sharpening a serrated blade

I don't understand why you think that there would be a loss in durability when you sharpen a serrated blade. If you perfectly match the original bevels the durability would be the same. If you went the lazy way and honed at a slightly higher angle than the basic bevel you would add a slightly more obtuse microbevel at the edge. This would be more durable than the original.

The basic answer is that sharpening is always a good thing. It is harder to do neatly on a serrated edge, but even a little bit helps. The Spyderco Sharpmaker triangular rods will help almost any serrated edge. Go into a knife shop and ask if they have one that you could try.

Afterthought:
Maybe you're concerned about the blade breaking rather than the edge getting damage. As long as you do a smooth job of honing (you don't create any new sharp notches) you are unlikely to remove enough material to affect the blade strength. You just won't reduce the width of the blade appreciably.
 
I have the sharpmaker, but i read somewhere (I forget where) that sharpening serrated blades weakens them.

I am having trouble getting the sharpmaker to sharpen the blade w/o altering the bevel, any special techniques that work especially well?
 
In my first reply I mentioned "It is harder to do neatly on a serrated edge". I was hinting at the problem that you found yourself, sharpening serrated edges usually degrades their shape. I have a whole bunch of tools to try and deal with that, but it only lessens the problem.

I have a rat-tail diamond hone that helps some. It removes enough material that I can get the points of my serrations back after wear and honing starts to round them. I also have a series of small diameter Dremel grinder bits that work on some serrations. One thing you could try is getting some metal rods or tubes with various small diameters. Try bending some 240 grit Wet of Dry (silicon carbide) sand paper around the rods and using them hone the serrations to shape. If you have a Woodcraft store near you they usually have some cylindrical or conical stones that might work.

Here's a link to a diamond rat-tail by Lansky:
http://www.knifeworks.com/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWPROD&ProdID=5525

The best solution is to never buy serrated knives. They will only make you unhappy.
 
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