Sharpening tips

[tps3443]

How do you guys and gals normally sharpen tips? Do you do it last? Or first? It seems as if it is a whole different sharpening skill I think, I’ve finally gotten close to a factory tip, I think anyways. How’s this look? I’ve noticed several times it doesn’t get very pointy feeling.

But after working on this one a while, I must say it is extremely pointy.

It is so easy to mess up the tip, even if the rest of the blade is scalpel sharp.

[ZrowsN1s]

Depends on what you are using to sharpen.

[JD Spydo]

I'm glad you brought up the subject of "Sharpening blade tips". Because with myself being a devout Hawkbill fan I sometimes find that getting the tip factory sharp can be a huge challenge and a job that can be demanding even for the most experienced guy with good sharpening skills. I'm thinking that some type of guided system is probably your best bet IMO..

Tips on Hawkbills, Reverse S blades and Recurves are a very difficult item to restore to factory conditions. I always spend quality time on my Hawkbill tips in particular. I had a thread on this subject I think about 4 years ago but got only one or two hits on it :confused: But with the upsurge of Hawkbill, Reverse S and Recurve fans it's something we do need to talk about. Because to me the 204 Sharpmaker lacks in that area IMO.

I'm hoping that this new upcoming GAUNTLET system will remedy that challenge of tip sharpening. But I've never got to see one or test drive one yet so it remains to be seen. Thanks for bringing this subject up :)

[Ookami]

If you want to sharpen hawkbills, the Spyderco Pro-Files are pretty good for this. If you struggle with free-hand sharpening, you can clamp the knife to a workbench so that the part of the blade you want to sharpen slightly protrudes over the edge of the bench. Then use the Pro-File like an actual file; the magic marker trick can help you with finding and maintaining an appropriate angle.


Ookami

[Bloke]

How do you guys and gals normally sharpen tips? Do you do it last? Or first?

Good question! :)

I just sharpen heel to tip and tip to heel in one fluid motion when I’m finishing a bevel. I think the “trick” may be to not let the stone roll or override the tip and I could probably show you better than I can explain.

I think a knife used to dress game or clean fish can be razor sharp but if the tip isn’t, the thing is useless so I take particular care to ensure the first 1/2” of the blade is as sharp or sharper than the rest of the blade.

This is the tip of an S30V Military and as a matter of fact I used it to run along side a splinter and cut it out of my foot on Sunday. My Sprig’s tip was even sharper but I snapped off about 0.010” slamming it into a chopping board I think. :rolleyes:

[JD Spydo]

If you want to sharpen hawkbills, the Spyderco Pro-Files are pretty good for this. If you struggle with free-hand sharpening, you can clamp the knife to a workbench so that the part of the blade you want to sharpen slightly protrudes over the edge of the bench. Then use the Pro-File like an actual file; the magic marker trick can help you with finding and maintaining an appropriate angle.


Ookami

Brother I don't have a problem sharpening the overall edge of a Hawkbill>> it's the tip of the blade that I've had some problems with in the past. But those Recurve, Reverse S and Hawkbills all are more difficult to get the tips sharpened.

And I agree with you 1000% that the 701 Profiles are the ticket to manually sharpen most Hawkbill blades as well as any other blade with curve in it. Haven't seen you on the forum for a while good to see you back posting again.

[awa54]

Another thing to do for tips is to finish with a few light strokes on the spine of the blade tip, this will bring the point up to full sharpness. You don't want to remove much stock, just enough to clean off any burr and create an apex at the exact tip

[Ookami]

Well, it's pretty hard to keep that point factory fresh on a hawkbill. It is the most stressed part of the edge and tends to wear more than the rest of the blade.
Thus, you'd have to either grind down the rest of the edge to keep up with the receeding point or you grind down the back of the blade to establish a fresh point. The latter is often done on Japanese kiridashi knives as they tend to have (and due to the blade design regain with every sharpening) a very delicate tip that might break off during, say, woodcarving.


Ookami
PS: Yeah, I had a bit of a break. But the collaboration for the HatchetHawk kinda brought me back.

[vivi]

I've never sharpened tips separately from the rest of the blade. I do the entire edge at the same time.

Only exception are my serrated knives. I use the corners of my sharpmaker rods to sharpen the serrations, which is how Spyderco designed it. I avoid dragging the tip off the stones while I hit the full edge. Then I go back over the tip area with a regular bench stone or the flats of the SM rods, so I can get a crisp point and avoid rounding it.

In the case of a knife with a really worn down tip, like my beater Tasman Salt before I gave it some TLC, I might grind down the spine of the knife a bit to make a fresh point. That can be a quick and easy fix if you're not too concerned about maintaining the original profile 100%.

[knivesandbooks]

How do you guys and gals normally sharpen tips? Do you do it last? Or first? It seems as if it is a whole different sharpening skill I think, I’ve finally gotten close to a factory tip, I think anyways. How’s this look? I’ve noticed several times it doesn’t get very pointy feeling.

But after working on this one a while, I must say it is extremely pointy.

It is so easy to mess up the tip, even if the rest of the blade is scalpel sharp.

I've rounded many a tip. I can almost always get them back in the next few sharpenings. They're never too bad.

I agree with Bloke, watch out for the stone rolling over in the tip.

Here's a video from one of the KME guys. He addresses the tip issue when sharpening. This is, of course, relevant to sharpening knives on other systems.
https://youtu.be/wjIrAehBw-k

[tps3443]

How do you guys and gals normally sharpen tips? Do you do it last? Or first?

Good question! :)

I just sharpen heel to tip and tip to heel in one fluid motion when I’m finishing a bevel. I think the “trick” may be to not let the stone roll or override the tip and I could probably show you better than I can explain.

I think a knife used to dress game or clean fish can be razor sharp but if the tip isn’t, the thing is useless so I take particular care to ensure the first 1/2” of the blade is as sharp or sharper than the rest of the blade.

This is the tip of an S30V Military and as a matter of fact I used it to run along side a splinter and cut it out of my foot on Sunday. My Sprig’s tip was even sharper but I snapped off about 0.010” slamming it into a chopping board I think. :rolleyes:

That looks great! This is what I strive for in my edges. I’m so OCD about it lol. I don’t think I could ever free hand, one mistake and I’d be starting all over again. It looks like my edge is getting similar to that one.

^ is that factory?

[tps3443]

I use a Wicked edge for all of my sharpening, and it’s easy to round a tip. Even with a guided system, you can mess a edge up or the tip.

It’s very tricky sharpening and allowing the stones to glide off the edge. But they must go perfectly straight while leaving the tip. Even the slightest rubbing when the stone exits the blade will give you a shorter looking tip.

You can even hear it, and feel it. It is really muscle memory too.

I was mainly curious how a lot of you guys tips looked.

[Bloke]

That looks great! This is what I strive for in my edges. I’m so OCD about it lol. I don’t think I could ever free hand, one mistake and I’d be starting all over again. It looks like my edge is getting similar to that one.

^ is that factory?

Ah, hahaha! We wouldn’t be here if we weren’t OCD. :)

That’s a 28deg, perhaps a little less, bevel I set. Tips can be a little tricky but with practice it all falls into place.

Here’s a little “trick” - When you set up to sharpen and your knife is clamped or set in place ready to grind, grab a lump of plasticine or similar and stick a bamboo skewer or piece of wire in it. Then set it up as a stop/indicator so that you only have about 1/3 of the width of your stone past the tip when the stone touches the wire.

I hope this makes sense and don’t roll the stone or you’ll round the tip irrespective.

[tps3443]

That looks great! This is what I strive for in my edges. I’m so OCD about it lol. I don’t think I could ever free hand, one mistake and I’d be starting all over again. It looks like my edge is getting similar to that one.

^ is that factory?

Ah, hahaha! We wouldn’t be here if we weren’t OCD. :)

That’s a 28deg, perhaps a little less, bevel I set. Tips can be a little tricky but with practice it all falls into place.

Here’s a little “trick” - When you set up to sharpen and your knife is clamped or set in place ready to grind, grab a lump of plasticine or similar and stick a bamboo skewer or piece of wire in it. Then set it up as a stop/indicator so that you only have about 1/3 of the width of your stone past the tip when the stone touches the wire.

I hope this makes sense and don’t roll the stone or you’ll round the tip irrespective.

I just got my Military a few days ago. And I couldn’t resharpen it fast enough lol. It’s amazing how something could feel sharp to an average person. But feel dull to me haha. The edge was pretty good out of the box, but not quite sharp enough, and I too wanted mine at about 28-30 degrees inclusive. But, I actually set my bevel back to around 36-38 inclusive range. I like the look of that very thin bevel on a Spydervo Military. This Military S110V is just hair popping sharp, and at about 38 inclusive I can chop PVC pipe and other things, and it still pops hairs. It is a very durable edge, after a few sharpens I can move to 14 DPS without chipping.

I’m gonna try that technique you mentioned with sharpening the tip. I think I have gotten it close to the look of yours. But it’s not quite as pretty yet.

[Tarman The Champ]

Depends on what you are using to sharpen.

Also the knife tips durability is dependent on the steel your knife is made out of. My stainless steel AUS -A10 cold steel spartan pocket knife will stay razor sharp for about a weeks time of heavy use. Mainly chopping wood & cutting card board. Compared to my high carbon, powdered steel Benchmade Osborne that I swear will stay razor sharp for a good couple months!! But the unfortunate part about the Benchmade is that i have to either send it in or get It professionally sharpened because of how hard the steel is. It's so hard that it takes a skilled hand to produce a burr when sharpening it!! On of the best knife makers/sharpeners I know who has 40 years experience said it was a ***** to get razor sharp. That being Lyle Brunckhorst! Who was able to produce a burr AND get my benchmade razor sharp. BTW carrying 3 pocket knives as EDC should be practiced by everyone! Totally legit & very useful! Love it!

[Bloke]

I’m gonna try that technique you mentioned with sharpening the tip. I think I have gotten it close to the look of yours. But it’s not quite as pretty yet.

I’m sure you’ll get there ... perseverance, brother, perseverance.

[bdblue]

I use a guided system and sharpen the entire edge the same way. Some systems such as the sharpmaker require you to be careful that you don't hit the tip wrong and wear it excessively. I think a guided system will do fine on the tip. But it isn't how you sharpen the tip that is the problem, it is that the tip can wear a lot faster than the rest of the knife depending on how you use it. 5 years ago my wife and I moved to a new house and I used my Manix 2 for cutting boxes open. I noticed that this wear of cutting open boxes rounded the tip. I could sharpen the edge and this would sharpen the tip somewhat as well, but it would not restore the tip to its original keen point. In order to restore the tip you have to take a lot of material off near the tip to get down to the right shape. I don't do this but I am careful with my knives that have a keen tip to not put more wear on the tip than necessary.

[Evil D]

Possibly the most important thing I've learned is contrary to what I've always been told about sharpening, and that's to avoid making a burr, or at least make as little burr as possible. This seems especially important with high carbide steels as those carbides tend to rip out depending on how you're sharpening and some steels seem borderline brittle when it comes to burrs and when you think you're removing them or bending them straight you're actually just breaking them off, and then you move on to the next grit up and continue the same burr creating/breaking process only to end up with a pretty polished bevel that is either not very sharp or goes dull the first time you cut something because the apex is a mess. So, possibly the best sharpening advice I can give is, instead of relying on the formation of a burr to tell you you've reached the apex, use a bright light source and look for the edge to reflect light. Make progressively shorter/lighter/cross hatching edge leading passes alternating sides and try to leave the edge as crisp as you can before moving on to the next grit. A very slight micro bevel between grits can also help here.

[Sharp Guy]

I bought a guided system a year ago and I've been struggling to figure out how to keep/get the tips pointy. The tips on some knives would turn out ok but others not so much. I usually use a back and forth (sawing) grinding motion to speed up the reprofiling process. I also use heel to tip/tip to heel motion too. I've finally realized that it was back and forth motion that was preventing me from getting pointy tips. I still use the back and forth motion when removing stock but when I get to the tip I only use a forward (into the edge). This work great for me and the tips on the knives I've reprofiled in the last few weeks look much better.

[vivi]

Possibly the most important thing I've learned is contrary to what I've always been told about sharpening, and that's to avoid making a burr, or at least make as little burr as possible. This seems especially important with high carbide steels as those carbides tend to rip out depending on how you're sharpening and some steels seem borderline brittle when it comes to burrs and when you think you're removing them or bending them straight you're actually just breaking them off, and then you move on to the next grit up and continue the same burr creating/breaking process only to end up with a pretty polished bevel that is either not very sharp or goes dull the first time you cut something because the apex is a mess. So, possibly the best sharpening advice I can give is, instead of relying on the formation of a burr to tell you you've reached the apex, use a bright light source and look for the edge to reflect light. Make progressively shorter/lighter/cross hatching edge leading passes alternating sides and try to leave the edge as crisp as you can before moving on to the next grit. A very slight micro bevel between grits can also help here.

Couldn't agree more. Any time you intentionally raise a burr, you're wasting steel IMO. It takes more strokes to raise one and remove it than it does to simply get the edge sharp.

If your knife doesn't cleanly slice paper, it's not time to progress to the next grit. Regardless of what grit you're currently at.

Lastly, like you mentioned, light strokes are key. If you can't do your finishing strokes on the sharpmaker without using your off hand to hold the base and steady it, you're using too much pressure.