What is your preferred way of maintaining the edge on your spydercos?

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SBaker34

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Jun 16, 2010
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I'm turning into a bit of a sharpening junkie, and I'm curious how you guys prefer to maintain your edge, especially those who use a sharpmaker but anyone. Not curious so much what tools you use but rather how you use them

What I mean is do you microbevel, or keep it at a straight angle, do you work it through the grits each time, what do you stop on etc. what angles etc

I'm still trying to make up my mind. 30 degrees inclusive should hold a edge longer, but it took 3 minutes to restore the razor edge on my PM2 with a 40 degree microbevel. I'm also somewhat debating on stopping with the medium stones instead of working up to UF each time. Curious what you guys do.
 
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Edge Pro Apex. Its expensive, but it turned me from a zero to a hero because its almost foolproof.
 
powernoodle said:
Edge Pro Apex. Its expensive, but it turned me from a zero to a hero because its almost foolproof.
Click to expand...
I'll second that. I just got done turning my cruwear sprints into light sabers using that system. If you do go EP be sure to pick up the Chosera Kit..
 
I use a single angle and hand sharpen with Waterstones or Diamond plates. I've measured it before and I have a 14 dps shoulder with a 18 dps apex on average. Yes, it's slightly convex as all hand sharpened edges are... even those you do with the Sharpmaker.

I finish to around 2k with waterstones and a coarse (320) or fine (600) DMT Diamond plate for tougher steels. If needed I follow with 1 micron diamond paste on a balsa strop.

When sharpening always go to the lower angle first, you can always make it thicker if needed but for most knife-like activities the thinner edge angle works better.
 
I don't do anything extreme. I just use a Sharpmaker with the standard rods at whatever angle matches the factory grind.

I also have a DMT Aligner that I use for reprofiling and repair.
 
Freehand on Spyderco bench stones. Brown medium stone for cardboard, white fine for paper. Probably around 15° per side but with freehand it varies.
 
Edge pro to 30, touch up on SM @40. Usually stop at Brown stones. I have done a reprofiling with diamonds, and sometimes if a knife gets too dull, I go to diamonds to bring it back.
 
I have a couple of Sharpmakers if I need them, but nowadays I prefer loaded and bare strops and handheld stones (ceramic or diamond). Don't really care much about what the angle is as long as the knife is sharp enough for my needs.
 
I strop them when they get dull. They convex slightly so even on my millie that I've had for a while, there's a polished edge on the shoulder and the very edge but there's a hint of the factory grind marks in the center. I basically just strop them as is and let the blade polish up over time. Works for me. I've thought about going to stones so I can go a bit coarser on my work knives but haven't switched up yet.
 
I've been sharpening on flat stones for over sixty years and currently use DMT Diamond Whetstones. I have the x-fine, fine, coarse, and x-coarse, but for my Spydercos the coarse probably gets the most use. I own a Sharpmaker, but never had much success sharpening PE knives with it, so the only time I drag it out is when I need to sharpen one of my serrated Kitchen Sharps.
 
BTW, I am kind of considering getting the wicked edge for reprofiling and sharpening super steels, but the fact it doesn't go below 15 degrees without an adapter kind of kills it for me. Best I can tell very very very few steels hold up well under 25 degrees inclusive if subject to anything beyond letter opening, so it might not be that big of a deal though, But I really only want it to reprofile.
 
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Once a month I'll polish the edge a bit on 8000 grit. Takes about a minute. I do a convex with very little shoulder, for ease of cardboard cutting at work.
It's the southard, excellent steel I will add.
 
Sharpmaker. First Sharpie the edge.
1) Diamonds to rebevel to a clean apex. 30 degrees.
2) medium rods to polish the toothy edge just a bit. 30 degrees.
3) medium rods to create a nice sharp microbevel (maybe 20 swipes per side). 40 degrees.

I then repeat #3 as necessary, when the knife just starts to dull.
 
KME system (diamond)
17 degrees per side, 34 inclusive. locked in so no guessing, I sharpen for my two sons, a few nephews.
No micro bevel
Strop with diamond paste. I use my knife daily so I strop a few times after work almost every night to maintain edge alignment. S30v has kept a nice edge for daily use.
 
for zdp 189, a polished edge with no micro-bevel at 15-20 degrees per side. this will make a good working edge. 10 dps is great for slicing and showing off but it chips too easily.
 
Sometimes, simple is good. For me, anyway. I have quite a few nice stones and an Edge Pro Apex, but I haven't used it in a while. I'm a very casual user, so my edge stays good for quite a while.
Today, I finally used my DMT Knife Clamp for the first time, although it has set on my desk for a year or two. Alone with a diamond bench stone and a strop, I'm very happy with the result.

DMT Knife Clamp...pretty cheap method, but works very well. Easy setup, but the theory is fine.

10 Inch x 4 inch DuoSharp® Bench Stone...600 mesh, fine (25 micron) and 1200 mesh, extra fine (9 micron).
The extra fine is listed as "sharpens to a razor edge" and appears to do pretty nicely.
I finished with the green compound on the strop from Stropman.com.

I used an Angle Gauge from iGaging, which put the bevel angle at 23 deg per side.
The finished edge will push-cut yellow-pages with acceptable efficiency, so I'm happy.
 
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My method is similar to Razzle's.

1). Diamond's on the Sharpmaker to 30 dps. Light strokes at the end until I can easily slice paper.
2). Medium browns on SM to smooth it out. Very light strokes at the end until I can push cut magazine paper at 90 degree angle.
3). I stopped doing microbevels because I realized I was doing it as a cheat. If I can't maintain a 30 deg angle throughout the sharpening process then I have no business messing with a microbevel. Maybe once my technique gets better I'll start using them again.
4). ZDP-189 is the only steel so far I use the fine white stones on. Can't seem to get it to pass the 90 deg magazine paper test unless I use those.
 
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