Community Sharpening Journal

[bbturbodad]

Been grinding away on the yellow handled Pac Salt trying to get it closer to the all black one. Still needs some work, especially at the tip and heel but having fun with the aggressive CBN edge while I take a break.

Current progress


Factory edges

[vivi]

Looks a lot closer to the black one now.

I love the toothy edge my diamond rods give SE knives. I have a Pacific Salt that only gets sharpened on the diamond rods and its such an aggressive cutter.

[Pelagic]

https://youtu.be/2hHLoLgdt_g

This guy (while obviously being a troll account making fun of Michael christy) gets it.

[Cambertree]

Yes, the sage1 is a Taichung model.
I'm relieved to hear someone else has had this experience, tho sorry about the aggravation it causes.

It's hard to tell how far you've taken your edge back from the pictures, but I feel confident if you keep going, it'll get better. There's only one way to know for sure...
At first I was grinding at a higher angle than normal on coarse silicon carbide. AS I started seeing/hearing/feeling improvements [after many sessions], I gradually lowered it back to where I normally hold, then finish with diamond as usual.

I'm with you on possible heat treat issue, but leaning more towards too thin at the edge pre heat treat.

Makes me wonder how many of the reports about s30v being chippy and prematurely losing it's fine edge might be related.
I doubt there's very many people persistent enough to keep grinding their edge away, just for the sake of experimenting.

Thanks Jpm2.

Sorry that you’ve had those issues too, but it’s also a relief to me that someone else has experienced the same problems.

It’s interesting that you had the issues in a Taichung knife and mine are in a Golden model.

I hadn’t considered the issue of the edges potentially being ground too thin behind the edge before heat treatment, but that’s certainly a possibility, especially when combined with those knives in each batch which come in at the top of the target hardness range.

Ok, sorry for my delayed reply, but I wanted to be able to report some progress, and hopefully the microchipping issue may be slowly stabilising with repeated resharpenings.

In the two weeks since last posting on this, I’ve basically been using this S30V PM2 exclusively.

I’ve deliberately been cutting cardboard recycling down to fairly small pieces, as well as using the knife for gardening tasks like trimming and pointing bamboo stakes and cutting down plastic pots, as well as basic prep in the kitchen like rough slicing leftover vegetable odds and ends to make stocks. I haven’t been abusive with it, but I have pushed it so any issues would become apparent.



At the end of each day I examined the edge with a 10x loupe, looking for those tiny half-moon chips barely visible to the naked eye.

At first I sharpened the knife very lightly as previously described, with the flats of my worn in Spyderco 400 mesh diamond rods.

At the end of the first day, about 4 or 5 tiny chips appeared.

Next day I resharpened again, removing the chips, and after a day or two of use the same chips appeared.

Sorry, this blurry pic is about the best I was able to do while holding the loupe and phone camera and trying to get the focus and lighting right:



Next resharpening, I decided to use the light ‘up and down scrubbing’ motion on the rods to strip away steel. Once the chips were removed, I used the light finishing pass progression of 10 on one side before switching to the other side, then 5-5,4-4,3-3,2-2; then 1 per side for about 10 ultra light passes, going from one side to the other to ensure burr minimisation.

I like the coarse edge, but it’s not quite what I’m used to in most of my knives.

This time I decided to do a few light passes on the brown rods to clean up the apex a bit.

Interestingly, every time I used the ceramic rods, no matter how lightly, they knocked out microchips all along the edge, which were only visible with the loupe.

I’m currently using the 15dps setting. Of course, the 20dps setting will provide more durability, but S30V should be able to take a 30 inclusive edge without issues.

Next sharpening, after ‘scrubbing’ with the diamond rods then deburring as described above, I decided to try a coarse 60/40 μm Venev diamond stropping paste on balsa.

This grit size would be around 220-400 grit.

I did a couple of light passes then stropped any residual paste off the blade on clean balsa, and clean roo leather.



This actually worked really well, leaving the edge still very aggressive, but slicing through paper much cleaner and smoother.

At the moment I’ve probably sharpened away at least a millimetre or two all along the edge, and done at least 5 or 6 full resharpenings in the last couple of weeks.

The microchipping seems to be clearing up a bit, but the odd chip here and there is still evident, following a day or two of use.

Given the effectiveness of the 60/40 μm strop, I also pasted up a Venev 10/7 μm diamond balsa strop.

That progression actually produces a really nice edge - 400 grit diamond rods, then a couple of 60 μm passes, followed by a couple of 10μm passes, then a couple of cleaning passes on roo leather.

Anyway, I hope that I’ll be able to report that my issues with S30V in this knife have cleared up with quite a bit of repeated sharpening soon. I’ll start running this knife in parallel with one of my other S30V blades, once it stabilises, as a comparison.

Thanks for the advice guys. This knife has been quite frustrating, but learning how to resolve troublesome issues is a valuable experience. Also the coarse stropping has been a useful ‘discovery’.

Jpm2, I daresay you’re right - most users wouldn’t bother to go through that many sharpenings to try to see if the edge stabilises. I’ve also sharpened this knife on lots of different media (CrOx, SiC, AlOx), and with different techniques before this as well.

[Doeswhateveraspidercan]

Wow Cambertree great researching.

Do you have one of the 1000 King stones Murray Carter favors? It has really impressed me recently they are pretty cheap like $20.00 on Amazon.

As I was reading this I was thinking hmmmm wonder how this wet stone would work for his micro chipping experience?

[Baron Mind]

Just to pose an alternate school of the thought to the ultra toothy preferences prevalent in this thread, the goal should be a polished toothy edge, as close to the polished end of the spectrum possible without losing that toothy aggression on the apex. This is no easy task, but I would argue is the pinnacle of sharpening. An edge with the most narrow teeth physically possible. A toothy edge, where the apex ot each tooth is submicron.

Not claiming I can achieve this regularly, but I think it's worth keeping this goal in mind rather than rejecting finer abrasives altogether and worshipping ultra low grit finishes.

[Pelagic]

Just to pose an alternate school of the thought to the ultra toothy preferences prevalent in this thread, the goal should be a polished toothy edge, as close to the polished end of the spectrum possible without losing that toothy aggression on the apex. This is no easy task, but I would argue is the pinnacle of sharpening. An edge with the most narrow teeth physically possible. A toothy edge, where the apex ot each tooth is submicron.

Not claiming I can achieve this regularly, but I think it's worth keeping this goal in mind rather than rejecting finer abrasives altogether and worshipping ultra low grit finishes.

Absolutely correct. Cutting performance is key. I'm not some master or anything like that, but this concept is what led me to diamond powder. Having 0.1 micron abrasive that cuts like 3 micron abrasive is a radical change. I want to refine the teeth, not eliminate them or reduce their size.

You can be any kind of edge snob. The human ego can lead you down any rabbit hole. You've found the greatest way, and everyone else is laughable. I know what works best for me, BIG TEETH, refined until hair whittling. That's what works for me. But for someone that doesn't slice 4-5" thick rope, they'll likely prefer a much finer finish before stropping. Their knife may be slightly better at slicing tomatoes, while mine is more likely to save a life when a line needs to be cut immediately. Some people may just want a good looking uniform bevel/apex, and don't care how it cuts. For me, a knife must do a job. As a sharpener, I have to make it do that job as well and easily as possible.

[Baron Mind]

Just to pose an alternate school of the thought to the ultra toothy preferences prevalent in this thread, the goal should be a polished toothy edge, as close to the polished end of the spectrum possible without losing that toothy aggression on the apex. This is no easy task, but I would argue is the pinnacle of sharpening. An edge with the most narrow teeth physically possible. A toothy edge, where the apex ot each tooth is submicron.

Not claiming I can achieve this regularly, but I think it's worth keeping this goal in mind rather than rejecting finer abrasives altogether and worshipping ultra low grit finishes.

Absolutely correct. Cutting performance is key. I'm not some master or anything like that, but this concept is what led me to diamond powder. Having 0.1 micron abrasive that cuts like 3 micron abrasive is a radical change. I want to refine the teeth, not eliminate them or reduce their size.

You can be any kind of edge snob. The human ego can lead you down any rabbit hole. You've found the greatest way, and everyone else is laughable. I know what works best for me, BIG TEETH, refined until hair whittling. That's what works for me. But for someone that doesn't slice 4-5" thick rope, they'll likely prefer a much finer finish before stropping. Their knife may be slightly better at slicing tomatoes, while mine is more likely to save a life when a line needs to be cut immediately. Some people may just want a good looking uniform bevel/apex, and don't care how it cuts. For me, a knife must do a job. As a sharpener, I have to make it do that job as well and easily as possible.

Well said, I can agree with all of that. I like the idea of carrying one knife with a coarse toothy edge, and one knife with a more refined, polished edge, so you can use whichever knife a given cut requires, but I think that idea may be more philosophically sound than it is practical.

Ultimately you probably want to go with whatever finish best suits the majority of tasks you are likely to face on an average day. For me, a highly refined, polished toothy edge is the most versatile and appropriate finish for my edc knives, but I also have a propensity for push cutting. But again, that is largely philosophical, and my life wouldn't come screaching to a halt if I carried around a knife with a basic worksharp edge on it.

[bbturbodad]

I need to watch Vivi's video on sharpening serrated edge again. I'm having trouble getting the centers on the small serrations.


Edit: Didn't realize there was a serrated and a normal sharpening thread... :o

[Cambertree]

I need to watch Vivi's video on sharpening serrated edge again. I'm having trouble getting the centers on the small serrations.

Not sure how Vivi does it, it’s been a while since I watched his excellent video on sharpening serrations. I’d just slow down on the full pass, and spend a little time ‘rocking’ up and down in the tight serrations. I also use the corners of the Doublestuff 2 or Sharpmaker rods freehand until you feel a slight burr on the back side of the blade - you can follow the edge angle very easily.

Eventually if you keep doing what you’re doing, the scallops will become more shallow, and you’ll hit the entire edge with a single pass.

[Cambertree]

Wow Cambertree great researching.

Do you have one of the 1000 King stones Murray Carter favors? It has really impressed me recently they are pretty cheap like $20.00 on Amazon.

As I was reading this I was thinking hmmmm wonder how this wet stone would work for his micro chipping experience?

Thanks Doeswhatever.

Yeah, I came to folding knives from sharpening Japanese kitchen knives, so the first set of decent stones I built up were the Naniwa Choseras. I think they now sell that line as the Naniwa Professionals. I haven’t tried the Kings, but they’re generally known for being relatively soft in their binder material and requiring regular flattening to work well. If you enjoy sharpening with waterstones, the Choseras are designed to have excellent feedback in sound and feel, and I highly recommend them. They are also more than 60% alumina abrasive.

Feel free to PM me if you want to get further into these stones or natural Japanese stones, and I’ll put you onto a place in Kyoto who have very reasonable prices.

As mentioned, what first brought me to Spyderco, was it was a company where I could get a pocket knife in a high quality Japanese bladesteel like VG10 or Superblue (at the time).

I did try to sharpen my S30V PM2 initially with the Chosera alumina waterstones in a 400, 1000, 3000 progression. At the time, I was baffled by the poor edgeholding due to microchipping, and I attributed it to possible excessive pressure from the Japanese ‘scrubbing’ motion, or suspended abrasive particles in the slurry smashing into the edge apex.

Then I tried using silicon carbide sandpapers taped to different backing materials, using trailing passes, with the same result.

I tried different kinds of stropping with green Chromium Oxide or White Aluminium Oxide to refine the edge.

Same microchipping after a little use.

I bought a Sharpmaker and with very light pressure I could get a decent apex with the brown stones, but the edge would start to fragment with a white F or UF progression.

After that I just decided that S30V and high vanadium steels weren’t for me. Although when I tried steels like CPM M4, Cruwear and HAP40, they delivered great fine edges. So did ZDP189.

So this return to my second Spydie purchase has been a valuable learning experience, and if I can finally get it to stabilise, I may well try returning to the fine alumina finishing stones to see how it performs.

At the moment I very much like the Venev OCB stones and diamond and CBN stropping pastes, which seem able to shape high carbide steels to almost as fine an edge as Japanese waterstones can achieve on steels like VG10 and Superblue.

My next experiment will be to get some loose diamond powder like Pelagic has recommended and try that out.

Pelagic, do you ever use the diamond powder on stones like fine waterstones, or only to augment stropping pastes?

[bbturbodad]

Not sure how Vivi does it, it’s been a while since I watched his excellent video on sharpening serrations. I’d just slow down on the full pass, and spend a little time ‘rocking’ up and down in the tight serrations. I also use the corners of the Doublestuff 2 or Sharpmaker rods freehand until you feel a slight burr on the back side of the blade - you can follow the edge angle very easily.

Eventually if you keep doing what you’re doing, the scallops will become more shallow, and you’ll hit the entire edge with a single pass.

Thanks! I just hit the tight serrations individually and no more snagging now.

[Cambertree]

Just to pose an alternate school of the thought to the ultra toothy preferences prevalent in this thread, the goal should be a polished toothy edge, as close to the polished end of the spectrum possible without losing that toothy aggression on the apex. This is no easy task, but I would argue is the pinnacle of sharpening. An edge with the most narrow teeth physically possible. A toothy edge, where the apex ot each tooth is submicron.

Not claiming I can achieve this regularly, but I think it's worth keeping this goal in mind rather than rejecting finer abrasives altogether and worshipping ultra low grit finishes.

I agree, and generally the type of edge you describe is what I seek.

It suits my own uses where I generally want a fine, clean cut - like when pruning leaves and branches off plants, or doing food prep for cooking.

For other purposes I certainly appreciate coarse edges and serrated blades, and that’s why I like the breadth of experience offered on this forum.

I figure I’m here to learn and expand my skill set, and the best way to do that is to listen and ask questions and perform my own experiments.

Pelagic makes a good point that ego can form a large part of different sharpening techniques that are espoused by different people.

I’ve noticed that generally the most experienced sharpeners recognise that there’s many ways to skin a cat, or attain a razor sharp edge, and they’re fairly relaxed about advocating different techniques.

After all, everyones sharpening needs are slightly different and someone who tells you ‘this is the best edge’ usually has no idea what your daily cutting needs are.

It could be 5” synthetic rope, like Pelagic, or clay particle laden double walled Chinese cardboard, or game or fish meat for food presentation. Or it could just be envelopes and packing straps on boxes of photocopy paper, and slicing coupons and crossword puzzles out of magazines.

Personally, I appreciate and am thankful for the learning I’ve had from many teachers, and like having a ‘toolbox’ of different edges and steels and blade shapes I can call on for various purposes.

[Doeswhateveraspidercan]

Agreed and the cool thing is we are figuring out how to sharpen our hone for the task at hand.

Maybe I am missing something, Cambertree but is this just 1 knife the PM2 S30V you are having the crumbling blade issue with?

If so perhaps it has a flawed heart treatment? Might be worth sending it into Sal and let them look at it seems to me with all the ways you have tried and your skill level what you are experiencing should not be happening.

[RustyIron]

A couple weeks ago I rediscovered an old knife that got stashed away and forgotten. It travelled on some pretty big adventures 30+ years ago and finding it brought back a lot of memories. I always enjoyed using that knife, which is probably why I kept it. I quickly put a new edge on it, and started using it in the kitchen.

Since then, I've enjoyed using it enough that this afternoon I put a little more effort into the edge. I used a cheap diamond plate to set the edge at 15 degrees, then progressed through the Nubatama stones to 5k. Then I gave it about a quarter degree more angle and went at it lightly with the 8k Speckled Ume. After that I went to the nanocloth with 1.00 and 0.25 micron CBN.

It's kinda neat to have the polished edge on the old carbon steel. After the edge wears, I'll probably not bring it to this level again. But it was fun to give my old friend a little bit of extra attention.

[vivi]

I went through a couple knives in my EDC rotation and touched up their edges. Here's one of the Spydercos:



15 degrees on the diamond rods, 10 strokes on the presentation side, 1 on the back. Repeated that ratio for about a minute, then switched to bare minimum pressure strokes with a 2:1 ratio. Once the edge felt really clean, I ran it along the corner of my strop using a 1:1 ratio. Fifteen swipes per side.

I never strop that much but it seemed to work well with the diamond edge. Still extremely toothy if I run my fingernail down the length of the edge, but the apex is polished enough to pop off arm hairs with the peaks between scallops.

[Doeswhateveraspidercan]

This morning I decided to carry two knives to work knowing I have allot of cardboard to take down. One is my Buck 110 in 440C the other is My Spyderco Smock in S30V.

Before leaving the house I gave each knife 3 stropping passes per side then followed by 3 alternating stropping passes on the King Stone without wetting it. The result was rather amazing both knives honed to immediate sharp crisp toothy edges. Broke down a bunch of cardboard earlier and both are holding up well.

Folks might want to consider one of these cheap stones for roughly $20.00 you can't beat the results heck even if you never wet the stone and only use in stropping passes for touch up it is worth it.

Looks Like I am going to be putting some sharpening equipment up for sale on ebay. Wicked Edge Pro 3 is going to get sold and so is the Hapstone 7.

Feeling really happy with the Atoma Diamond plates for rapid re-profiling and the Kingstones, I will never get rid of my Spyderco sharp maker.

All the Ken Onion stuff... and worksharp stuff... well adios amigo thanks to Pelagic and Vivi I am done with fixed angled sharpening equipment, if not for you guys turning me on to freehand sharpening, input form DeadBoxHero and learning from Murray Carter's DVD's I would still be unhappy with S30V, lol no more. Thanks guys.

[vivi]

I've always felt strongly that most knife users are going to see a bigger jump in edge holding by improving sharpening skills rather than buying a new steel. I get over twice the edge retention from VG10 and S30V compared to when I first started sharpening them.

[Pelagic]

Doeswhatever, glad you're getting into freehand sharpening!

[Doeswhateveraspidercan]

I've always felt strongly that most knife users are going to see a bigger jump in edge holding by improving sharpening skills rather than buying a new steel. I get over twice the edge retention from VG10 and S30V compared to when I first started sharpening them.

I believe you are right an thank you for all the great encouraging videos.