The Edge is (no longer) a Ghost

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vivi
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The Edge is (no longer) a Ghost

#1

Post by vivi »

In a recent thread we discussed photographing knife edges under magnification.

This will be a thread dedicated to sharing those photos.

I'm using a USB microscope under the brand Plugable with 250x zoom. If you search for them on ebay they're only $20.

This is my first set of images. I'll try a better lighting setup next time.


H1 Pacific Salt PE - Sharpened by hand on a 200 grit diamond stone to about 10 degrees per side. Has seen use since sharpening but still scrape shaves.

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LC200N Pacific Salt PE - Sharpened by hand on a 200 grit diamond stone to about 8 degrees per side, microbevel on spyderco sharpmaker at 15 degrees per side with fine white rods. Fresh edge, hair popping sharp.

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S30V DLC Yojumbo - Factory edge after some utility use

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archangel
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Re: The Edge is (no longer) a Ghost

#2

Post by archangel »

Very cool. Bring on them pics!! ;)
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Re: The Edge is (no longer) a Ghost

#3

Post by Sharp Guy »

I've always thought magnified edge pics were pretty cool. I bought one of those little hand held microscopes and it works but it's kind of fussy. I'd buy one of those Plugable USB ones but I'm not seeing them for $20. They're more like $40 on both ebay and Amazon. I do like that I could plug it into my phone and take screen shots with it. So I may pick one up
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Re: The Edge is (no longer) a Ghost

#4

Post by Deadboxhero »

Cool thread :clapping-hands
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Re: The Edge is (no longer) a Ghost

#5

Post by MFlovejp »

This is awesome!
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BeggarSo
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Re: The Edge is (no longer) a Ghost

#6

Post by BeggarSo »

Very Nice work.

I am currently stone washing an S90V Military from Bento Box Shop (have about 24 hours into it and it keeps getting better) and a VG-10 Stretch 2 with a drum shaker ( Not Sure what to call it) set up from Harbor Freight with ceramic media, water simple green and soap. I have to do it outside because the lid goes flying and the slurry makes a mess in the garage.

Both knives were thinned out by hand using a Low grit Diamond stone which obliterated the faces of the knives and I am putting a lens grind on the Military to give it a scandi grind I already started this by hand.

After they are finished I will sharpen them on the TSPROF BLITZ with the lens adapter and since we have the same camera add pictures to the thread you already started. Both were set to 10 degrees using an angle cube before the stone wash and I intend to sharpen at that angle.

One thing is for sure S90V is way more difficult to thin out and stone wash than VG-10.

Here are some pictures thus far the Stretch has 2 hours worth of stone washing.

Image

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:bug-red-white Those who are wise sharpen their steel to it's chemistry not their beliefs. "BeggarSo" :fortune-cookie
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Re: The Edge is (no longer) a Ghost

#7

Post by abbazaba »

I bought the ~$40 Pluggable about 5 years ago and it's been fun, but mostly collects dust.
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Re: The Edge is (no longer) a Ghost

#8

Post by Deadboxhero »

abbazaba wrote:
Tue Sep 14, 2021 9:25 pm
I bought the ~$40 Pluggable about 5 years ago and it's been fun, but mostly collects dust.
Share the edges.
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Re: The Edge is (no longer) a Ghost

#9

Post by JMM »

Awesome! Thanks for sharing
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Re: The Edge is (no longer) a Ghost

#10

Post by Bill1170 »

vivi wrote:
Tue Sep 14, 2021 7:47 am
In a recent thread we discussed photographing knife edges under magnification.

This will be a thread dedicated to sharing those photos.

I'm using a USB microscope under the brand Plugable with 250x zoom. If you search for them on ebay they're only $20.

This is my first set of images. I'll try a better lighting setup next time.


H1 Pacific Salt PE - Sharpened by hand on a 200 grit diamond stone to about 10 degrees per side. Has seen use since sharpening but still scrape shaves.

Image
Image
Image
Image

LC200N Pacific Salt PE - Sharpened by hand on a 200 grit diamond stone to about 8 degrees per side, microbevel on spyderco sharpmaker at 15 degrees per side with fine white rods. Fresh edge, hair popping sharp.

Image
Image



S30V DLC Yojumbo - Factory edge after some utility use

Image
Image
Vivi, what is your grid background in those photos, and what size are the squares?
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Re: The Edge is (no longer) a Ghost

#11

Post by Bill1170 »

BeggarSo wrote:
Tue Sep 14, 2021 6:15 pm
Very Nice work.

I am currently stone washing an S90V Military from Bento Box Shop (have about 24 hours into it and it keeps getting better) and a VG-10 Stretch 2 with a drum shaker ( Not Sure what to call it) set up from Harbor Freight with ceramic media, water simple green and soap. I have to do it outside because the lid goes flying and the slurry makes a mess in the garage.

Both knives were thinned out by hand using a Low grit Diamond stone which obliterated the faces of the knives and I am putting a lens grind on the Military to give it a scandi grind I already started this by hand.

After they are finished I will sharpen them on the TSPROF BLITZ with the lens adapter and since we have the same camera add pictures to the thread you already started. Both were set to 10 degrees using an angle cube before the stone wash and I intend to sharpen at that angle.

One thing is for sure S90V is way more difficult to thin out and stone wash than VG-10.

Here are some pictures thus far the Stretch has 2 hours worth of stone washing.

Image

Image

Image

Image

Image
Is it important to protect the lock bar interface during stone washing?
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Re: The Edge is (no longer) a Ghost

#12

Post by Sharp Guy »

Bill1170 wrote:
Wed Sep 15, 2021 9:25 am
Vivi, what is your grid background in those photos, and what size are the squares?
It's the squares on the stand. From pics on Amazon they're 5mm x 5mm each

https://www.amazon.com/Plugable-Microsc ... NrPXRydWU=
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BeggarSo
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Re: The Edge is (no longer) a Ghost

#13

Post by BeggarSo »

Bill1170 wrote:
Wed Sep 15, 2021 9:27 am
BeggarSo wrote:
Tue Sep 14, 2021 6:15 pm
Very Nice work.

I am currently stone washing an S90V Military from Bento Box Shop (have about 24 hours into it and it keeps getting better) and a VG-10 Stretch 2 with a drum shaker ( Not Sure what to call it) set up from Harbor Freight with ceramic media, water simple green and soap. I have to do it outside because the lid goes flying and the slurry makes a mess in the garage.

Both knives were thinned out by hand using a Low grit Diamond stone which obliterated the faces of the knives and I am putting a lens grind on the Military to give it a scandi grind I already started this by hand.

After they are finished I will sharpen them on the TSPROF BLITZ with the lens adapter and since we have the same camera add pictures to the thread you already started. Both were set to 10 degrees using an angle cube before the stone wash and I intend to sharpen at that angle.

One thing is for sure S90V is way more difficult to thin out and stone wash than VG-10.

Here are some pictures thus far the Stretch has 2 hours worth of stone washing.

Image

Image

Image

Image

Image
Is it important to protect the lock bar interface during stone washing?
I honestly do not know but suspect it is not, most of the geometry of the blades that has changed was due to my efforts with Atoma Diamond stones and Silicone Carbide Stones which you can see in the shape of the blade and the ricasso as I was trying to really work on the plunge grind.

When I say thinning out the knife I do not mean just behind the edge I thinned out the flats quite a bit as well.

Here is the Shaker I am using to stone wash, pretty messy and loud. Thank fully I live pretty much in the country so folks are not getting disturbed by it running.

I am taking the S90V Military blade through its final run which will end at the 30 hour mark then putting the Stretch 2 VG-10 back in and letting it run until satisfied.

Looking forward to sharpening both of these and posting pics.

Image
:bug-red-white Those who are wise sharpen their steel to it's chemistry not their beliefs. "BeggarSo" :fortune-cookie
vivi
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Re: The Edge is (no longer) a Ghost

#14

Post by vivi »

H1 SE Pacific Salt 1 - Heavily used and abused for over a decade. Reprofiled bevel to 15 degrees on diamond sharpmaker rods, sharpened at 20 degrees on brown medium rods.

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(compare how fat this apex is from repeated 20dps sharpenings compared to my microbeveled Military below)

DLC Military S30V - Reprofiled to roughly 12 degrees per side on my 200 grit diamond stone from harbor freight. Sharpened one stroke per side with a feather light touch on fine white sharpmaker rods at 15 degrees per side. Carried and used for a few weeks since edge was set, still aggressively shaves.

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The idea behind this sharpening method is to have extremely aggressive slicing performance combined with a high level of push cutting ability. Applied correctly the edge will aggressively shave and push cut thin paper while retaining most of the microserrations from the coarse stone.

H1 SE Pacific Salt 2 - Brand new, never cut with.

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PE H1 Aqua Salt - Reprofiled to the 8-10 degrees per side range on a 200 grit diamond stone. No follow up strokes on ceramics, just stropped twice per side on 7 micron diamond paste. Used hard since knife was edged, including batoning & prying apart fire wood, carving wood, splitting and carving fatwood, light chopping etc. Edge still covered in pine sap.

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The aggressive microserrations are easy to see on this edge. Just imagine how much longer a low edge retention steel like H1 will cut with an edge like this vs a high polish edge that is worth little once it loses hair scraping sharpness.
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Re: The Edge is (no longer) a Ghost

#15

Post by nerdlock »

That macro photo of the bnew Pac Salt 2 looks like a bloody row of teeth, not gonna lie. Awesome pics vivi.
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vivi
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Re: The Edge is (no longer) a Ghost

#16

Post by vivi »

nerdlock wrote:
Thu Sep 16, 2021 5:46 am
That macro photo of the bnew Pac Salt 2 looks like a bloody row of teeth, not gonna lie. Awesome pics vivi.
Yeah, it's pretty wicked looking :)

I was surprised at how rounded the tips of the teeth look under magnification.
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Re: The Edge is (no longer) a Ghost

#17

Post by u.w. »

I went over to the'bay and grabbed one of those USB microscopes. It came in today, and I've been messing with it a bit, taking some photos

Here's one of I took today with it of a 260 grit edge on a Spyderco Endela w/ 20CV steel

Image

that edge has been used all day doing yard work, cutting branches, saplings, and vines. I've wiped it off of course.

I'm messing with different ways to light the edge for the image

u.w.
vivi
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Re: The Edge is (no longer) a Ghost

#18

Post by vivi »

u.w. wrote:
Sat Sep 18, 2021 6:57 pm
I went over to the'bay and grabbed one of those USB microscopes. It came in today, and I've been messing with it a bit, taking some photos

Here's one of I took today with it of a 260 grit edge on a Spyderco Endela w/ 20CV steel

Image

that edge has been used all day doing yard work, cutting branches, saplings, and vines. I've wiped it off of course.

I'm messing with different ways to light the edge for the image

u.w.
the lighting is definitely the trickiest part.

the edge looks nice! i love how you can really see the micro teeth along the apex when zoomed in like this.

Whenever I reset the edge on my Yojumbo, I'll get some pictures prior to using it.
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Re: The Edge is (no longer) a Ghost

#19

Post by Deadboxhero »

Vivi, this is great, I am not under any misconceptions about the limitations of a USB Microscope however we can certainly discuss things better with being able to see things more empirically and objectively.

Bravo.
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Re: The Edge is (no longer) a Ghost

#20

Post by Freediver »

Wow cool pics, great idea for a thread. Now I want a USB microscope.
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