Success with chakma!

Just wanted to write and say that I spent alot of time yesterday carefully working with the chakma on both my Khukuris. I used Yvsa's advice on how to do it and I had great success! I started by sharpening the edge with Forstner steel (med and fine on same steel), then when the blade was very sharp I ran the Chakma lightly over the edge to smooth it out and hone it even finer. getting to where as Yvsa said "the weight of the chakma" was all that was pressing on the blade. What an edge! My next idea was to go out and test this new edge on some hardwood and see how it held up, and then when it dulled a little, if I could bring it back up with the chakma alone. I cut into some hard Eucalyptus (dry) for awhile (took along time to show ANY dulling--was very tired by then), and then tried to reform the edge using the chakma. It worked great! I'm now a converted burnisher! Thanks again to everyone for all the help.
 
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Good going Rob!!
I am glad to have been of help.
smile.gif

I told my cuz about the chakma and it's use when I gave him a resurrected 20" Sirupati.
He has much more patience then I and he listened.I was over to his place about a week after and he was telling me with a Big Smile that his "Big Knife" was shaving sharp with only using a very light touch with the chakma.
it's a good feeling when a man can get to that point with his knives.I will bet that you start using that system on all your blades now.

A friend of mine brought me his dad's knife to clean up and sharpen.His dad passed on some time ago and his mom wanted him to have this Old Timer pocket knife.Cougar was just in time with his method of using a pre 1982 copper penny to clean rust off a blade without damageing it.
I have it about cleaned up now and used a very hard Spanish steel blade I am going to make a karda with some day to "steel" the edge.The knife was pretty dull.You could safely run the edge over your arm without it cutting you.I wouldn't dare do it now as it has the original edge and it is razor sharp.


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>>>>---¥vsa---->®

If you mix milk of magnesia with vodka and orange juice do you get a phillips screwdriver?

Khukuri FAQ


 
Thanks. And yes Yvsa, I already have been "chakma'ing" (new HI vocab?) my other knives! Its a good feeling when you can put the edge just how you want it without loosing the steel from your blades. Cause I don't know about you, but sometimes I just like to have an excuse to get a khuk out of the scabbard and hold it! Man! I've only had these knives a short time and I'm totally hooked. Do the kamis put an addiction spell on the blades or what?!

Thanks again!
 
I'm glad I could help! That's just the kind of application for the penny method -- using steel wool or sandpaper would have made that old knife look like new and ruined it. Scraping with a penny takes a while but with an heirloom like that it's well worth it.

I was just looking at an old three-bladed pocketknife that belonged to my grandfather ... he'd used that knife so long he'd sharpened his favorite blade, the middle-sized one, down to about a third its original width. I love that old knife ... I would no more shine it up ... that would be a desecration.

-Cougar :{)
 

I must be sharpining challenged. I know that the chakmas of from village models are lower quality, but they should still work, right? I recieved my villager with a usable edge that had a few nicks in it. So I went to work with the chakma and nothing came of it. I can't even get an edge with my regular sharpeners.

- D
 
If the edge has nicks in it the chakma is not the tool to use to sharpen it assuming you want to take the nicks out of course. As Yvsa noted in the thread just recently, you first want to get the edge sharp with a hone. Once it is this way a chakma will maintain it well for a long time.

If the edge is visually damaged, nicks and such probably the easiest way to sharpen it is to grind a secondary bevel on it with a small hone keeping the khukuri fixed and moving the hone along it. Start with a coarse hone and finish with a fine one. Once this is done the chakma can sometimes improve it with a stroke or two depending on how careful you were with the honing.

-Cliff

 
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