Para 3 S110V shaving sharp

[Marko1478]

Hi,
I have a Para 3 with S110V steel and I also bought the tri-angle sharpmaker so I have the coarse rods and the finer rods. I sharpened one of my beat up kitchen knives to a shaving sharp edge. It just glides through all the hair.
But the Para 3 on the other hand.. I am able to shave a bit of hair if I put some pressure on the blade and I can also cut paper relatively easy, but it's nowhere near the kitchen knife. I used a sharpie and I got all of it off of the bevel but still it isn't as sharp as I would like.
What should I do? I used the 30 degree setting first and then moved to the 40 degree setting.

[the Southerner]

Don't bother with the sharpie, too much work.
How much have you used your tri-angle rods? When was the last time you washed them? You have to clean them because the steel you're cutting off the blade inevitably gets lodged/clogged into the actual abrasive, and then the stones don't cut the steel nearly as well. It can get to the point where you can't even sharpen the knife.
Also, do you sharpen dry? The ceramics really do need mineral oil. If you really have no idea, I'd suggest lapping the ceramics. Get another medium ceramic or cheapo fine diamond plate and basically grind one against each other to cut off the surface of the tri-angle rods. It's a failsafe way of making sure the tri-angle will cut the steel because now you have truly fresh ceramic exposed.
Don't over think your angle consistency, it's probably the stone being clogged/worn. You need it to cut as well as possible for S110V because of how extremely hard S110V is, it's obviously far far beyond a normal kitchen knife.

[araneae]

Don't bother with the sharpie, too much work.
How much have you used your tri-angle rods? When was the last time you washed them? You have to clean them because the steel you're cutting off the blade inevitably gets lodged/clogged into the actual abrasive, and then the stones don't cut the steel nearly as well. It can get to the point where you can't even sharpen the knife.
Also, do you sharpen dry? The ceramics really do need mineral oil. If you really have no idea, I'd suggest lapping the ceramics. Get another medium ceramic or cheapo fine diamond plate and basically grind one against each other to cut off the surface of the tri-angle rods. It's a failsafe way of making sure the tri-angle will cut the steel because now you have truly fresh ceramic exposed.
Don't over think your angle consistency, it's probably the stone being clogged/worn. You need it to cut as well as possible for S110V because of how extremely hard S110V is, it's obviously far far beyond a normal kitchen knife.

I have never oiled a ceramic, pretty sure I've never heard of that before despite my years here. Use em, clean em no problem.

To the OP, its hard to know exactly where your edge was to start. I can almost guarantee your kitchen knife was way softer than a 110V P3 so you should expect more work to get that fine edge. If you had a rough edge, you would want to follow standard instructions on the user video working through grits and angles. A touch up might just need white stones on 40 degrees.

[Marko1478]

The rods are new, just a couple kitchen knives and a kershaw knife have went through them. I wash the rods after every use. I rubbed the rods against each other for a while but maybe that was not enough. The P3 was cutting paper roughly before I started. Now it slices paper quite easily but shaving requires force. I was sharpening the knife for a long time but maybe that wasn’t still enough. Which angle would be better, 30 or 40?

[araneae]

You need to use a good scouring cleanser to clean them to remove metal buildup. There is no need to lap new rods or even well used ones IMO. Have you watched the video? If not start there.

[Marko1478]

Yes I did watch the video. I’ll just have to try harder and longer I suppose.

[araneae]

Yes I did watch the video. I’ll just have to try harder and longer I suppose.

It's a lot about technique, once you have it down, its just about the easiest sharpener there is. Don't lose hope.

[the Southerner]

I have never oiled a ceramic, pretty sure I've never heard of that before despite my years here. Use em, clean em no problem.

I'm not surprised, this is a very tight echochamber.
Just like with a regular Norton stone, the oil helps the ceramic cut, lowers the rate of clogging, and accordingly prevents burnishing/weakening of the edge caused by steel on steel grinding and eventual burr formation because as the ceramic readily clogs up, the natural reaction is to apply more pressure. Even with diamond stones, you should always use a lubricant to help flush the abrasive.

[vivi]

I'd have to guess it comes down to angle consistency. When you sharpen a blade with such high wear resistance, it takes many more strokes than a typical kitchen knife. If it takes, say, 3x the number of strokes, then that can mean holding a consistent angle over 60 strokes compared to 20. That is where most the difficulty in getting steels like S110V razor sharp comes from.

Another important thing to do is gradually use less pressure as you finish up the edge. I've mentioned this elsewhere but your finishing strokes should be so light that an unsupported sharpmaker won't move around at all (No clamps, no holding it down with your off hand like you would during the start up).

Either 30 degrees or 40 degrees will work fine. 30 degrees will take longer to set the angle but cut better, 40 degrees will sharpen up quicker but cut a touch worse. Neither angle should give you durability issues.

Don't bother with the sharpie, too much work.
How much have you used your tri-angle rods? When was the last time you washed them? You have to clean them because the steel you're cutting off the blade inevitably gets lodged/clogged into the actual abrasive, and then the stones don't cut the steel nearly as well. It can get to the point where you can't even sharpen the knife.
Also, do you sharpen dry? The ceramics really do need mineral oil. If you really have no idea, I'd suggest lapping the ceramics. Get another medium ceramic or cheapo fine diamond plate and basically grind one against each other to cut off the surface of the tri-angle rods. It's a failsafe way of making sure the tri-angle will cut the steel because now you have truly fresh ceramic exposed.
Don't over think your angle consistency, it's probably the stone being clogged/worn. You need it to cut as well as possible for S110V because of how extremely hard S110V is, it's obviously far far beyond a normal kitchen knife.

OP, don't listen to this post. Spyderco sharpening products NEVER require lapping, and they NEVER require an oil based lubricant. Lapping might even damage your stones, and oil is plain messy.

The sharpie trick takes all of five seconds and is highly informative. You'll spend five minutes just cleaning up oil.

[vivi]

I have never oiled a ceramic, pretty sure I've never heard of that before despite my years here. Use em, clean em no problem.

I'm not surprised, this is a very tight echochamber.
Just like with a regular Norton stone, the oil helps the ceramic cut, lowers the rate of clogging, and accordingly prevents burnishing/weakening of the edge caused by steel on steel grinding and eventual burr formation because as the ceramic readily clogs up, the natural reaction is to apply more pressure. Even with diamond stones, you should always use a lubricant to help flush the abrasive.

More pressure is NEVER the answer when sharpening.

Lubricants are not required with Spyderco ceramic sharpeners. If you're doing a lot of knives at once you can wipe the rods down with a wet rag every so often to extend the time you can use them between cleanings. Same with diamond bench stones and rods. But neither require lubrication, and neither will cut a better edge with lubrication. I've tried both methods multiple times over the past fifteen years, they work different than old arkansas stones.

[Evil D]

1) Slow down. Nobody wants to hear this but slow and steady wins the race. You can't force a knife sharp.

2) Use light pressure. Again, you can't force a knife sharp. Let the grit of the stone do the work. Increasing pressure will only fracture out the edge and cause loads of problems.

3) Accept the fact that it's going to take a lot more passes than your kitchen knife did. It's a very hard, very high wear resistant steel. It is essentially designed to resist the very act of sharpening.

4) Don't be in a rush to switch from the brown rods to the white. If the edge isn't sharp enough to pluck hair off your arm from the brown rods, the white rods aren't going to magically make the edge sharper. They will refine what the brown rods do but since they cut even slower than the brown, if you're not sharp coming from the brown then you're moving up too soon. If you know anything about polishing metal, this is the same concept. You can't just move to a finer grit sandpaper and expect to get a mirror finish if you haven't removed the deep scratches from the heavier grit sandpaper. It's all about grit progression.

5) Having a cheap 10x loupe so you can look at the edge in detail is helpful.

6) Personally I avoid burrs like the plague but you'll get some varying opinions on that and it's a can of worms I'd rather not open.

[atv223]

Don't bother with the sharpie, too much work.
How much have you used your tri-angle rods? When was the last time you washed them? You have to clean them because the steel you're cutting off the blade inevitably gets lodged/clogged into the actual abrasive, and then the stones don't cut the steel nearly as well. It can get to the point where you can't even sharpen the knife.
Also, do you sharpen dry? The ceramics really do need mineral oil. If you really have no idea, I'd suggest lapping the ceramics. Get another medium ceramic or cheapo fine diamond plate and basically grind one against each other to cut off the surface of the tri-angle rods. It's a failsafe way of making sure the tri-angle will cut the steel because now you have truly fresh ceramic exposed.
Don't over think your angle consistency, it's probably the stone being clogged/worn. You need it to cut as well as possible for S110V because of how extremely hard S110V is, it's obviously far far beyond a normal kitchen knife.

No offense, but you're relatively new on this forum and keep telling people to lap ceramics and use oil on them. That's completely counter to anything I've ever read and even Sal commented on an earlier post you made about lapping the Sharpmaker ceramics. It's great you want to help, but it really seems like to you are pushing some "fake news" here.

[vivi]

1) Slow down. Nobody wants to hear this but slow and steady wins the race. You can't force a knife sharp.

2) Use light pressure. Again, you can't force a knife sharp. Let the grit of the stone do the work. Increasing pressure will only fracture out the edge and cause loads of problems.

3) Accept the fact that it's going to take a lot more passes than your kitchen knife did. It's a very hard, very high wear resistant steel. It is essentially designed to resist the very act of sharpening.

4) Don't be in a rush to switch from the brown rods to the white. If the edge isn't sharp enough to pluck hair off your arm from the brown rods, the white rods aren't going to magically make the edge sharper. They will refine what the brown rods do but since they cut even slower than the brown, if you're not sharp coming from the brown then you're moving up too soon. If you know anything about polishing metal, this is the same concept. You can't just move to a finer grit sandpaper and expect to get a mirror finish if you haven't removed the deep scratches from the heavier grit sandpaper. It's all about grit progression.

5) Having a cheap 10x loupe so you can look at the edge in detail is helpful.

6) Personally I avoid burrs like the plague but you'll get some varying opinions on that and it's a can of worms I'd rather not open.

I agree with all of the above.

On your last point, I feel raising a burr after setting the initial bevel is a waste of time and steel. Raise one setting a new bevel to be sure you've formed a clean apex on both sides, but after that there's no reason to form one IMO. If you take a knife with a clean, established bevel, and dull it some, simply touch it up with alternating strokes and grind both sides evenly. It will get sharp without raising a noticeably burr.

Don't bother with the sharpie, too much work.
How much have you used your tri-angle rods? When was the last time you washed them? You have to clean them because the steel you're cutting off the blade inevitably gets lodged/clogged into the actual abrasive, and then the stones don't cut the steel nearly as well. It can get to the point where you can't even sharpen the knife.
Also, do you sharpen dry? The ceramics really do need mineral oil. If you really have no idea, I'd suggest lapping the ceramics. Get another medium ceramic or cheapo fine diamond plate and basically grind one against each other to cut off the surface of the tri-angle rods. It's a failsafe way of making sure the tri-angle will cut the steel because now you have truly fresh ceramic exposed.
Don't over think your angle consistency, it's probably the stone being clogged/worn. You need it to cut as well as possible for S110V because of how extremely hard S110V is, it's obviously far far beyond a normal kitchen knife.

No offense, but you're relatively new on this forum and keep telling people to lap ceramics and use oil on them. That's completely counter to anything I've ever read and even Sal commented on an earlier post you made about lapping the Sharpmaker ceramics. It's great you want to help, but it really seems like to you are pushing some "fake news" here.

Yep, this is a case of straight up bad information. Anyone reading this thread, ignore sharpening advice from the southerner. If we're an "echo chamber" for promoting common sense sharpening techniques accepted by millions of enthusiasts, so be it.

[Evil D]

On your last point, I feel raising a burr after setting the initial bevel is a waste of time and steel. Raise one setting a new bevel to be sure you've formed a clean apex on both sides, but after that there's no reason to form one IMO. If you take a knife with a clean, established bevel, and dull it some, simply touch it up with alternating strokes and grind both sides evenly. It will get sharp without raising a noticeably burr.

It's an old technique used a lot on older carbon steels that are far more forgiving and less likely to chip. When you create a burr on a high carbide steel you have to deal with removing it properly, which means cutting it off at a higher angle. Most people assume the next grit stone will do the job but it usually just breaks off and leaves you with a nasty jagged apex. Then if you repeatedly make a burr each time you end up on high grit stones that don't cut enough to leave you with a clean apex. Then you use the knife and the edge is still a jagged mess so it continues to fracture out in use and the owner comes here to complain about how Spyderco has heat treat issues and their steel is prone to chipping.

Wash/rinse/repeat.

[kwakster]

Try using only diamond or CBN when sharpening & polishing S110V steel.
Look at the pic below and you'll see why.

[ZrowsN1s]

I'll "echo" what Evil D said. Patients. It took me three tries to get S110V right the first time because I was trying to rush things. Slow and steady wins the race. And once you get it shaving sharp, I recommend touching up the blade on the white stones often. Don't let it get too dull if you can avoid it.

[Marko1478]

I will try to take my time next week and go slow and steady without rushing things. What seems to be the best pressure when sharpening? Should I just let the blade sit on rods and then swipe or how much should I put pressure at the beginning? Last time I did do the final strokes with minimal pressure so that I was just honing the final edge.

[dj moonbat]

Here's what happens: you put Sharpie on, and start putting the 30° back bevel on there. A long time later, all the Sharpie is gone, so you move on to the 40° setting. But the reason the Sharpie's gone is that your angle discipline was imperfect enough for you to wipe that stuff off without actually abrading the metal down to a zero apex at 30°.

I've found that once you've got the Sharpie off on 30, you should reapply and make sure. Also, IMHO, trying to put a 30° back bevel on S110V with the brown rods of a Sharpmaker is a Sisyphean labor, to be avoided at all costs.

[Bloke]

Everything Vivi and D said! :)

I'd just like to add that if you use Windex applied with a 1/2" artists brush it washes away swarf as you go. It does get a little mess but at least it all rinses off with water when your done. :rolleyes:

[the Southerner]

You'll spend five minutes just cleaning up oil.

>"lapping might damage your stones"

Pretty much confirmed that you're one of the knife-selfie types.