stick with my sidewalk!
So there we have it. The rabbit hole is infinite once you enter, but hopefully someone will find this helpful (or i now have carpal tunnel for naught haha). There is always more to add, so this will be a work in progress if it stays popular.
I would like to see this as a sticky. If you guys and the Moderators agree, please make it so!
Thx.
Last edited:
first step is just try it a few times, then decide on a direction