Very OT ….Knife steels ..

[giordana93]

....and then literally today I was glad to have that old Wusthof steel.
my wife (French Canadian) has a family recipe for the best apple pie I've ever had. Sour cream for the apple mixture and a brown sugar/butter crumble on top. Amazing. Anyway, I peeled the apples for her using the paring knife which does NOT get heavy sharpening; it's a "sharp enough" knife that gets a little abused + handled by less careful folks so I keep more of a cleaver edge than something I impress my friends with by shaving my arm hairs. Anyway, some good careful strokes on the steel brought it in line for peeling those apples and I was glad for the slightly more aggressive ridges. Although, as I mentioned, at about 25 years old, it is getting pretty polished from use, so that is still my recommendation. Natural patina, not belt sander, and get a leather strop for the Japanese stuff. I'm going to have to add that to the arsenal. I know my dad used an old belt. Great discussion, as usual.

an afterthought: the cleaver vs razor edge angle raises the question about steeling technique. It is still super important to maintain a fixed angle between knife and steel. When I was first learning to use it, I would actually anchor the end of the steel on cutting board so it would not move and I could maintain a firm wrist/honing angle. People who imitate the TV chef whipping a steel around almost never have developed a feel for that angle. It matters, just as when using stones.

[TMB]

My dad grew up on a farm in Ireland. He milked cattle by hand.

He had the wrists of a superman. He pulled that steel out before he used a knife, even cut down it was about 18” long, and honestly you’d get dizzy watching him.

Never missed a stroke.

[COVRTDESIGN]

I am really glad you posted this. I think that this may be the gem here . Most of my knives are either German or swedish and it never occurred to me that that would be the difference. I have couple of Japanese knives and maybe my inner voice just knew I should not be going near a honing rod with them - so I haven’t.

Most of my shop, and knife sharpening is done on diamond stones. I have one ceramic waterstone - 15,000 grit - which is mostly for my carving tools but I do haul it out from time to time to touch up a kitchen knife.

I have pieces of leather around here then any normal person would - I was given a lerge piece of leather years ago and make a new strop whenever the mood hits me - but I probably still have enough to pass down to my kids.

I have, from to time, just used the burnishing rod I have in my shop for touching up my cabinet scrapers and it is certainly better than the “knife steel” …

There is a post further down the page suggesting just taking the belt sander to the steel - which I guess was really what I was hoping to see because it had never crossed my mind. So, I may take the steel down to the belt sander and if I F it up, I’ll toss it out and say I didn’t really lose anything.

You can use the steel to bring the edge back over on a japanese knife, just remember to vary your degree when using it. I have all Japanese knives and sharpen them at 11*, with a few speciality knives changing a bit.

[COVRTDESIGN]

In my exec chef days I always had some cheaper japanese stones soaking in water in my office. They are roughly a 400 grit then the 1000 grit, then leather strop to polish as time is a premium in a professional kitchen and couldn't spend more than 10 minutes to really sharpen the knives that I need for the days work, but they were still incredibly sharp. I still use these to this day and don't spend more than 30 minutes to sharpen the go to knives at home.

I would say that I wasn't happy with my results and techniques on stones for a good 2-3 years. I sharpen most of my Japanese knives at 11* and really maintaining that shallow angle at first was hard, now it is a second feeling.

[steve garro]

I tell you what - I can get a knife DAMN sharp.
Fishermen in Mexico hand me theirs and say "I can do it, but not like he does."

Just grew up doing it, I can skin or fillet damn near anything.
I have down to 8000 grit & steels but most things don't need near that fine of an edge and yes, I can matchstick veggies with the same knife or cut a hanging sheet of paper in 1/2.
Most important thing IMO is maintaining the edge geometry and not just folding the edge over & over itself.
Learned a lot fro old Creighton Natchigall about "sharpness", he had 10 edge patents while he worked at Bosch


- Garro.

75418151_2842755529075982_3702902270380212224_n.jpg

[Alistair]

Most of my shop, and knife sharpening is done on diamond stones. I have one ceramic waterstone - 15,000 grit - which is mostly for my carving tools but I do haul it out from time to time to touch up a kitchen knife.

Sounds like you're a woodworker? Cool, I know that people in that world can easily be just as, or more, fanatical about how they go about keeping tools sharp compared to other blade related professions. Woodworkers, chefs, barbers, and machinists can all realte and appreciate to some degree to how being able to maintain their tools makes them more effective at their job and, I would argue, makes their job more enjoyable.

You mention diamond stones, which are what I first used when I got into sharpening. I was using a DMT product that has an interrupted surface that allows for capture of swarf. They worked well for me, in the sense that removed metal very effectively, but I found it difficult to get the feedback I was looking for that told me what was going on where the stone met the knife edge.

I wasn't getting the results I was hoping for so I started looking around and I heard good things on knife sharpening forums and YouTube videos about Naniwa Chosera (I think they're called the Naniwa Professional series now) stones so I tried those and have had good results. It's a subtle thing but I found that with the Chosera's I could tell via feel when I had my sharpening angle correct. When the primary bevel is in contact with the stone there is a smoothness that I can feel, up through the knife into my hands (it took me a couple of years to really develop this feel, but maybe I'm a slow learner). I couildn't get that with the diamond stones but maybe that's just me, or maybe my technique wasn't right for that type of stone. I really don't know.

The DMT bench stones are the kind where the diamond is bonded to metal plate substrate by being part of a layer of electroplating. I know that there are other styles of diamond whetsone, for example where the diamond is bound in some kind of resin, which is applied to a flat plate, but I have yet to try those. Perhaps that would give me the feel and feedback that I'm looking for but I've been pretty happy with the more conventional water stones that I ended up using so I'll probably stick with those, at least until they need replacing.

It's a fun hobby, and I try to keep it at that but I could easily see myself getting sucked into it more deeply. Synthetic vs natural, soaking vs splash and go, resin bonded diamond vs vitrified diamond and so on and so forth. There's a lot to know, but I leave it to the experts.

Alistair

[TMB]

Yes, woodworker.

I have some of those “grid surface” DMT stones. I use them for garden tools, rough sharpening, etc. they are sort an odd product but the small pocket size ones are great for sharpening out of the shop. they do have their place, I am just not 100% sure what it is.

I use the big DMT bench stones. I used waterstones once upon a time but got sick of the mess. Got rid of them. I have ceramic stomes ( 800 and 8000) for carving tools , can then follow up with the superfine waterstone if need be but honesty so long as I keep the blades sharp and well stropped I rarely have to go a polishing stone.

For chisels, plane irons or scrapers - i find a really quick 30 seconds on a fine or superfine diamond stone is all I need. I am not one of the legion of woodworkers who obsess over running through 19 different grades of waterstones before you can put a plane iron back in the plane …I would rather use the plane.

I think, may be wrong here, but I think the quality of the plane irons I use makes ahuge difference too. For the planes I have made myself I use Hock irons. For planes I have bought - I really prefer the german style planes made by Emmerich. They are a wood bodied plane and the iron is what you awould expect from a german plane.

I have never been a big fan of the English / US style of planes, the Record/Stanley/Bedford planes. If I use them at all, I replace the irons with Hock irons.

And I think Garro is right - whether a filet knife, a kitchen knife or a bench chisel - i think the medium is less important than absolute consistency and nothing beats muscle memory for that.

[dgaddis]

do you always use compound/paste or dry?

I have the strop loaded up with the green compound that came with it (basically a green bar of clay - heated the leather with a hair dryer and then rubbed the clay onto it). I've had it a few years and only added more compound once I think.

I'm curious: What's your full sharpening drill, for a not-sharp, lightly dinged-up edge? What stones/grits do you use and typically finish with?

Based on my strop-newbie internet searching I'm guessing the knives y'all strop have been on stones well into the polish grit stage (above the equivalent of 4000 in Japanese waterstones). Is that about right?

What suppliers do you use for your strop compounds, and what grits?

This was educational for me: https://sharpyknives.com/what-does-s...ng-a-knife-do/

As others have mentioned this is a huge rabbit hole you can go down. I went part of the way down the rabbit hole and ultimately decided to go the fast and simple and potentially brutal way with a powered sharpening device (which I'll get to in a bit). The advantages are I can sharpen ALL my knives in less than an hour, and get them very sharp, and the convex edge is very durable for my use. The disadvantages are that you can totally ruin a blade in an instant if you don't know what you're doing (there are easy ways to mitigate that risk, which I'll get into below) and I'm sure a skilled sharpener could get a finer and sharper edge using stones. But I decided I just don't need my knives quite that sharp, and I don't want to spend that kind of time sharpening, and, I'm fairly certainly those even-sharper edges with some used on them, say a few months after sharpening, won't be noticeably better that my quickly done convex edge. I could be wrong about that though.

I have one of these with this attachment. The "elite" version of the sharpener didn't exist when I bought mine, not sure exactly how much it differs from my set up, but at a glance they're very similar. I feel like this set up allows me to get a great very sharp working edge with very minimal time invested. Other methods can get a sharper edge, other methods are faster, but this one strikes the right balance for me.

Any powered sharpener can ruin a blade if you're not careful. The two things to look out for - heat build up, and aggressive grits that QUICKLY remove material - and I mean F***ING QUICKLY. Both of those are very easily avoided if you're not stupid. I keep a big glass of water handy to dunk the blades in to avoid heat. I don't ever let the blade get hot (you can mess up the temper at lower temps that most people think....your home oven can do it), as soon as the blade feels warm at all I give it a dunk (which isn't always even necessary FWIW). To avoid removing too much material too quickly I pretty much only use the two finest belts on my knives. Mine stay reasonably sharp, so there's never big chips and chunks missing from the edge. I sharpen all my kitchen knives around the first of the year, but the 'sharpening' is really just a tune up. Since I strop the knives regularly throughout the year none of them get dull, they just get less sharp. Now when I sharpen other people's knives, like my moms or MIL, then I'm starting with a more aggressive belt because they do zero maintenance on their knives so they'd super dull by the time they get to me.

I've got a video...I'll see if I can find it and get it uploaded...

[dgaddis]

Here's the video, it finally finished uploading. This is no downward pressure on the blade other than the weight of the steel itself.

https://i.imgur.com/ClX2ZY8.mp4

[rec head]

I have one of those electric sharpeners too. It works great but I brought it to work to keep the knives there sharp because they get a lot of abuse. At home its crock sticks. I long ago decided sharpening wasn't a rabbit hole I wanted to go down and if a blade is sharp enough to shave my arm then it is good enough to cut vegetables.

Dustin, that is a good video but I'd never eat if I sliced veggies that slow.

[steve garro]

they get a lot of abuse.

Fillet knives are intended for abuse - you often have to give them a few licks between fish and sometime every fish if you are doing things like cleaning a pile of fine-scale trigger fish for ceviche and if you are going stright through rims then you can guess what that does to a blade - as such, expensive fillet knives are somewhat silly as they are disposable and not only that but can definitely get dropped in sand or even better overboard and off they go.
I buy Edge-World fillet knives, good high carbon steel at a good price and you can get them crazy sharp and it you send them in the drink or give them away when they get to be an odd shape you are not out a ton of $.
I like the 10" & the 8" fillet and you need the covers as they are crazy sharp.

https://www.meltontackle.com/edge-wo...et-knives.html

To the OP - do I have a steel?
Yes, a 12" Gerber I bought at Goodwill for $2 - I use it at home, it rusts near the sea
- Garro.