Three Newby Questions

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russell_c_cook

Joined
Dec 2, 2013
Messages
5
Hi all,

I've just recently been getting into knife sharpening and have three questions I was hoping to discuss.

1) My kitchen knife has a 14cm blade. So the way I've been sharpening it is to push it along my 5cm wide India stone in 3 separate parts. That is, the right side away from me, then back to me, then the middle, then the left side. Is this acceptable practice? The edge I get is definitely better than when I didn't use to sharpen it.

2) The handle of my knife is quite chunky, so it's not possible to sharpen at an angle lower than about 20-25 degrees. I use it as a utility knife so that's OK, but am wondering how I would deal with this if I wanted an acuter angle.

3) I've heard people say that the flatness of a whetstone is not as important for knives as it is for razors (and have seen people using some very out of flat whetsones for kitchen knives and cleavers). Why is this?

Any help would be great, unfortunately youtube is blocked here in China so it's hard to get some videos to learn from.
 
1) I sharpen all my knives in overlapping sections, except when stropping. Then I usually swipe the entire length of the blade.
2) You mean you're not reaching the very heel of the blade because the handle gets in the way? Sharpening the knife with the handle 45 degrees to the side of the stone with the edge towards you should allow as low an angle as you'd like for your average chefs knife.
3) The flatter, the better, but your hand is most likely not perfectly steady, so a very slightly dished stone will probably affect the angle less than your hand movement. At least when you're just starting out.

PS. I'm no expert. Still learning.
 
Thanks for the replies.

I actually had a go at doing circular strokes today, it seemed to go well. Are circular strokes considered unorthodox? Do they carry any disadvantages?
 
1. That's a good method. Try putting the fingers of your other hand (3 of them) on top of the edge *right* where it contacts the stone. This will help concentrate the grinding in that exact area. You can do more than 3 sections if you like, doing sections that are only as wide as your three finger tips on the blade.
2. You may have to change your approach angle as you get close to the handle of the knife. I've had to do this on numerous knives.

Circular grinding is ok. Some people get good results with it. The direction of grinding doesn't seem to matter so much. It's more about holding a consistent angle and grinding until you get a burr.

Brian.
 
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