The first sharpening

awestib said:
You should really post a video of your sharpening technique!
AW
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It would be awesome. I'd love to see knifenut1013 in action. I've read just about everything he's said and looked at videos he's recommended.

I've really been bitten by the sharpening bug. It's only been a couple of months. It's not uncommon for me to spend an hour or two an evening. There's just something so satisfying about striving for the perfect edge. Of course, at this point I'd settle for hair-whittling. ;)
 
awestib said:
OUC, you are not alone! I have been trying to sharpen a knife freehand for the last few months, don't have much time on a daily basis, but try to practice here and there. I still don't feel whether I am on the edge or not, end up with multiple bevels, I grind and grind and the knife gets rather duller.

I am also still not sure which technique I prefer. I watched Murray Carter's DVD and it does make sense but lifting the edge up and putting it down after every 5 strokes or so is guaranty for inconsistency even more (as knifenut and Co. always say), at least in my case. I have been trying knifenut's grip and pressure points and I think I get the idea, found out though that the table height is crucial to be able to lift up the handle for the tip etc.

I think my main problem is that once I decided about an angle that I want on my knife, how do I grind this angle "enough" to be able to follow it through (don't know if that makes sense but I think you get what I mean). That's where the aligner clamp might come into play (which I ordered now too). Once this is established on the coarse stone, I hope I can practice feeling the edge along and cont. to sharpen the knife without the clamp.
Thanks!
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Yes I can see I've ended up with multiple bevels. I did order the DMT Aligner as Knifenut suggested, but it doesn't arrive till just before Thanksgiving. Looking forward to trying it.
 
Keeping a consistent angle especially when starting a new one can take some time to get right. Its not always perfect though and 99% of the time it looks more like this.


ZDP-189039.jpg
 
Freehand

Using a aligner would look more like this

Picture1479.jpg
 
knifenut1013 said:
Freehand

Using a aligner would look more like this

Picture1479.jpg
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lol, gott it!...because the first sample looked way better than what I got free hand and to me that looked pretty good. Nice to see what I can expect once my aligner arrives in the mail. thanks for the pictures, they always help!
 
Knifenut,
Thanks for all the tips so far. I worked on my BM Torrent last night with the DMT aligner on the DMT Diamond Stones. If your familiar with the knife, it has a nice belly on it. I apparently did something wrong because I left a little bump right at the tip. It is very visible. I imagine the bump is there because I didn't remove metal/sharpen evenly. Do I have to lift the knife and aligner off the gliding surface to sharpen the point? what is the technique for doing this? And can I go back just over the belly to get my point back?

I was able to sharpen a kitchen parring knife just fine but it did not have a belly like my Torrent does.

thanks!
 
ouc said:
Knifenut,
Thanks for all the tips so far. I worked on my BM Torrent last night with the DMT aligner on the DMT Diamond Stones. If your familiar with the knife, it has a nice belly on it. I apparently did something wrong because I left a little bump right at the tip. It is very visible. I imagine the bump is there because I didn't remove metal/sharpen evenly. Do I have to lift the knife and aligner off the gliding surface to sharpen the point? what is the technique for doing this? And can I go back just over the belly to get my point back?

I was able to sharpen a kitchen parring knife just fine but it did not have a belly like my Torrent does.

thanks!
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Could you post a picture of your problem OUC?
 
To work on a larger belly knife you need to raise the handle higher. Its easiest to notice how much you need to raise when you are on a away stroke, just be careful to not go too far or you will deform the tip.

This vid shows how to reach the belly and tip properly. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rGYSp8Cn3_o
 
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ouc said:
looks like this. sorry hope this looks clear.

http://img.mypicturetown.com/cache/...6Sv.RD*JN1RarJuaZ7%BbnZfiucRHi/item.jpg?rot=1
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OUC, I noticed the same problem at the tip, I think it's the difficult part there. I have been trying it freehand and constantly put marker on the edge to see what I do. In my case I didn't lift up the handle enough so the edge got always narrower toward the tip. I also noticed that once you have a bevel, it's often easier "to feel" the edge when the first stoke has very little pressure. I find that important each time I switch the side of the blade.
 
how do you fix a deformed tip. I have a griptilian that has some minor deformation at the tip from past sharpening.
 
To fix a tip like seen in the picture from OUC's post it takes grinding of the whole edge, the key though is to grind just shy of the tip. When the tip is deformed or broken it removes length from the edge and changes alignment of the bevel grind, grinding shy of the tip brings the edge behind the tip into alignment with the new tip location.


It takes careful and frequent inspection of the edge a good grinding stone and practice to fix tips correctly and change bevel geometry. Knowing how to grind a bevel is part of the learning experience, a little bit of it can be taught but the most knowledge will come from doing.
 
so reset a bevel with grinding just a little shy of the tip? I can do that with practice.
 
+1 for waiting for Knifenut1013 to become the youtube guru of freehand sharpening :thumbup:
Meanwhile, it's awesome to see the pics of your edges, and it's useful to read how u describe your technique. It's really good to get so many inputs from people on this forum who know about the thing, and sure u are one of them.
Personally, I have loved knives since I was very young but only recently I decided to learn how to sharpen my knives freehand. So for now I am starting with sandpaper (and old cheap kitchen knives) until I feel I get a decent technique to sharpen my knives...then my guess is that I will move to continuous diamond stones.
I assume that the moves and technique (as your hints on pressure points) do not really change from sandpaper/diamond stones/waterstones but if I'm wrong then I know someone here will let me know :)
About DMT continuous diamond stones...any cons for the double sided stones? cause to my surprise, I saw a place here that sells the coarse/extra coarse 6' and the fine/extra fine 6' at what seemed to be a decent price....
Thanks
:cool:
 
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Remember that the pressure point don't involve much pressure, its basically the weight of your finger holding the blade in place. And yes, from stropping to grinding a new bevel the the pressure points are always the same.

I don't like dual sided stones (personal preference) but they will work just the same. Just don't set them on a glass table and make sure to buy a stone holder. If you plan on investing in any stones I'd suggest you look into bigger stones in the 8x3 size. It's a common size in sharpening stones and allows you to sharpen bigger blades and sharpen faster because of the size.

A good starter set would be C/F/EF if you look into the larger plates.
 
On a serious note, I'd like to say thanks.

I am a better sharpener because of many of the practices you have shown us here on the forum. It is pretty amazing what can be done to create a simple little edge. (simple, HA!)

I like the "eastern perspective" you have on the process too. How everything effects the edge, even what you ate that day... How you have to find "the flow." How even a wandering piece of dust can have its significance... Mmmmmm, the force is strong with this one.:D

I remember seeing one of your edges in person. It was immediate "shock and awe." I am pretty sure that what followed was the long, drawn-out word, "fuuuudge," only I didn't say "fudge." :p:thumbup:

I have a stockman with three 1095 blades that need their "first sharpening." I cant think of a better time to take on these edges on than after the giddy feeling I am getting from this thread. :D

Keep 'em Sharp!
 
Thanks Gov, post some pics when your finished.
 
knifenut1013 said:
...
No turning of the knife just a lift of the handle. You don't want to force a angle you want to follow the curve of the blade letting the stone cut the steel not the steel cut the stone.
...

I love convex but it has to be the right blade.
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knifenut1013 said:
To work on a larger belly knife you need to raise the handle higher. Its easiest to notice how much you need to raise when you are on a away stroke, just be careful to not go too far or you will deform the tip.

This vid shows how to reach the belly and tip properly. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rGYSp8Cn3_o
Click to expand...

I was interested in hearing more about your technique. I read the first post I quoted above and it was a bit of a revelation for me. I'd been in the lift handle and rotate blade to follow the belly to tip camp, but I tried just lifting the handle perpendicular to the plane of the blade last night without rotating and noticed it was the exact same position as if I'd tried to also follow the curve by rotating the blade, just with the handle in a different place.

However, I noticed the scratch pattern is going to be different along the length of the bevel since the edge will be cutting cut by the stone in a different direction as you lift the handle. For instance, assuming the stone is extending out away from my body and I'm holding the a clip point blade 90 degrees to it, the straight section will get scratches perpendicular to the edge while the tip will get scratches almost parallel to the edge. I'm not sure if that's really that important, but thought I'd ask about it.

Also, I noticed in the strop video you linked to in the second quoted post, that person was lifting and rotating the blade to keep the edge perpendicular to the direction of travel on the strop. It seems to me in my head that for convex sharpening and stropping, you would want that, since the backing is contouring to the shape of the blade. If you didn't rotate the blade for the clip point example above, you'd be stropping almost parallel to the edge by the time you got to the tip, wouldn't you?

Thanks for this great thread. I'm late to the party, but still learning.

~Dan
 
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