The low grit sharpening thread

[JayHenMac]

Is there a recommended source for triangle rods for the Sharpmaker? I want to play with 400 grit finishes on the Sharpmaker. I am still learning and I don't want to learn on and destroy the expensive CBN/Diamond rods. I found some aluminum oxide triangle rods on sharpeningsupplies.com. does anyone have experience with those?

[vivi]

Is there a recommended source for triangle rods for the Sharpmaker? I want to play with 400 grit finishes on the Sharpmaker. I am still learning and I don't want to learn on and destroy the expensive CBN/Diamond rods. I found some aluminum oxide triangle rods on sharpeningsupplies.com. does anyone have experience with those?

You won't destroy your knives or rods if you go with Spydercos diamond rods.

All you need to remember is use light pressure. Like you're trying to slice a soft loaf of bread without smashing it as opposed to slicing through thick triple wall cardboard.

https://www.congresstools.com/catalog/c ... ory/?id=27

They have a lot of different triangle rods in various grits. I played around with them to see if I could find one I liked for quick low grit touch-ups on the sharpmaker.

To be honest I stopped using them pretty quickly and went back to cheap diamond plates.

belt sander with 80 grit belt for ultimate tooth.

80 grit and 140 grit chefknivestogo diamond plates for very coarse edges.

harbor freight 4 sided diamond bench stone for 200-400 grit edges.

worn sharpmaker diamond rods or a DMT Coarse for medium grit edges.

20+ year old DMT Fine and / or Spyderco fine bench stone for polished edges.

That entire arsenal costs me under $300, less than most guided sharpeners.

[RazorSharp86]

Medium grit from Spyderco is pretty fine.
Try putting a 220, 400 or even 600 diamond edge on a high carbide steel and see what kind of performance you’ve been missing out on.

[TkoK83Spy]

Medium grit from Spyderco is pretty fine.
Try putting a 220, 400 or even 600 diamond edge on a high carbide steel and see what kind of performance you’ve been missing out on.

Absolutely! Vivi spearheaded low grit finishes years ago here on the forum. I was working in a warehouse at the time, using the crap out of my knives and learning about steels and sharpening. Found low grit to be perfect for my needs, tested it on many different steels and it never failed to impress. I grew to appreciate the aggressive, semi toothy finish, and much less time sharpening.

We may butt heads at times, but I'll always respect and appreciate his input on sharpening and how it truly changed my thoughts and ways of sharpening my own knives.

[Fastidiotus]

I put a coarse edge on an aus8 blade I had and it's a night and day difference in edge retention for the things I use it for. Aus8 is so easy to sharpen I'd always go through the motions to get as fine and sharp an edge as possible but a nice coarse edge lasts much longer. It's easy to fall into the thinking that everything needs to be hair whittling sharp and if its not are you really exploring the potential of the steel. Now I'm exploring the dirtiest edges I can put on steels without a concern about what they do to hair on my arm and it's been a fun experiment.

[Nestor]

Thank you for the reading. Good stuff. I myself reversed to the coarse edge just after two months of trying to get the finest edge possible. For me it just wasn’t worth it, even though I still do it sometimes I much prefer coarse edge nowadays - both on my pocket and kitchen knives.

[horzuff]

I recently switched almost completely from a guided system to hand sharpening, too much hassle with setting up the whole thing and the stones reprofile much quicker than the system.

However I've found that it's much easier to keep the correct angle on lower grits for me. Don't know if it's a question of stone feedback or just how fast I can apex the blade (less time for making mistakes). Additionally I slightly changed how I strop afterwards - instead of alternating sides every stroke I strop one side ~20-30 passes keeping a similar angle as the bevel, two grits of diamond paste, though I don't recall what they are exactly, I think 5 and 1 micron. This results in an edge that shaves easily yet bites like an absolute madman, really scary to touch.

This is a pretty recent change but so far I'm delighted with the results and think I'll keep doing things this way for the forseeable future