Sharpening ZDP-189???

TxTroubleMaker

TxTroubleMaker

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Jan 26, 2006
Messages
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I have been using my ZDP Caly pretty hard lately, zip ties, heavy cardboard, and other stuff, no abuse though. I have tried to touch up the edge with my Sharp Maker, however I just can't seem to get it to that factory razor sharp edge. After I touch up my knives, I like to slice printer paper to make sure I have a nice smooth edge on my knives. My Caly does not cut very smooth anymore, it feels like the edge is toothy. It cuts the paper, but its nowhere near as smooth a slice as my other ZDP Caly. Any suggestions on how to get that nice, smooth razor edge back??? I really don't want to have to send it in to get sharpened...
 
The cutting angle on the Caly is way less than you can do with a Sharpmaker. Secondly, if you are trying to remove some steel, you'll never get it done with the brown rods.

I sharpened my Caly to about 10degrees per side using my Edge Pro. You also could do it freehand with Japanese Waterstones. You'll need a fairly course stone to start.

Lastly, ZDP189 does not readily form a burr.
 
Cliff Stamp said:
Can you push cut the paper at all?

-Cliff
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Yeah, it can definitely push cut. It's still has a pretty sharp edge on it, it just doesn't have that nice smooth feel when it cuts. Like I said, when I slice paper, especially thin news paper, it feels toothy. I'm gonna go to Cabela's later on today and check out the Edge Pro. They usually have one or two on display, so I'll see how it works on my Caly.
 
That is interesting, generally when a knife is sharp enough to push cut it will glide on a slice with almost no feedback at all. ZDP-189 has a lower grindability compared to most cutlery stainless due to the high carbide content so it may be just a matter of not enough passes on the finer stones to completely raise the polish. This is often an issue with burrs, but generally I have not found that to be a problem with ZDP-189 specifically.

-Cliff
 
I've used the Spyderco medium bench stone with a Japanese laminated kitchen knife (advertised 62 Rockwell core hardness), and I can testify that it takes many strokes to remove any significant amount of metal on these really hard blades with that ceramic stone material. Seems like more 'skating' than 'sharpening' is happening.
 
Cliff Stamp said:
That is interesting, generally when a knife is sharp enough to push cut it will glide on a slice with almost no feedback at all. -Cliff
Click to expand...

Maybe I'm misunderstanding your statement... but can't you leave a knife 'toothy' and it will still push cut?

cbw
 
Not as smoothly. I really wanna dupe the factory original method of a coarse belt, followed by a polish. Nice toothy edge that will shave the hairs off a gnat
 
cbwx34 said:
Maybe I'm misunderstanding your statement... but can't you leave a knife 'toothy' and it will still push cut?

cbw
Click to expand...

I have a NIB ZDP Caly and this thing cuts like a scalpel. My user ZDP Caly does not have that buttery smooth slicing ability anymore. It's still very sharp, it just doesn't cut as smoothly as the NIB one. Maybe toothy is the wrong word but I can't think of any other way to describe it...
 
A sharpmaker is not nearly fine enough to polish the edge. That buttery smoothness usually comes from a high polish.
As previously mentioned, the angles on the sharpmaker may not match the orginal bevel and this too will affect the performance.
Greg
 
cbwx34 said:
Maybe I'm misunderstanding your statement... but can't you leave a knife 'toothy' and it will still push cut?
Click to expand...

Yes, you can get it to push cut off of x-coarse diamond, however this behavior off of the fine Sharpmaker stones is problematic because they won't leave the edge in a toothy condition. Hence my initial thoughts that there was a burr issue which generally means it won't push cut at all. However the combination of the ability to push cut paper and having a "toothy" feel off of the fine Sharpmaker stones is interesting. I would check the edge under magnification. It may be the case that too much force is being used and the edge is fracturing. There were some reports of this on the Spyderco forum.

-Cliff
 
Cliff Stamp said:
I would check the edge under magnification. It may be the case that too much force is being used and the edge is fracturing. There were some reports of this on the Spyderco forum.
Click to expand...

I second that suggestion. My Calypso Jr. had some microchipping issues after a few weeks of moderate use, and the chips were easily visible at 6x magnification. What I did was to regrind the edge freehand on a diamond hone. No more problems since then, so that may well have been a somewhat burnt edge with solid steel underneath.

For regular maintenance I only use a fine ceramic stone and occasionally a strop loaded with diamond paste (1 micron). The result is pretty good, I don't find there's any noticeable difference compared to my second NIB Calypso Jr.

A quick note on using the sharpmaker: The factory edge of both my Calypsos was somewhat more acute than the angles you get on the sharpmaker, so the sharpmaker is IMO not really the best choice for the Calypso Jr., at least not when you want to preserve its performance. Edge geometry rulez when it comes to performance ... :D

Hans
 
I have had fantastic results with sharpening on a coarse DMT diamond stone, then polishing on the sharpmaker. The trick is to not over polish so that you leave some of the "toothiness" from the coarse diamond stone. I discovered this when I chipped my Caly Jr. ZDP blade and had to reprofile with my DMT coarse, after I finally ground out the chips I got lazy and just did about 20 passes on the Sharpmaker brown and whites. I quickly thumbed the edge to test it (not expecting it to be sharp at all) and received one of my nastier cuts to date:eek: I experimented cutting things, and relized that the knife was scary sharp, but was still really toothy since I skipped from a coarse diamond stone straight to the Sharpmaker rods.
 
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