What's difficult about sharpening serrations?

V

Vivi

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Dec 4, 2005
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I hear time and time again on here about how serrated edges are difficult to sharpen and I just don't get it. Unless you don't have the proper tools I can't see any difficulty in it at all.

All I do is setup a single sharpmaker rod with the corner side up, tilt the knife to match the angle of the serrations (they usually don't follow the curve of the blade), then start at the ricasso and pull the knife towards me as I run it down the stone. I do this a few times, then using extremely light pressure and a very acute angle I hit the back side, then move on to the next stone. Finish with an UF rod and the corner of my strop and the SE blade will easily whittle hair. Touch ups take me all of a minute.

Where's the difficulty?
 
Well then you have a lot more skill than I do.

With plain edge knives, I can rest the blade on a flat stone, begin my stroke, then lift the spine until I feel some resistance which tells me that I am at the correct angle. This makes it very easy. I simply can't do the same thing with SEs.
 
THG, when I sharpen my serrated blades to find the right angle I'll gently rock the blade back and forth until I feel the stone hit the flat of the bevel. With my spydercos they usually line up nicely with the 15 degree slot. I might make a video tutorial because some of the things I'm talking about are difficult to word effectively.
 
probably lack of tools as much as anything. I have a couple SM rods...

but no serrated edges :D
 
The bevel of Spyderco Serrations are consistantly more surface area than the plain edge bevels. It should be easier to "find" the factory bevel even if you are not using the Sharpmaker.
 
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