sharpening a chisel grind?

3

308shooter147

Joined
Dec 9, 2013
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Hey everyone.

I picked my first chisel ground knife today (kershaw/emerson cqc8k) and I am at a loss as to how to sharpen it without scratching the coating off the flat side.
I have the EPA as my primary sharpener and no freehand stones at all. Thanks for any info!
 
I would suggest you pick up a bench stone or three. That's what I would do anyway....
 
You really don't need to do anything to the flat side other than knock the burr off. Just a few light passes holding your ep stone in hand.
 
That is correct in terms of the flat side. It is probably just easier with a bench stone. Won't take much effort.
 
Sharpen the ground side like you normally would and just knock the burr off after each grit.
 
There will come a time when at least a tiny bit of work needs to be done on the flat side. The drawback to only working the bevelled side, in order to protect the finish on the flat side, is that burrs folding to the flat side will limit how sharp you can make it. Woodworkers sharpening their wood chisels and plane irons do most of the grinding or honing on the bevelled side, and then will usually scrub or polish the flat side on something like a hard black or translucent Arkansas stone (must be true flat) or some very fine-grit wet/dry sandpaper over glass, or a Fine/UF ceramic, which removes the burr and leaves a beautiful polish near the edge on the flat side. I wouldn't worry at all about taking some of the factory finish off, and instead look for that high shine on the back side that indicates (hopefully) a truly sharp edge. That always looks better, to me anyway. :)


David
 
I guess you could do a micro bevel on the flat side. Sharpen the bevel side on your EP like you would any other knife, then take your finest EP stone, lay it on the counter/table, lay the flat side of the blade on the stone, then raise it just a hair and remove the burr like that.
 
In my experience it is a lot easier to knock the burr off on that chisel grind than you might think. True enough you're trying to spare the finish, a very very slight elevated angle from flat will knock it off or at least flip it over and you can get rid of it with very light strokes on the bevel side. If the finish isn't a concern, keeping it flat on the backside is a better idea in the long run. It takes a lot of removal to true up the flat side of a chisel grind if it gets too far out of whack.

Here's a video I did of a bench plane blade being done freehand - it really is a very convenient edge type to work.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xk1mwm2GcVA
 
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