I've heard that certain steels like 154CM and s30v are hard to sharpen. I use diamond for most of my sharpening tasks, but am just wondering if it would take that much longer to sharpen these steels with Japanese water stones, or even those $5 aluminum oxide stones found in most hardware stores.
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Stones for hard-to-sharpen steels
- Thread starter jcmv4792
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Sometimes you can get lucky with the 'cheap' hardware-store stones. I've noticed more of them are switching to silicon carbide, instead of aluminum oxide. Norton's 'Economy' stone, in it's most recent incarnation, is an example of that (I verified it's silicon carbide, in communication with Norton). Ace Hardware also has a small line of stones that appear to be of identical sourcing (for the abrasive type and construction methods of the stones), though in slightly different sizing; I have a 4" version that performs identically to the 6" Norton Economy stone found at Home Depot. Also noticed what appears to be an identical 6" stone (to the Norton) at Sears recently, under their own branding. If they all are silicon carbide, those might do OK with S30V for basic sharpening (not so much for refining), and 154CM shouldn't be a problem at all. Cheap hardware-store stones in aluminum oxide are often prone to glazing, so they'll slow down dramatically without proper use & care (& maybe lapping or re-surfacing).
Some quality waterstones are reputed to grind S30V pretty well, in terms of grinding out the matrix steel and (likely) dislodging the vanadium carbides, as opposed to truly cutting or shaping the carbides themselves. At coarser or medium grit levels, should be OK. Vanadium carbides start to get in the way of less-hard abrasives at polishing grit levels, as the carbides are actually harder than the abrasives used in any stones other than diamond (or CBN, if such a 'stone' exists).
Having said all the above, you can remove all doubt with a diamond hone of good quality. No worries at all, from coarse grinding to high-mirror polish, regardless of steel type.
David
Some quality waterstones are reputed to grind S30V pretty well, in terms of grinding out the matrix steel and (likely) dislodging the vanadium carbides, as opposed to truly cutting or shaping the carbides themselves. At coarser or medium grit levels, should be OK. Vanadium carbides start to get in the way of less-hard abrasives at polishing grit levels, as the carbides are actually harder than the abrasives used in any stones other than diamond (or CBN, if such a 'stone' exists).
Having said all the above, you can remove all doubt with a diamond hone of good quality. No worries at all, from coarse grinding to high-mirror polish, regardless of steel type.
David
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154CM shouldn't be bad on synthetic stones, but I'd stick with diamond for S30V due to its high volume of very hard (vanadium) carbides. I use DMTs for 99% of my sharpening. TRhe remaining 1% I sharpen on ancient Black Arkansas bench stone I inherited from a great uncle; it puts a great finishing edge on high carbon steels.