What is your experience sharpening traditional knives (1095, CV, 01, etc)?

Fred Sanford

Fred Sanford

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Sep 3, 2006
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Usually I sharpen my knives with DMT stones and Spyderco ceramics. This works fine for me for steels like S30V, D2, K390, M4, 440C, etc. I get the impression that 1095 and CV do not like DMT stones.

My experience is that it takes me an awful long time to get 1095, or Case CV sharp if I use DMT and/or ceramics.

I can usually get any of my knives to shaving sharp, in 30 mins or so. Sometimes it takes me over an hour to do the same to 1095 or Case CV. I should mention that I freehand sharpen.

I don't own a regular style "Norton stone" (or similar). I only have DMT and ceramics. At some point I had an old stone but I misplaced it.

--What do you guys use?

--Do you find that carbon steels need sharpened differently?
 
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I sharpen traditional carbon steels on Spyderco ceramics with good results. I like to use a few drops of glycerin as a lubricant to keep them from loading with swarf.
 
For 60+ years I used Arkansas oil stones. Aside from coarse manmade stones, that's all there were. Japanese waterstones either weren't imported yet, or if they were, they were not available in my area. (that was back in the pre-Internet dark ages.) Diamond stones/plates haden't been invented yet, that I know of.
I've also used to bottom of ceramic/porcelain coffee cups and mugs, edge of a car door window, smooth river rocks, and so on.
A couple years ago when I lost my stones in a move, I bought a inexpensive Smith's pocket diamond plate/stone. I'd acquired a couple knives with CPM154 blades, which the Arkansas stones only burnished or polished. The steel was harder than the stones. (kinda like Buck's 440C back in the 1960's and 70's. DaRn near impossible to sharpen a 110 using an Arkansas stone.
Of course the obtuse edge angle they used back then had a lot to do with the difficulty in sharpening it to a more acute angle. Even with diamonds it takes a while to get from a 50° ~ 60° inclusive edge (AKA: "duller than an axe") to the 20° ~ 25° inclusive that pretty much every other manufacturer used back then, which muscle memory/habit had you attempting to put on the 110.
At present, I have not gotten new Arkansas stones yet. I do plan on getting a set (or a set of Japanese water stones) sometime this year or next, when funds allow and I don't need/want something else more.
 
Norton India 'Fine' is my favorite, for setting bevels and even finishing the edges as I like on traditional steels (1095, CV, 420HC). Arkansas stones can work well too, for these steels.

If using diamond for these steels on relatively small/medium-sized traditional folders, I'd strongly suggest not starting any coarser than a 'Fine' 600 or (maybe) a 'Coarse' 325 diamond hone. Anything coarser will be overkill, removing too much metal and leaving the edge in need of more cleaning up & refinement. This is a factor which sometimes seems to slow the progress quite a bit in sharpening small blades in traditional steels. It's not that it takes a long time to remove steel - it's just that it takes more time to clean up the edge after sharpening with these aggressive abrasives. This is why I like the Norton Fine - I often set bevels and finish on the same stone, and it goes pretty fast.

BTW, a medium Spyderco ceramic also works very well for follow-up sharpening after I use the Fine India to create a new edge. In fact, for subsequent sharpening after the new edge is set, I go back to the medium Spyderco probably 95% of the time. I do that on the Sharpmaker - my Case '75 stockman in CV is shown below, alongside the SM. Takes maybe 5 passes or fewer per side.
5HVj3Xf.jpg
 
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Fred Sanford said:
Usually I sharpen my knives with DMT stones and Spyderco ceramics. This works fine for me for steels like S30V, D2, K390, M4, 440C, etc. I get the impression that 1095 and CV do not like DMT stones.

My experience is that it takes me an awful long time to get 1095, or Case CV sharp if I use DMT and/or ceramics.

I can usually get any of my knives to shaving sharp, in 30 mins or so. Sometimes it takes me over an hour to do the same to 1095 or Case CV. I should mention that I freehand sharpen.

I don't own a regular style "Norton stone" (or similar). I only have DMT and ceramics. At some point I had an old stone but I misplaced it.

--What do you guys use?

--Do you find that carbon steels need sharpened differently?
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I have great results and find it enjoyable to use spyderco ceramics on my carbon blades. Most of the time it's my GEC users that get sharpening attention. I have a DMT stone too, but have never felt the need to use it on my carbon blades as I have plenty of cut with the spyderco medium, and a good progression to the fine then ultrafine.
 
Lansky turnbox for touch ups and whetstones for extremely dull blades.
 
One thing that I do find is that if a blade isn't heat treated hard enough, you will struggle for a very long time to attain an edge, if ever. Some knives the steel is soft and that presents a very very tough time to get an acceptable edge, so much so that I will up and stop trying. But a harder steel takes an edge easier, maybe longer to reach it if your stones won't cut it, but you will have a crisper edge. Think of it like whittling on soft wood and hard wood, one will bend and fold on a thin edge that you whittled while the harder wood you almost think it could cut you if you were not careful, infact I've come close to being cut on some oak before !

As to which stones produce what edges better on a given steel, several variables contribute to the final answer.

Myself I use diamonds to start to get the edge bevel and finish on some very fine Shapton stones for a mirror polish.
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I use the 4-rod Lansky box sharpener for most all of my sharpening. After that, I prefer the Spyderco Triangle sharpener. The ceramic rods regardless of shape make for quick, easy, sharpening.
 
I've sharpened more 1095 on DMT diamond stones than any other steel.
Use water, start at a coarse grit (depending on the work to be done) and have at it.
Do all the work with the coarsest stone, then a few strokes on subsequent stones will polish the edge.

works just fine.
 
I use both Arkansas stones and dmt stones.

For my carbon steel knives, I prefer Arkansas stones going all the way to translucent and then stropped on leather if I’m feeling frisky. I can get a decent edge with dmt stones but I don’t have an extra extra fine and I feel that it’s needed for carbon steel.

But for stainless like case SS or buck 420hc, I get better results using no finer than the fine dmt or a soft Arkansas stone then stropped. My experience is that these stainlesses loose their bite as they become more refined. They will get shaving sharp, but will not bite into the item to be cut, rather they skate across the surface.
 
at best its lansky crock sticks for me. but im starting to see the limit of these crock sticks. Yesterday ive been noticing some blade rap on an 85 that i bought as a user and had deleted, so its one of the few gecs ive ever needed to sharpen or hone. that and the 92 elderberry. that was another model that had some blade rap for me. the crock sticks dont really get near the choil spot very well so it might be time to break out the spyderco sharp marker i purchased ages ago and never opened.
 
r8shell said:
I like to use a few drops of glycerin as a lubricant to keep them from loading with swarf.
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:thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup: I have made my own honing oil for use with stones, and glycerin gives it the oil effect, but because mine is water based you can still use water on the stones if required. You get the best of both worlds, oil and water can be used.
 
I use stones made of cryptocrystalline chert sustainably collected by Peruvian maidens of the highest moral caliber. I hand chip the edges, and scrape and flake the honing surfaces with traditional flint chisels, the flint being an uncommonly high grade, of course. I lap the cutting surfaces on specially made marble slabs, reaching a surface flatness of .0000001 +- 3% inches. I make a base out of sinker Blackwood. The base is split out, and cut to length on a shooting board carrying a Tidey plane with a custom wrought steel plane iron made of metals from Antarctic meteorites harvested during March through June. The cover is made of sandalwood, and constructed in a similar manner, but obviously more care is taken on the top since it's more visible. If I'm feeling particularly extravagant, I might inlay a Mother of Pearl family crest, the pearl coming from ornaments made for a certain Russian noble family. Both box pieces are scraped and burnished to a smooth, slick surface, note that abrasives of any kind are never used. The box components are treated with Tongue oil refined from the tongues of Glittering Starfrontlet hummingbirds who have died of natural causes in their sleep. The stone is wet with Svalbarði Polar Iceberg Water, and both sides of the knife get exactly seven passes, paying attention to angle and tip, of course. The blade is dried thoroughly using a chamois from an Australian rabbit. The rabbit, incidentally, was skinned using a pre-production Blade Forums Bunny Knife. The blade is stropped using a handcrafted strop of repurposed fine Corinthian leather from a (once) pristine 1975 Cordoba owned by Ricardo Montalban. The finely sharpened blade is then protected with a generous coat of Moebius Synt-a-Lube 9010. The knife is then stored in a specially modified (and quite lavishly restored) Chubb fireproof safe with highly energy efficient, not to mention complex and costly environmental controls.

Or Crock Sticks.
 
cudgee said:
:thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup: I have made my own honing oil for use with stones, and glycerin gives it the oil effect, but because mine is water based you can still use water on the stones if required. You get the best of both worlds, oil and water can be used.
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Not to get off topic (ha! too late for that) but I'd be interested in what you make your honing oil out of.
 
Been using the really coarse Baryonyx Manticore for most of my sharpening, then a ceramic stick to try and break the burr, doesn't always work...

My theory is Carbon steels kind of "like" natural stones. But I was way better at sharpening as a kid than I am now, go figure.

Maybe a cheapie stone from harbor freight or Arctic Fox from Baryonyx is in order?
 
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