Tricks to keeping blade 90 degrees on sharpmaker?

Daniel Moore

Daniel Moore

Joined
Jul 28, 2003
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2,790
The last time I sharpened my Griptilian, I ended up getting the edge off center because I didn't keep the blade vertical enough. Does anyone have any good methods of making sure the knife stays 90 degrees throughout sharpening?
 
Watch your knife carefully as you pull it through the Sharpmaker. As soon as you see yourself tilting the knife cut a small nick in your arm. After a few dozen cuts you will equate tilting the knife with the pain from a small cut in your arm. Keep doing this and eventually you motor skills will automatically keep the knife perpendicular.
 
Well, I only do blood sacrifices on car projects. As for the sharpmaker, if I am having problems I put my forefinger on top of the blade and that seems to help keep my orientation. Mostly it's just a matter of practice though. Once you've done it enough, you won't even think about it any more and the edge will come out fine.
Bob
 
Unless your technique is incredibly bad I doubt that your problem was the way that you were holding your blade. Test this idea using the felt pen trick. Color the sides of your edge bevel with blade felt pen. Set the medium rods in your normal honing slots. Being very careful to hold the blade vertical do a few strokes on the left side and then carefully do a few strokes on the right side. If the felt pen is removed fairly evenly and well centered on each side you have a different problem. Even if the felt pen is removed slightly off-center it may indicate that you previously were doing a reasonable job of holding your blade vertical.

Other suspects for how your edge bevel looked asymmetrical include--
--The blade came from the factory with the edge off-center.
--You used uneven pressure or number of strokes from side to side and just honed more on one side (this will also make your edge off-center)..

So don't just look at the bevels, also look at the blade edge-on and see if the apex of the edge looks centered. If it isn't centered maybe all you need to do is hone more on the side with the narrower bevel.
 
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When I first got my Sharpmaker, I also had trouble keeping the blade vertical. What's worked for me is to hold the knife palm up (like holding a fencing foil, if that helps). That way I can see both liners (or scales) as well as the blade, giving my eye three points of reference.
 
The biggest problem I see that takes place with the Spyderco 204 Sharpmaker is that people have to realize that before you can achieve a razor sharp, finished edge you have to re-profile and/or should have proper relief ground into the edge of the blade as mentioned in John Juranitch's book "The RAZOR Edge Book Of Sharpening". Improper bevels and not grinding them down properly you will never get a good finished edge. I usually take and stroke my knife blades about a dozen times on each side with my Norton 325 grit Diamond Benchstone.

Also I can't stress enough that you need to watch that video over and over again to ascertain the methodolgy that Sal & company are trying to get across. I have had my Sharpmaker for about 5 years now and I still get out the video occasionally to brush up and review what I learned before. I always seem to catch a trick or 2 that I overlooked the prior time of watching it. The only fault I can find with the Sharpmaker is that they need a very coarse stone for rapid stock removal. Even the Diamond stones you can get for the unit don't really grind the primary and secondary bevels like I like it done. Good Luck :)
 
I was pretty sure there was something wrong with my Sharpmaker: watched the video, read the book, worked diligently, but still could not get that “scary sharp” edge or the one that promised to be “hair poppin.”

Now, I still can't get that sort of an edge on the Sharpmaker, but here are 2 suggestions for getting the most out of it:

1.Place the Sharpmaker on a lower surface so you can look down on the blade as you sharpen it. Makes it lots easier (for me, anyway!) to maintain the verticle angle.
2. Clamp the Sharpmaker to the work surface: Lets me use both hands to hold the knife steady as I sharpen it.

Finally, the Sharpmaker will give me anything from a good working edge to a shaving sharp one, but for anything beyond that, I have to go to superfine stones (Japanese water stones and like that) and a leather strop and am learning to finish sharpening freehand.

My.02, anyway.
 
maury said:
2. Clamp the Sharpmaker to the work surface: Lets me use both hands to hold the knife steady as I sharpen it.
Click to expand...

That's a good idea. The base has holes where it can be screwed down to a work bench. I'm drawing up some plans for buiding a small work bench that'll occupy an unused corner of my house.

I'm trying to come up with a way to raise and lower the ends of the base to create other sharpening angles through the use of screws. Any ideas?
 
For me, it's the following:

1. Use non-dominant hand with thumb on blade spine (unless it's a dagger)
2. Go slow and use medium-to-gossamer-soft pressure
3. Practice
 
NR didn't say that his knife wasn't getting sharp, he said that his edge didn't look right. It sounds like the problem is more cosmetic than functional.

You don't have to maintain constant or equal angles when you sharpen a blade. You just need a small included angle between the two faces of your sharpening bevels and you need the angles to come to a sharp apex. Just think of how people rave about the sharpness of chisel-ground edges where the blade is at zero degrees on one side and something like 20 degrees on the other side. That is as asymmetrical as you can get and yet the edge is sharp. The main concern with extreme lack of angle control when you sharpen is that you will make your angles too obtuse or you won't sharpen all the way to the edge as you work (unless you're real bad and you round over your edge). You usually don't impact the quality of your edge from asymmetry you goof it up through applying too much pressure and either damaging your edge or creating a burr, or you don't sharpen long enough and never really achieve an edge.

Don't give yourself a cramp trying to maintain perfect allignment on your sharpmaker. Give your wrist a rest and save it for other one-handed excercises.
 
To keep the knife at 90% to the stone, on the Sharpmaker.

Make sure you have the sharpmaker mounted or resting on a level surface (it's absolutely better to mount the sharpmaker on a bench etc. if possible, then you can use two hands to hold the knife).

Stand directly over the knife and triangle your are using. Close one eye and sight down the blade (like sighting a rifle). Do the same for the other side.

Slow, firm, smooth deliberate strokes are best.

Practice first on your old knives if necessary.
 
I accidently put a micro edge on one side of the edge on one of the knives I sharpened because I either was off a few degrees or the knife was not ground from the factory at a perfect 20 degree angle on one side.
 
It is weird I have a polished bevel and I guess micro edge on one side, and the other side is regular.
 
I have found that clamping the SM to the table helps, so I can use both hands. Also, I try to keep the knife in the center of my body, lined up w/ my belly button, since that's about the level I prefer the SM to sit. I also alternate eyes, closing one then the other. All this results in what can only be hilarious swaying (for center of body) and winking while sharpening my knives. I also hold the knife with my palm slightly turned up. It allows for more freedom of movement at the wrist. I've re-learned to sharpen freehand just to get my wife to quit laughing. Also, very few knives have an even bevel on both sides. This drove me nuts and resulted in a CRKT M16 carbon fiber loosing nearly 1/16" of its edge, before I figured it out.
 
I keep my Sharpmaker below my waist so I will be looking down on the blade and any canting will be easily detected and corrected.
 
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