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Stropping

H

Hc720

Joined
Jul 9, 2012
Messages
29
Hey guys first time post here!! New to the forums. I have a homade strop its just leather on wood basicly. I am trying to repair my edge on my spyderco tenacious and it just cant get sharp enough to cut paper. it can slice through an inch sometimes other times it just tear the paper not a cut. Should i use the soft side of the smooth side? Also what techniques or hints can you tell me about stroping?





thanks in advance,
henry
 
You may need to do more repairing than a strop can do. A strop is used to "fine-tune" an edge. You should be able to slice paper easily before getting the strop out. The strop will make it sharp to the point of effortlessly shaving arm hair. Guys do maintain their knives with strops basically every time they use the knife they strop a few times, but if you go a week with moderate use on a Tenacious I can almost guarantee that the edge will need more work (stones) to get it back to sharp, then strop to get scary sharp! I usually touch mine up with a fine and ultra fine stone and then strop because I do not maintain my knives that periodically.

Or, you are using bad techniques and rolling your edge with the leather. That may explain why sometimes it cuts better than others. Go very very light. I am no stropping expert, but have found that most of my problems arise from too much pressure. I found that my ultra fine stone gets my knife sharp enough and stropping to me is not always necessary.
 
Without some abrasives, it's not going to get better, especially if you can't even cut paper.
 
Thanks for the advice nccole. I dont have stones i have a little pull thrugh sharpener. Its called the smiths pocket pal. I cant seem to get a good edge using that eather. It must be my technique.
 
I'm also betting the edge needs some touching up on hones, prior to stropping. As mentioned, paper-cutting should be easy from the stones/hones first. Work the edge to full apex (form a burr) on the hones, then stropping can be used to clean up the burr and refine the edge.

Another simple and inexpensive option, if you're so inclined (and if you don't yet have any other sharpening tools), is to 'strop' the edge on some medium or fine grit wet/dry sandpaper, laid over the top of your leather strop. Any grit from 400 and up should work. I'd suggest starting/practicing with higher grit, like 800 - 1000. That'll give enough grit (likely) to effect some noticeable change on the edge, but at the same time, it will minimize the damage if your technique is a bit off. It's the same exact technique as stropping; keep the pressure light and the angle conservatively low. Make just 2 or 3 passes at a time, and watch for the burr formation. When the burr forms along the full length of the edge, turn the blade to the other side and 'flip' the burr the other way. Use progressively lighter pressure to gently abrade the burr away as much as possible; keep verifying the edge is staying sharp while doing this. You obviously don't want to overdo the burr removal, if it's making the edge dull again.

Using the sandpaper on the strop will convex your edge a bit. Using a firmer/harder backing under the paper will minimize that, as will using lighter pressure also (always, always keep pressure light). I'd suggest praticing this technique on some cheap knives first, to get a feel for it.

Here's a good reference for stropping technique. It's posted as a 'sticky' at the top of the Maint forum page:

Stropping: angle plus pressure
 
Hc720 said:
Thanks for the advice nccole. I dont have stones i have a little pull thrugh sharpener. Its called the smiths pocket pal. I cant seem to get a good edge using that eather. It must be my technique.
Click to expand...

It isn't your technique. There are a lot of threads on here about how bad pull-through carbide sharpeners are. Here is a good one: http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php/831118-Are-pull-through-sharpeners-that-bad

Step one on the road to a sharp edge is to trade that in for a good sharpener.
 
Hc720 said:
Thanks for the advice nccole. I dont have stones i have a little pull thrugh sharpener. Its called the smiths pocket pal. I cant seem to get a good edge using that eather. It must be my technique.
Click to expand...

I had a look at the smith pocket pal. The image looks like a single blade in each slot set at around 20 degrees. These wont give you the right angle on a full flat grind like the tenacious. They would work on a scandi grind because the flat of the blade would rest against the vertical. You could cheat a little by sharpening concentrating on keeping the knife vertical rather than using the guide. These sharpeners are very aggresive so only a few light strokes (5 max) keeping the blade vertical. Don't forget to do both sides. Have you tried marking the edge and seeing where the sharpener is removing material? You may find that you've added a shoulder and haven't even touched the edge.
I don't like these kind of sharpeners because the angle is fixed and because they can remove too much steel too quickly. Don't forget that the ceramic blade is 600 grit.
 
kreole said:
It isn't your technique. There are a lot of threads on here about how bad pull-through carbide sharpeners are. Here is a good one: http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php/831118-Are-pull-through-sharpeners-that-bad

Step one on the road to a sharp edge is to trade that in for a good sharpener.
Click to expand...

Yep. I'd toss that thing out. Only bad things happen to good edges after being dragged through them.

And speaking of the Smith's Pocket Pal, see post #10 (in particular) in this thread:
http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php/683180-Long-term-carbide-scraper-use
 
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Regarding stropping with various grits of sandpaper, that type of blade grind (Full flat) would suit a small secondary bevel. I would recommend a flat sheet of glass and wet and dry. Just soak the paper and stick it to the glass. The water will hold it in place. I find laying paper over strops lets the paper bunch up under the knife and you can end up changing the angle by concentrating on stopping the paper from moving. Also, the softer the backing material, the more convex the edge you put on the blade. So you have to compensate by reducing the angle of the blade. A blade held at 20degs to a soft strop may put a convex on the bevel resulting at 25 degs at the edge. This is a function of pressure and softness of the material.
 
To get started I would get a silicone carbide stone,they are pretty inexpensive they remove metal quickly. Get a ceramic rod a large one ,you can get them pretty cheap on ebay also.Use the carbide stone to reprofile your edge then follow with the ceramic polish it up .- the Tenacious is a good knife to practice sharpening because its pretty easy to sharpen (8cr13mov),it has a broad blade so helps you determine your angle easier,the knife is relatively inexpensive

You can add more sharpening options later because going from Carbide stone to ceramic is a pretty big jump,but this will help you get a decent edge quickly.You should be able to shave arm hair and slice paper pretty easy after using the carbide/ceramic method then you can even go to your strop after this and refine that edge even more
 
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