Spyderco Sharpmaker for pretty dull knives

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Cochese23

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Apr 19, 2013
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Hello all. I am new the forum and had some questions about the Spyderco Sharpmaker. I just bought a Miyabi Kaizen 8" chef's knife and am planning to buy the Sharpmaker to maintain it. I understand the Sharpmaker is great at maintaining knives that are already fairly sharp. But my question is related to a few older kitchen knives I have that have been neglected. I have Zwilling/Henkels santoko, utility and paring knives that have pretty damaged edges.

I had read of people using sandpaper wrapped around the stones on the 30* setting to set a new bevel, then just going to the 40* setting on the stones following the normal process. Will this restore the edge on my older knives?
 
Cochese23 said:
Hello all. I am new the forum and had some questions about the Spyderco Sharpmaker. I just bought a Miyabi Kaizen 8" chef's knife and am planning to buy the Sharpmaker to maintain it. I understand the Sharpmaker is great at maintaining knives that are already fairly sharp. But my question is related to a few older kitchen knives I have that have been neglected. I have Zwilling/Henkels santoko, utility and paring knives that have pretty damaged edges.

I had read of people using sandpaper wrapped around the stones on the 30* setting to set a new bevel, then just going to the 40* setting on the stones following the normal process. Will this restore the edge on my older knives?
Click to expand...

That's one way to do it; you have LOTS of options otherwise. For the Sharpmaker, a 3/8" round rod or dowel for your sandpaper (glued to the dowels) will snugly fit into the triangular holes in the SM's base (leave the bottom end of the dowels bare, so they'll still fit). I sort of discovered this by accident a while back, when I tried out some 3/8" round ceramic rods in my SM's base; fit like a glove. If you happen to find a 3/8" diamond 'steel' (or two) for knife sharpening, that'd also do well or even GREAT for that job.

I've also tinkered around with using oval diamond 'steels' propped at my chosen angle (measured with an angle gauge or protractor, or other similar means), using them to reprofile a few blades. A longer 10" or 12" 'steel' of this type affords a lot more grinding surface area & length, and can make the job pretty simple.


David
 
Thanks David. The 3/8" dowel sounds like a great idea. What grit sandpaper would you recommend to start? Should I use a couple different sandpapers before going to the SM stones?

Also, I am correct in the process of using the sandpaper at 30* to make a new bevel, then going to 40* on the stones?
 
Yes, the sandpaper rod will work fine if you're only going to do a few knives.

I got 240 and 400 1/2" triangle rods from Congress Tools and they work okay. But I eventually broke donwn and got the Sharpmaker CBN rods and they work much better and faster.

Personally, I found that 40° works just fine on my Henkel santuko; the blade's so thin already there's no need for a double bevel.
 
Cochese23 said:
Thanks David. The 3/8" dowel sounds like a great idea. What grit sandpaper would you recommend to start? Should I use a couple different sandpapers before going to the SM stones?

Also, I am correct in the process of using the sandpaper at 30* to make a new bevel, then going to 40* on the stones?
Click to expand...

For the knives you mentioned, some 220/320/400-grit (any or all of them) should work pretty well for rebevelling, depending on how damaged/dull your blades are. Might make a couple or three 'sets' of dowels with the different grits; start with the 400, and if it's a bit slow, then jump back down to 220/320. If you're pursuing more polished edges on your knives, taking the grit up through a sequence of 400 > 600/800 (either or both) > 1000 should get you prepped for the medium (brown) SM rods. On the other hand, if you're just wanting to restore some good toothy utility edges for slicing, and polish isn't as important, you could just jump straight from your rebevelling grit (according to your choice) to the SM's rods. Oftentimes, a good toothy edge created on 220/320/400 is GREAT in the kitchen, with some burr cleanup accomplished by a few light passes on the ceramic rods (or a strop, for that matter).

And setting the bevels at 30° inclusive first, is the way to go; it'll make subsequent touchups on the SM a breeze. It's your choice as to whether you follow on the 40° setting afterwards. My own preference is to use 30° inclusive or less for everything I sharpen.


David
 
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Great info guys. I am going to go with the Sharpmaker and will pick up some 3/8" dowel. Already have plenty of different sandpaper laying around. Really like the idea of gluing the paper on the rods. So simple, but sounds like it would work great.

Can't wait to try it on the older knives. Should be great practice getting the older knives in shape to make sure I keep the new Miyabi Kaizen sharp.
 
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