Sharpening the Project 1&2

Joined
Sep 25, 2000
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535
For the folks that actually use their Chris Reeve one piece line knives, when it comes time to sharpen what are you doing? Did you keep the convex grind or work it to a more traditional V grind. How did you accomplish this? Is the A2 steel really hard to sharpen?
 
Mike,

Cliff Stamp did a fairly rigorous review of the Project II, and part of the review included a discussion on how he re-sharpened the knife after doing some cutting and shopping. Don't have the URL off hand, but do a search on this forum or the general discussion and you should be able to find it.

CS did find it relatively easy to sharpen the A2 blade.

Geode
 
Cliff might post his reviews in a maker's forum. I've never seen one, but I only look at 3. All of his reviews that I've read have been in the Review forum, not the general.
 
Generally I post the reviews once, unless asked to post them somewhere else, as it eliminates overlap and allows for a more cohesive commentary that is far easier to reference.

To sharpen a convex blade I use the same technique as described in the reivew but now use different sandpaper. I use SiC on Mylar sheets which are available from Lee Valley as they cut faster and leave a more even finish than the same abrasives on paper or cloth. For a mirror finish polish with a 0.5 Micron CrO sheet.

Unless you have actually induced visible damage to the edge, the 15 micron SiC paper will sharpen a really dull knife in no time (minutes). Unless I have done some really abrasive cutting, the 5 micron paper is enough, and usually the 0.5 micron CrO will do the job. For example, blunting by extensive cutting on wood or rope would be countered by a simple stropping on the CrO, repeated cutting of used carpet will require the 5 micron paper, and cutting up sods would warrent the 15 micron.

Instead of the 0.5 micron CrO you can use CrO compound on leather. It will not cut as well as the paper, but it much cheaper as a CrO block will last forever, and even it cuts very fast. For example yesterday I did 50 cuts into used mats with an ATS-34 blade and brought the blade down to I would estimate lower than 10% of its optimal light cutting ability. 100 passes on CrO on leather had it back to 100%. If I had started with 20 passes on the 5 micron paper, only 20 on the CrO would have been necessary.

The knife will not fall apart if you switch to a flat ground bevel, but a convex profile has several advantages and I would recommend that you are least try to sharpen it before removing it. You may find the above technique (passed on to me by Mel Sorg) is not as hard as you might think.

Reference link :

http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=90048

-Cliff
 
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