It's Hawkbill Time: Spyderco Units Only Please

[Wartstein]

Absolutely JD. Carrying both is the way to go. I think serrated is more useful for a wider variety of cutting tasks and retains that usefulness longer in between sharpenings. My PE preference is as you say, specific to my EDC needs.

I love that razor blade sharpness and clean push cuts, and like you and I and others have been saying on this forum for years serrated CAN get that sharp, but you need to maintain it often to keep it that sharp. And once it drops below that level it tends to rip and tear certain material (which IS still cutting, just not that hair splitting smoothness).

I will also say I find it easier to maintain a razor edge on PE than SE. The sharpmaker can bridge that gap, but I can strop a PE back to shaving easier than I can get a SE blade back to razor sharp with the sharpmaker.

I have never stropped an SE blade myself, but it can be done obviously: Vivi describes it in his thread (see quoted text below) and shows it in the vid that is linked in the first post (viewtopic.php?t=84544). No idea how well that works though.

QUOTE: "14. Serrated edges can be stropped. I use a typical strop, thin hard leather glued to a wooden block. To strop my SE knives, I liberally rub green buffing compound on the corner of my strop, then use that corner like a sharpmaker rod, except I use edge trailing strokes. I have heard of others using a leather boot lace under tension to strop SE. The serrated H1 knife I carry responds really well to a strop, so does the 420HC on my serrated Leatherman blades."

[ZrowsN1s]

Absolutely JD. Carrying both is the way to go. I think serrated is more useful for a wider variety of cutting tasks and retains that usefulness longer in between sharpenings. My PE preference is as you say, specific to my EDC needs.

I love that razor blade sharpness and clean push cuts, and like you and I and others have been saying on this forum for years serrated CAN get that sharp, but you need to maintain it often to keep it that sharp. And once it drops below that level it tends to rip and tear certain material (which IS still cutting, just not that hair splitting smoothness).

I will also say I find it easier to maintain a razor edge on PE than SE. The sharpmaker can bridge that gap, but I can strop a PE back to shaving easier than I can get a SE blade back to razor sharp with the sharpmaker.

I have never stropped an SE blade myself, but it can be done obviously: Vivi describes it in his thread (see quoted text below) and shows it in the vid that is linked in the first post (viewtopic.php?t=84544). No idea how well that works though.

QUOTE: "14. Serrated edges can be stropped. I use a typical strop, thin hard leather glued to a wooden block. To strop my SE knives, I liberally rub green buffing compound on the corner of my strop, then use that corner like a sharpmaker rod, except I use edge trailing strokes. I have heard of others using a leather boot lace under tension to strop SE. The serrated H1 knife I carry responds really well to a strop, so does the 420HC on my serrated Leatherman blades."

:D I strop my SE blades. Knifes plus strop block has a soft corner that is good for SE blades. I have also used a dremel for 'power stropping'. I think it was David or Darby who came up with that idea. There's a thread here somewhere.