How's the durability without a micro bevel? Any chipping or rolling?
Durability is good. I de-burr with a just slightly higher (more obtuse) angle than I apex at - so that may count as an extremely slight or small micro-bevel. I have not had any issues with chipping or rolling of the edge though. Provided I ensure that I have apexed and deburred fully.
I absolutely use a light and magnification for that (checking for full apex and burr removal).
My only edge issues are when I don't clean it after cutting through a lot of vines, or veggies, or anything that leaves gunk and/or residue on the blade and edge. Then cutting performance is reduced. A quick cleaning of the blade with light soap and water always makes it good again though.
That said, 8Cr13Mov isn't the at the top of the list for edge holding; so it looses it's keen-ness before K390, or REX45, or M4 does. Now that said, while it (8Cr) doesn't hold it's keen edge as long as those three, I have no issues with it for the money I paid.
The knife is still what I'm carrying and using. It's in my right front pocket as I type this. I cut through a wheelbarrow full of Wysteria vines today, some cucumbers and cilantro (aka: coriander), a few cardboard boxes, top off a new bag of walnuts... that's all so far today I think.
It just glides through everything.
I recently got a used Caribbean SE. The knife is in great shape and the flats of the blade look brand new, without so much as a scratch. But when I looked closer, there was quite a bit of edge damage. Mostly rolled edges within the serrations. It looks like the previous owner maybe used it to cut wire? But it was very dull. That's probably why he was selling it cheap.
This is my first Spyderedge knife, other than a Ladybug. And my first time sharpening a Spyderedge.
I used a combination of the ceramic rod on my Worksharp guided field sharpener, my Harbor Freight 4 sided diamond block, and a loaded leather strop. I was able to repair the edge and get it very sharp in a relatively short time. I'll probably break down and get a Sharpmaker (I've been meaning to for awhile anyway). But I'm happy with the results thus far
Remember to maintain the tools you use to maintain your tools.
I dulled my kitchen knives a bit, processing some toughs cuts of beef today (they were already dull, lol), so decided to give them some tlc.
Elmax, 3V and cpm 154, all convex. The plan was to use just BRKT white compound, but the dullest, the one in cpm 154 took too long so diamond paste loaded strops (6 and 3 micron) helped a bit. Noticed though that my strops were not performing too well, so i went on to wash and scrub them and re-apply the abrasives. I also found a spray bottle with 0.5 micron dmt diaspray emulsion and applied that on a cleaned strop with very smooth leather.
Then went on to refresh all my recently used folders (none of them would shave at all). The Magnacut Native (factory edge), the Chaparral (factory edge), the Stretch 2XL Cruwear (factory edge), the Rex 45 Native Chief (micro-convex), the S90V CF Native (factory edge), Spy27 Native (microconvexed) and they all responded amazingly well to just stropping with the same progression: white compound, one micron dmt diapaste, half micron dmt diaspray. Diamond abrasives just don't care about the type of your knife steel.
Military/PM2/P3Native Chief/NativeGB2DF2PITSChaparralTasman Salt 2 SECaribbean SF SESpydieChefSwaybackManix2Sage 1SSSS2XL G10
Remember to maintain the tools you use to maintain your tools.
I dulled my kitchen knives a bit, processing some toughs cuts of beef today (they were already dull, lol), so decided to give them some tlc.
Elmax, 3V and cpm 154, all convex. The plan was to use just BRKT white compound, but the dullest, the one in cpm 154 took too long so diamond paste loaded strops (6 and 3 micron) helped a bit. Noticed though that my strops were not performing too well, so i went on to wash and scrub them and re-apply the abrasives. I also found a spray bottle with 0.5 micron dmt diaspray emulsion and applied that on a cleaned strop with very smooth leather.
Then went on to refresh all my recently used folders (none of them would shave at all). The Magnacut Native (factory edge), the Chaparral (factory edge), the Stretch 2XL Cruwear (factory edge), the Rex 45 Native Chief (micro-convex), the S90V CF Native (factory edge), Spy27 Native (microconvexed) and they all responded amazingly well to just stropping with the same progression: white compound, one micron dmt diapaste, half micron dmt diaspray. Diamond abrasives just don't care about the type of your knife steel.
I've been trying to embrace stropping more, and I am just not sure if I get it.
I got some 5 micron diamond paste and loaded it into some suede cowhide and it works fine for restoring an edge, but I don't know that I really see the point of it over just sharpening on something like the 9 micron DMT pocket hone I have, unless I just really want a more polished edge.
Last edited by Mage7 on Sat Aug 09, 2025 3:02 am, edited 1 time in total.
I'm with you. I can get a great edge off stones in a fraction of the time it takes to strop it back. I don't know the last time I seriously used a strop.
they can help but personally I find using a very light touch (less than the weight of the knife) is good enough for burr removal. I get tree topping sharpness off a few strokes of my DMT Coarse or medium sharpmaker rods I resurfaced with 200 grit carbide powder. the edges look a lot crisper under magnification than the micro convexed edges my strops give me. but maybe my stropping technique is worse than my stone technique.
outdoors55 idea of a "coarse" doesn't really align much with the common appreciation of the term. 600 grit is literally considered "fine" by most abrasive manufacturers. The 600 grit JIS Atoma he's mentioning, for example, is 25 micron. The DMT "coarse" vivi just mentioned is 45 micron.
That's one thing that bugs me a ton about his videos. He insists upon calling what everyone else generally considers to be fine--or at least "medium"--abrasives coarse. I can understand the logic, considering that on the wider scale of things that 25 micron could be considered relatively coarse compared to 1-5 microns, but considering that many coarse hones range up to 100-200 microns then one could say he's ignoring the upper range of coarse grits by calling 600 grit "coarse" as much as he might claim someone calling it "fine" is ignoring the upper range of fine grits. But beyond whether you choose to view 600 grit as half-coarse or half-fine, the generally accepted wisdom is that it's a "fine" grit, as evidenced by virtually every abrasive manufacturer labeling it as such, so when he starts referencing people talking about "coarse edges" he should know they're not talking about an edge finished on a 600 grit hone.
Of course, that's a pet peeve that has little to do with the actual topic at hand lol I agree with finding it preferable to deburr on a hone rather than a strop, but also I am relatively certain that my stropping technique also must just suck. I say that because invariably I seem to end up with an overly polished edge that loses it's aggressiveness. I've been meaning to try some diamond compound closer to 15-20 micron to see if that would help, but it's surprising to me that something like my DMT Extra Fine which is 9 microns, or my Shapton Kuromaku 2k which is 7, both leave edges that are both highly polished but way more biting than what I get off my strop loaded with 5 micron compound. I figure I must be rounding the apex a little, but try as I might, I still haven't managed not to even after much practice. I keep meaning to try a larger micron compound to see if maybe it's just a matter of 5 micron on a leather backing being much finer than on a hard backing, but just never get around to it.
IME, stropping is not that different to using a stone, in a tactile way. When properly aligned, very smooth leather strops have that gliding suction cup feeling that I also get from a Spyderco Ultrafine benchstone. And the tactile feedback from both coarser leather strops and coarser stones is a certain sense of vibration/resonance as the apex is being hit just right.
Military/PM2/P3Native Chief/NativeGB2DF2PITSChaparralTasman Salt 2 SECaribbean SF SESpydieChefSwaybackManix2Sage 1SSSS2XL G10
"7. Burrs are bad (sometimes)
I am confident that many people are deliberately but unwittingly forming burrs with their sharpening process, and they are happy with the results. Most so-called “toothy” edges formed by coarse stones are burrs, and there is no question that these edges can perform better in certain tasks than a refined, burr-free razor-type edge."
Hans Favourite Spydies: Military S90V, PM2 Cruwear, Siren LC200N, UKPK S110V, Endela Wharncliffe K390 Others: Victorinox Pioneer, CRK: L Sebenza, L Inkosi, Umnumzaan
"7. Burrs are bad (sometimes)
I am confident that many people are deliberately but unwittingly forming burrs with their sharpening process, and they are happy with the results. Most so-called “toothy” edges formed by coarse stones are burrs, and there is no question that these edges can perform better in certain tasks than a refined, burr-free razor-type edge."
that aqua salt will cut just fine, but seeing that visible burr in my photo does bug me a bit. even without the medium rods I know I can deburr better than that. oh well. after nothing but 12-15 hour high paced shifts the past two weeks I've gotta choose my battles
I'm trying to experiment more with micro-bevels and stropping and have made some interesting observations.
On my Rex45 Manix 2 I put on a 28 degree inclusive angle. I was aiming for 30, but I undershot it a little bit according to the laser goniometer. I used a 400 grit diamond honed and had to do a good bit of reprofiling even though it had original been beveled at 15 degrees per side, but I must have accidentally made it a little bit more obtuse over a few touchups since doing that. Well, I noticed a good bit of microchipping under 60x magnification, so I took this bevel to a 2000k Shapton Kuromaku and got it pretty well polished and deburred, at least so far as I could tell with magnification.
Well, at that point I decided I wanted to put s micro-bevel on. I used a 13 degree wedge to get the 14 degree bevels, and I wanted a 20 degree micro-bevel on each one so I decided to use an 18 degree bevel since I figured if I undershot it again that 19dps would be fine and otherwise if I got right on or overshot a little bit that 20-21dps would be too.
Well, I put the microbevel one with the same Shapton Kuromaku 2k, and did basically two passes on each side. I could visually see the bevel created under magnification, but using the laser goniometer, it didn't register the new micro-bevels on both sides. One was the same 14 degree even that was there previously, but on the other side there was now the slightest hint of a 23 degree bevel. Again, micro-bevels, so I wasn't that concerned with the assyemetry, but was more concerned with making sure this micro-bevel had removed any burr and micro chips. It did seem that it worked under 60x magnification.
Well, for whatever, I wanted to experiment with stropping again too. When I strop or do touch-ups, I don't use the angle guides but instead just visually confirm the apex is in contact with the hone. I did about 9 passes on each side with 5 micron diamond compound, and was satisfied it was deburred. It wouldn't whittle fine hairs, but would instantly split beard hair and make arm or leg hair pop, so I was satisfied. Most/all of the microchipping was gone too.
Well, I was curious about how much I had changed the geometry, and after the micro beveling and stropping the edges had gone from 14dps to 25dps! Of course that was due to micro convexing. Looking under the loupe, I saw that I had blended the shoulders of the micro bevel out completely.
I find that kind of surprising for two reasons... One because I didn't think that 9 passes on 5 micron diamond compound could blend out the shoulders of even a micro bevel, and second because of how much the angle increase from the actual bevel I was when just "sighting" it in. Seems to explain quite will how my bevel angle had grown so much over subsequent touch-ups.
It makes me wonder much other people specify they have a bevel at a specific geometry but by how much it deviates at the actual apex. Most people aren't obsessive enough to buy a laser goniometer to actually observe that. I know that @Deadboxhero has mentioned this happens a lot and do it makes it somewhat useless for any of us to talk about geometries since we don't ever know if the geometry cited as at the apex or if it has even been measured.
It also makes me wonder about @Larrin 's CATRA tests. As far as I know the test coupons were sharpened with guided sharpeners, but I wonder if the angle at the apexes were verified with goniometers. Plus I kind of wonder if it even matters much. If there's a test blade whose bevel is ground at 30 degrees, but there's a bevel that's maybe .0005" wide at the very apex that is at 40 degrees, how much does it actually affect the data obtained?
Last edited by Mage7 on Sun Aug 17, 2025 3:34 pm, edited 1 time in total.
It also makes me wonder about @Larrin 's CATRA tests. As far as I know the test coupons were sharpened with guided sharpeners, but I wonder if the angle at the apexes were verified with goniometers. Plus I kind of wonder if it even matters much. If there's a test blade whose even is ground at 30 degrees, but there's a bevel that's maybe .0005" wide at the very apex that is at 40 degrees, how much does it actually affect the data obtained?
Yes they were and yes it matters. Anyone who is sharpening by hand for edge retention testing is only doing a test of the randomness of their sharpening.
It also makes me wonder about @Larrin 's CATRA tests. As far as I know the test coupons were sharpened with guided sharpeners, but I wonder if the angle at the apexes were verified with goniometers. Plus I kind of wonder if it even matters much. If there's a test blade whose even is ground at 30 degrees, but there's a bevel that's maybe .0005" wide at the very apex that is at 40 degrees, how much does it actually affect the data obtained?
Yes they were and yes it matters. Anyone who is sharpening by hand for edge retention testing is only doing a test of the randomness of their sharpening.
Again, thanks for confirmation that they were measured with a goniometer
I suppose my real question is how much it matter though.
Applying the regression formula you developed to Rex45 (2.5% MC and 5.3% M6C) and assuming it's 66 HRC, I get the following TCC estimates:
There's a huge decrease in edge retention going from 30 degrees to 50 degrees, but is it optimistic to assume that the decrease wouldn't be as bad if the 50 degree edge in question is formed by extremely small micro-bevels on top of a 30 degree edge?
I'm wondering if that's even something that can be speculated on, or if it would require actual testing to see. If the latter, have you ever thought about doing another set of CATRA tests with micro-bevels?
It also makes me wonder about @Larrin 's CATRA tests. As far as I know the test coupons were sharpened with guided sharpeners, but I wonder if the angle at the apexes were verified with goniometers. Plus I kind of wonder if it even matters much. If there's a test blade whose even is ground at 30 degrees, but there's a bevel that's maybe .0005" wide at the very apex that is at 40 degrees, how much does it actually affect the data obtained?
Yes they were and yes it matters. Anyone who is sharpening by hand for edge retention testing is only doing a test of the randomness of their sharpening.
Again, thanks for confirmation that they were measured with a goniometer
I suppose my real question is how much it matter though.
Applying the regression formula you developed to Rex45 (2.5% MC and 5.3% M6C) and assuming it's 66 HRC, I get the following TCC estimates:
There's a huge decrease in edge retention going from 30 degrees to 50 degrees, but is it optimistic to assume that the decrease wouldn't be as bad if the 50 degree edge in question is formed by extremely small micro-bevels on top of a 30 degree edge?
I'm wondering if that's even something that can be speculated on, or if it would require actual testing to see. If the latter, have you ever thought about doing another set of CATRA tests with micro-bevels?
Do a rudimentary test.
Set up a scale on a cutting board and test the weight needed to cut various media with your two different conditions.
In my experience, microbevel performance behaves more like the geometry at the microbevel rather than the back bevel.
This is undesirable, like pre-dulling; reduced bite and cutting longevity.
It also makes me wonder about @Larrin 's CATRA tests. As far as I know the test coupons were sharpened with guided sharpeners, but I wonder if the angle at the apexes were verified with goniometers. Plus I kind of wonder if it even matters much. If there's a test blade whose even is ground at 30 degrees, but there's a bevel that's maybe .0005" wide at the very apex that is at 40 degrees, how much does it actually affect the data obtained?
Yes they were and yes it matters. Anyone who is sharpening by hand for edge retention testing is only doing a test of the randomness of their sharpening.
Again, thanks for confirmation that they were measured with a goniometer
I suppose my real question is how much it matter though.
Applying the regression formula you developed to Rex45 (2.5% MC and 5.3% M6C) and assuming it's 66 HRC, I get the following TCC estimates:
There's a huge decrease in edge retention going from 30 degrees to 50 degrees, but is it optimistic to assume that the decrease wouldn't be as bad if the 50 degree edge in question is formed by extremely small micro-bevels on top of a 30 degree edge?
I'm wondering if that's even something that can be speculated on, or if it would require actual testing to see. If the latter, have you ever thought about doing another set of CATRA tests with micro-bevels?
Do a rudimentary test.
Set up a scale on a cutting board and test the weight needed to cut various media with your two different conditions.
In my experience, microbevel performance behaves more like the geometry at the microbevel rather than the back bevel.
This is undesirable, like pre-dulling; reduced bite and cutting longevity.
Hmm so basically I should be able to see that the 30->50 degree bevel takes more force than the 30 degree bevel?
I do have a BESS tester, though it's one of the prototypes and is kind of inconsistent and so I question how accurate it is. I usually have to take like a five-point average. But in either case I can usually get between 75-100 BESS even on edges that I measure to be over 25dps.
Do you think using something like a simple kitchen scale and just observing the force to slice through something would be more revealing than the BESS tester? Wondering if that would show the force needed to pass the whole bevel through the test material versus just testing the apex against the BESS media.
As a slight aside, I've been planning on getting a new BESS tester and saving up cardboard to plot BESS scores over an amount of slices of a controlled length. I noticed in your video that you seemed to give it plenty of time for the CATRA blade to sever the media, whereas I see a lot of people kind of game the tester by doing the downward force quite quickly. Do you think it would be a better idea to buy one of the models that samples several times a second to eliminate that as a variable, or just get the basic model and try to go slowly?
Yes they were and yes it matters. Anyone who is sharpening by hand for edge retention testing is only doing a test of the randomness of their sharpening.
Again, thanks for confirmation that they were measured with a goniometer
I suppose my real question is how much it matter though.
Applying the regression formula you developed to Rex45 (2.5% MC and 5.3% M6C) and assuming it's 66 HRC, I get the following TCC estimates:
There's a huge decrease in edge retention going from 30 degrees to 50 degrees, but is it optimistic to assume that the decrease wouldn't be as bad if the 50 degree edge in question is formed by extremely small micro-bevels on top of a 30 degree edge?
I'm wondering if that's even something that can be speculated on, or if it would require actual testing to see. If the latter, have you ever thought about doing another set of CATRA tests with micro-bevels?
Do a rudimentary test.
Set up a scale on a cutting board and test the weight needed to cut various media with your two different conditions.
In my experience, microbevel performance behaves more like the geometry at the microbevel rather than the back bevel.
This is undesirable, like pre-dulling; reduced bite and cutting longevity.
Hmm so basically I should be able to see that the 30->50 degree bevel takes more force than the 30 degree bevel?
I do have a BESS tester, though it's one of the prototypes and is kind of inconsistent and so I question how accurate it is. I usually have to take like a five-point average. But in either case I can usually get between 75-100 BESS even on edges that I measure to be over 25dps.
Do you think using something like a simple kitchen scale and just observing the force to slice through something would be more revealing than the BESS tester? Wondering if that would show the force needed to pass the whole bevel through the test material versus just testing the apex against the BESS media.
As a slight aside, I've been planning on getting a new BESS tester and saving up cardboard to plot BESS scores over an amount of slices of a controlled length. I noticed in your video that you seemed to give it plenty of time for the CATRA blade to sever the media, whereas I see a lot of people kind of game the tester by doing the downward force quite quickly. Do you think it would be a better idea to buy one of the models that samples several times a second to eliminate that as a variable, or just get the basic model and try to go slowly?
