What sharpening tools

[BeyondTheBox]

... do I need and you recommend?

I currently have:
- Spyderco Tri-Angle Sharpmaker
- Smith's CCKS 2-Step
- Whetstone Cutlery 20-10960 dual sided 400/1000 grit water stone
- Green Elephant ceramic honing rod
- Work Sharp guided Field sharpener
- Homemade leather strop with Jewelers rouge glued to a wooden board.

This is all brand new, never used, not even removed from the packaging yet. Just got it all based on things I've read online. I've never sharpened anything myself, other than a couple generic SAK and my Uncle Henry. I'm not sure if these items will suffice, as I know some of the newer premium steels require specific sharpening tools to work the harder material. Am I missing something? Like a diamond something or other?

I've now got S30V (which I read requires diamond and strop), S35VN, M390, 20CV, D2, & ZDP-189.

Thank you for your time and recommendations.

 

[Wowbagger]

Use all that other stuff and knock yourself out.
Get good and frustrated.
Practice
Get better.
Finally "GET IT".
Enjoy your hard won ability to produce a pretty much sharpish edge.
THEN . . .
Get an Edge Pro Apex with some diamond stones and Shapton Glass stones.
Learn to use it.
Check out the edge that has just caused your mouth to fall open and your brain to roll out onto the table.
. . .
ruminate on just why it was you didn't just get the Edge Pro to start with and skip all that pain and frustration for the old mediocre edge (compared with what you just created on the Edge Pro).
Or not.
It's up to you . . . but I tried.
PS: then have a little burial service for your strop. You won't need or want it.

 

[BeyondTheBox]

Use all that other stuff and knock yourself out.
Get good and frustrated.
Practice
Get better.
Finally "GET IT".
Enjoy your hard won ability to produce a pretty much sharpish edge.
THEN . . .
Get an Edge Pro Apex with some diamond stones and Shapton Glass stones.
Learn to use it.
Check out the edge that has just caused your mouth to fall open and your brain to roll out onto the table.
. . .
ruminate on just why it was you didn't just get the Edge Pro to start with and skip all that pain and frustration for the old mediocre edge (compared with what you just created on the Edge Pro).
Or not.
It's up to you . . . but I tried.
PS: then have a little burial service for your strop. You won't need or want it.

Wow, sounds like you believe very firmly in this product.

I was going to get a standard Lansky sharpening system, looks similar to this, but a lot more expensive. I honestly don't much care about price, at this point, so I'll look more into it. Thanks for the recommendation. But yes, I will first practice with the Spyderco state on my cheap blades.

 

[JD Spydo]

The Spyderco 204 Sharpmaker was an excellent choice for a kit type sharpening system. I own two of them myself and I do have a couple of recommendations to make for you. First and foremost before you use your Sharpmaker I must call your attention to the instructional video that comes with the kit. You can avoid a lot of mistakes by watching that video at least two time and preferably 3 times before you sharpen your first knife with it. Also don't start out by sharpening a high dollar Spyderco, Benchmade, Boker or any other premium, high dollar knife until you learn the proper technique of the Sharpmaker. Start out with cheaper thrift store type knives before you even try to do a premium quality blade with it.

Also there are extra stones and rods you can get for that 204 Sharpmaker>> they have a set of diamond rods, A set of CBN rods ( cubic boron nitride) and they also make a set of Ultra-fine stones for it too. Buy all of the extra stones and rods you can get. It really makes the Sharpmaker a much more versatile unit and the results are amazing when you learn the right techniques.

I've been wanting to get one of those Green Elephant ceramic rods myself because I've heard good things about them. Also with your Sharpmaker I do advise you to keep the stones clean and don't let them get really clogged up. The kitchen cleanser you get at the grocery and hardware stores called "Bar Keeper's Friend" is by far the best cleaner I've found for keeping ceramic stones clean.

 

[Dangerously]

You have a lot of options for sharpening and touching up edges. Spend some time and get good at that. It’s a frustrating but rewarding journey.

At the point when you want to start taking off lots more metal, reprofiling, then you’ll want some more firepower. DMT XC/C combination stone is a good bet. Also the Norton Crystolon combination C/F stone is pretty good for that too.

 

[draperfish]

I've gone through a lot of different sharpening methods over the last few years, I've literally spent hours and hours sharpening my knives, not because they were dull but because I have an obsession with trying to achieve and maintain very sharp blades. I started out with Arkansas stones, then Spyderco sharp maker, worksharp (ruined a brand new Strider SnG by rounding the tip), water stones, edge pro, and diamond stones. Even though I've spent so much time practicing and sharpening I never really got the results I wanted. A few years ago I got into Murray Carter knives and his sharpening system using 1000 and 6000 grit water stones, I bought and watched his instructional videos over and over and practiced for hours. I started to get better edges but they still weren't as good as I wanted, then I bought the edge pro, I thought I had found the end all sharpening system and was able to achieve very good results but the downside was being able to maintain the exact same angle when changing to different grit stones, but the worst thing was I kept getting micro scratches on the blades from the slurry that would get between the blade and the edge pro, very frustrating. Then I decided to buy some quality diamond stones from DMT. I'm somewhat of a blade steel snob and most of my knives are super steels, my problem with the water stones was I was having to grind so much to remove enough metal to sharpen them that it was very difficult for me to maintain consistent angles, the diamond stones fixed that problem. With the diamond stones instead of grinding back and fourth for an hour and trying to maintain constant angles the whole time (with water stones), I can use nice slow controlled strokes and remove enough metal to get a burr very quickly. Eureka! I've gotten the best results that I've been trying to achieve for years, so now I progress from coarse, fine, extra fine diamond stones and then finish on a Spyderco ultra fine bench stone. All that being said I've recently purchased a Worksharp Guided Sharpening system with the upgrade kit and it works even better for me than the 8" DMT bench stones, it's a much more solid setup than the Worksharp field sharpener for just a little more money. Get some cheap knives to practice on and work on maintaining consistent angles. I highly recommend using diamond stones and ceramic stones for your super steels.

 

[Wowbagger]

Wow, sounds like you believe very firmly in this product.

Science isn't based on belief.
Metal machinig isn't done by holding one's tongue just right or wearing a lucky pare of socks.
It's simple. If I want to cut a specific angle. I put the metal in a machine that cuts angles. Set the angle and . . . as if by magic . . . the angle is cut the same every time. How did that happen ? ! Geometry, science . . . in a word facts.
The alternative is to hold it in a squishy, fleshy hand, run the blade over a stone while it is teetering on an uneven surface (I have see """"Pro"""" sharpeners put their stone down on a pile of towel and watched the stone tilt back and forth) while they sharpened.
The edge came out sort of sharpish. How did that happen ? ! I have no idea . . . maybe they are good at . . . no . . . I have no idea and don't want to have.

A reliable, repeatable, non gyrating way to move the stone over the knife is what is required for apexing a knife. The stones (all of them) have to travel over the edge bevel at THE SAME ANGLE to produce a sharp well formed edge.

Sure some of the other things you mentioned might be able to, in theory, do that but I find electrical powered grinders to be WAAAAAAAAYYYYYYY over kill for any thing but some serious reshaping of the edge. They are preposterous for touching up a blade.

Many, most, all, of the other clamp the blade in the machine sharpeners one finds that the #&%*&$*%! clamp keeps getting in the way for smaller knives and slipping off the larger knives.

Some one has a quote here that says something like : "Elegance isn't what you can add but comes from what you can take away". Sorry to butcher that. In my world it is said : The simplest solution is the hardest to arrive at.

Clamps are something that can be eliminated.
Strops ? If I can get a tree topping, hair curl whittling edge off my last stone.
Why would I ever want to degrade the edge bevel by rounding it over with a strop ? I certainly wouldn't notice that the apex was any sharper and I could always just go to a finer stone if I wanted to do that.
Possible answers : Bur removal. Good / great steel is easy to debur using these stones.
Toothy edge polishing. . . . well there we get into . . . hahahahah . . . polished edges do every thing I need them to do. I have fooled around with taking an edge to polished and then taking a courser stone over it to then put teeth on the polished edge. One can take a polishing stone to a toothy edge to polish the teeth. I have even . . . had my flirtations with the dark side and stropped toothy edges with diamond goop. Don't get me started on how much I love digging that crap out of the syringe with a tooth pick.

I don't know; all that's not for me.
I do have quite a museum of inferior and obsolete sharpening paraphernalia.
m

 

[Mo2]

All those steels you listed san's zdp would highly benefit from cbn or diamond abrasives. At minimum SiC (silicon carbide). Wether you get a lansky diamond kit, kme diamond kit, edge pro kit with sic or diamonds doesn't matter really as long as you learn how to use them and the shortcomings if any.

Diamond paste strops to finish on.

Bench stones are always a good thing to learn on too. But generally easier to learn with non super steel. As the super steel can be difficult for some. I know it was for me when I first started with s30v and d2 long time ago. 420hc, vg10 etc were a piece of cake to sharpen in comparison. It wasn't till I got a kme then an edge pro did I get more consistent results on these steels.

 

[Wowbagger]

I honestly don't much care about price, at this point, so I'll look more into it.

I looked hard at the Wicked Edge $600 back then ish $800 now.
I just found too many questionable design elements once I got past the stone base and all the piles of duplicate paddles. My Dad said a guy ought to have two of everything but the Edge Pro seems to do perfectly well with one stone of each grit.
I would have bought the Wicked Edge if there weren't things about it that disappointed me design wise. It does produce pretty, even looking, bevels for the magazine photos. What is actually happening on the apex I shudder to think.

 

[Blues]

We're gonna have to keep Wowbagger and Kreisler apart or the bladeforums version of the crusades may jump off!

I dig the passion.

 

[Wowbagger]

We're gonna have to keep Wowbagger and Kreisler apart or the bladeforums version of the crusades may jump off!

I dig the passion.

I would like to hear how stone wear and different stone thicknesses and strop thicknesses is compensated for in the system.
Every time I ask that all I hear are crickets.

 

[Blues]

Don't ask me...I own an Edge Pro. (Even if I don't use it much and have a ton invested in it in stones and accessories. I guess it's comforting knowing that it's there when I screw something up.)

I was simply making a joke since both you and kreisler come out so strongly in support of your chosen methodologies. (BTW, he was a Sharpmaker advocate, apparently, that now only endorses the ceramic rods, but not the "system". He's not, to my knowledge, a WE acolyte.)

No criticism implied or intended, Wowbagger. Merely another of my weak attempts at humor.

 

[bgentry]

Then I decided to buy some quality diamond stones from DMT. I'm somewhat of a blade steel snob and most of my knives are super steels, my problem with the water stones was I was having to grind so much to remove enough metal to sharpen them that it was very difficult for me to maintain consistent angles, the diamond stones fixed that problem. With the diamond stones instead of grinding back and fourth for an hour and trying to maintain constant angles the whole time (with water stones), I can use nice slow controlled strokes and remove enough metal to get a burr very quickly. Eureka!

This is very important. Being able to remove steel quickly is one key to getting really sharp edges. If you can remove steel quickly, you don't get as fatigued, and the quality of your angle holding is better. This is why I made Secret #6 of the Seven Secrets of Sharpening "The Coarse Stone". Having a very coarse stone is very, very helpful.

Brian.

 

[Blues]

This is very important. Being able to remove steel quickly is one key to getting really sharp edges. If you can remove steel quickly, you don't get as fatigued, and the quality of your angle holding is better. This is why I made Secret #6 of the Seven Secrets of Sharpening "The Coarse Stone". Having a very coarse stone is very, very helpful.

Brian.

You do realize, don't you, if you keep telling everyone it's no longer going to be a secret!

 

[bflying]

I'm still a big fan of the KME System over my EdgePro. While I am somewhat ambidextrous, my eye/hand cordination is not what it used to be. So I prefer the clamped blade setup that allows a little more leway in the process. There are some blades (size and/or shape) that don't fit the KME as well, so the EdgePro is next in line for them.

Edit: And my Sharpmaker and/or Strops get used the most for simple touch-ups.

 

[bgentry]

You do realize, don't you, if you keep telling everyone it's no longer going to be a secret!

Ha! I actually laughed when I read this. Thanks.

Brian.

 

[Wowbagger]

(BTW, he was a Sharpmaker advocate, apparently, that now only endorses the ceramic rods,

Ahhh there ! You see . . . he and I have common ground.
Peace and contentment reigns on the land.

 

[Wowbagger]

Having a very coarse stone is very, very helpful.

I would go further : very, very important.
First two things I did when I got my Edge Pro; I ordered the coarsest stone they had in the Shapton Glass (220). It was back ordered and out of stock. So then I ordered and received an after market 120 and made due until the 220 came in. Took months by the way.
PS: I know you meant for hand sharpening but us sharpening jig wimps need coarse too.

 

[Wowbagger]

I'm still a big fan of the KME System over my EdgePro. While I am somewhat ambidextrous, my eye/hand cordination is not what it used to be. So I prefer the clamped blade setup that allows a little more leway in the process. There are some blades (size and/or shape) that don't fit the KME as well, so the EdgePro is next in line for them.

Edit: And my Sharpmaker and/or Strops get used the most for simple touch-ups.

Oh I agree I wish I could clamp all my knives but as you said clamps are problematic.
I just sharpened a Mini Griptillian and it would have been easier / less tedious if I could have clamped it. I had to be sure to hold the flat area of the blade near the spine down on the deck of the Edge Pro where as it wanted to flop down on the bevel. With that knife it is kind of a toss up which to use. I think if I had used the bevel I would have had to remove the thumb stud. Six of one.

 

[Wowbagger]

I would like to hear how stone wear and different stone thicknesses and strop thicknesses is compensated for in the system.
Every time I ask that all I hear are crickets.

Well I got tired of the noise of all the crickets so I went to the Wicked Edge web site.
It's worse than I suspected. That is . . . it is more insulting to one's sensibilities.
The good news is they finally seem to have realized the over sight and made a way to adjust / compensate for the variation in all the stones.
Here is the bad news (there is a list) :

• The device for accomplishing the operation is out of stock.
• There are no reviews for the product.
• The product does not come with their most expensive or one of the most expensive sharpeners which is . . . drum roll please . . . $1200.00 (!).
• The optional angle compensator is an additional cost of $45 (the compensator for the Edge Pro is $3.95, is available at hundreds of thousands of sources known as a "5/16" Drill Stop Collar" and comes with a number of their sharpeners all under $400).

Do you see what I am saying here ? It is hard to take Wicked Edge seriously. At least from an engineering and practical stand point.