Spyderco Forums

ejames13 wrote: ↑

Fri Feb 01, 2019 7:56 am

Following up on my previous post.

I took my REX45 PM2 to the 400 grit stock EP stone last night, and I was having to refresh the surface of the stone even more frequently than with the 220. I noticed it would stop cutting before the stone was even loaded up. I think this was due to glazing over rather than loading. It was amazing how quickly this happened. I wasn't counting, but after maybe 20 passes or so I could feel the stone start to skate over the bevel. Took it to my 140 grit diamond plate for a surface refresh and I could immediately tell a difference in cutting efficiency.

I chose not to eliminate the burr completely on the 400 grit stone, thinking I would clean it up on the 1000 grit. This was a grave mistake, as the 1000 grit stone had very little effect on the steel besides polishing it. I could not get the burr off completely with this stone. So I took it to a leather strop with 3um diamond compound. That cleaned up the burr pretty well. Edge will shave and push cut phone book paper, but still isn't quite where I hoped it would be. Perhaps I'll finish at 400 grit next time and no strop.

I'm wondering if anyone else has any experience sharpening REX45 on the EP stock stones? I'm not an EP expert, but I have sharpened other steels on it (VG-10, Vtoku2, cheap stainless) without any issues. My suspicion is that the steel is so hard it's difficult for the EP stones to cut.

Ankerson wrote: ↑

Fri Feb 01, 2019 10:12 am

Well the stock EP stones are aluminum oxide other than the 120 grit that is Silicon Carbide.

I haven't used the stock EP stones in so long I can't remember the last time.

I use the Congress Moldmaster SIC Stones.

I also have the Shapton Glass Stones, but I think the Congress stones work better.

abbazaba wrote: ↑

Fri Feb 01, 2019 11:24 am

Ankerson wrote: ↑

Fri Feb 01, 2019 10:12 am

Well the stock EP stones are aluminum oxide other than the 120 grit that is Silicon Carbide.

I haven't used the stock EP stones in so long I can't remember the last time.

I use the Congress Moldmaster SIC Stones.

I also have the Shapton Glass Stones, but I think the Congress stones work better.

Do you mind sharing what grits of the Moldmaster SIC you generally use?

abbazaba wrote: ↑

Fri Feb 01, 2019 12:07 pm

Thank you! I assume you've gotten very efficient over the years :)

Shooter4321 wrote: ↑

Fri Feb 01, 2019 9:40 am

ejames13 wrote: ↑

Fri Feb 01, 2019 7:56 am

Following up on my previous post.

...

I'm wondering if anyone else has any experience sharpening REX45 on the EP stock stones? I'm not an EP expert, but I have sharpened other steels on it (VG-10, Vtoku2, cheap stainless) without any issues. My suspicion is that the steel is so hard it's difficult for the EP stones to cut.

...
For the price of CKTG diamond, they can’t be beat for these tough steels, making life much easier lol.

Shooter4321 wrote: ↑

Fri Feb 01, 2019 9:40 am

ejames13 wrote: ↑

Fri Feb 01, 2019 7:56 am

Following up on my previous post.

I took my REX45 PM2 to the 400 grit stock EP stone last night, and I was having to refresh the surface of the stone even more frequently than with the 220. I noticed it would stop cutting before the stone was even loaded up. I think this was due to glazing over rather than loading. It was amazing how quickly this happened. I wasn't counting, but after maybe 20 passes or so I could feel the stone start to skate over the bevel. Took it to my 140 grit diamond plate for a surface refresh and I could immediately tell a difference in cutting efficiency.

I chose not to eliminate the burr completely on the 400 grit stone, thinking I would clean it up on the 1000 grit. This was a grave mistake, as the 1000 grit stone had very little effect on the steel besides polishing it. I could not get the burr off completely with this stone. So I took it to a leather strop with 3um diamond compound. That cleaned up the burr pretty well. Edge will shave and push cut phone book paper, but still isn't quite where I hoped it would be. Perhaps I'll finish at 400 grit next time and no strop.

I'm wondering if anyone else has any experience sharpening REX45 on the EP stock stones? I'm not an EP expert, but I have sharpened other steels on it (VG-10, Vtoku2, cheap stainless) without any issues. My suspicion is that the steel is so hard it's difficult for the EP stones to cut.

I have and like your experience, they won’t cut it. I went to shapton glass stones for the edge pro and on steels like s30v and 3v etc they work great. With S90v they did more polishing then cutting, it would polish or break the vanadium off. I could never get a fresh edge on S90v , always getting micro chips, diamonds fixed that.
Best thing I ever did was get the CKTG diamond plates in 140,400,1000k they all cut through Rex45 easily . Making even steels like S90v a breeze.
I finished on 1000k diamond and strop on 1 micron diamond paste to remove any hitchhikers that may be hanging on...Rex45 has become my favorite steel, it responds well to a combo of diamond and shapton glass, it’s tough and holds a crazy sticky edge for a long long time. It also responds to stropping really well.
For the price of CKTG diamond, they can’t be beat for these tough steels, making life much easier lol.

ikaretababy wrote: ↑

Sun Aug 19, 2018 8:31 pm

I sharpened my REX45 para twice because I couldn't get the deep scratches out of the area around the heel where the factory edge gets noticeably thick. The second time I followed my usual "recipe" for sharpening ZDP and it worked out really well. Still having trouble with the heel and I will probably add the usual notch there unless someone has a good tip for that problem. This is not a knock on the finish or design of the knife by the way. For now its too fussy for my present level of skill and patience.

ejames13 wrote: ↑

Fri Feb 01, 2019 2:45 pm

Glad to know it wasn't just me! Thanks for the tip. I was looking at those today actually. I have the 140 grit and it works wonderfully for bevel setting. I will look at picking up the 400 and 1000 as well. I also want to check out the Moldmasters, but that requires buying blanks and mounting them. For $10 bucks it seems hard to beat the CKTG plates.

The Meat man wrote: ↑

Thu Feb 28, 2019 8:26 pm

The past month I've been doing some cut testing with my CPM REX 45 Military and thought I'd share the results here. Obviously, none of my tests are conclusive or scientific in any way but I hope they can give you an idea of what the steel can take.

The edge was finished at 240 grit diamond, with a bit of stropping (14 micron diamond on basswood.) The edge was very sharp and aggressive:




First, some rope cutting. I was using 3/8" manila rope, making push cuts and going from heel to tip to utilize the entire edge. The goal was to go until it couldn't slice phonebook paper.

Now, according to my notes:

Cuts 1 to 500: almost no loss of sharpness discernable. At 500, it began to have a tiny bit of hesitation when slicing the phonebook paper at 90°.

At 800, paper slicing became a little more ragged but only upon inspection. Push cutting the phonebook paper began to be difficult without being pretty careful.

900 - tore a bit when trying wavy cuts through the phonebook paper.

1,000 cuts:



1,100 cuts - no longer able to push cut the phonebook paper, but..
1,200 - ..still slicing the phonebook paper reliably. Tried shaving some arm hair at this point - definitely lost the bite but managed to scrape shave fairly cleanly after a couple passes. I also tested the force required to cut the rope at this point - averaged about 22 lbs.

1,400 - no longer able to make wavy cuts. Slicing is becoming a bit more ragged, less clean and crisp.
1,700 to 2,100 - steady increase in raggedness of paper slicing. At 2,100 cuts, I started to notice some visible edge blunting.

I ran out of rope at 2,274 cuts. At this point, reflected light was visible along the whole edge. Phonebook paper slicing was getting ragged to the point of tearing a couple times. I tried slicing copier paper and it had no problems with that. I have no idea how long it would've gone on with copier paper.

Back to the sharpening bench for a fresh edge (same finish & sharpness), then on to the obligatory cardboard cutting test. I did this when I was working late one evening.

First sheet:


I cut a total of 1,675 feet of cardboard. I stopped there not so much because it had quit slicing phonebook paper reliably, but I just got sick of slicing up cardboard. Hats off to Jim Ankerson is all I can say.



At 1,675 feet the phonebook paper slicing became kind of ragged - less reliable, and no longer sliced cleanly - but it wasn't quite beaten yet. I suspect that it might have gone on for another 500 to 800 feet yet but that's just speculation.

Next phase (after sharpening it back up) of the testing was on edge strength rather than wear resistance. Cutting through a variety of copper electrical wires:



The smallest cord cut was a standard extension cord. This time I marked off about 1.5 inches of blade and did all the push cutting with just this portion. I made 100 push cuts through the extension cord with almost loss of sharpness.

On to thicker stuff:





I did a number of loop-and-cut cuts through this thick stuff. After this I could feel some catching on phonebook paper, indicating some micro chipping. Still sliced reliably though.

I made about 20 or 30 push cuts through the rest of that cord, then moved on to this.



First I tried to push cut through it, but only got about halfway, so I finished the cut with a forceful slicing motion. I sawed through this thick bundle of wires a couple more times then called it quits.



After this, it was no longer slicing phonebook paper reliably - too much micro chipping. But it still scrape shaved and blew through copier paper:



The last bit of testing I did was on the extreme side, but I wanted to see what this steel could do. So I cut up a steel aerosol can:



Not surprisingly, this did some damage to the edge, although not as bad as I thought.



Some visible chipping along the whole edge. Slicing copier paper was iffy, but I had no trouble cutting cardboard or shaving wood:




All in all, it's a great steel and I had a lot of fun really testing and using it.

TkoK83Spy wrote: ↑

Thu Feb 28, 2019 8:33 pm

Awesome job Connor!! We haven't had a thorough test done like this in a while. A great read! Though on a much smaller scale (Para 3), with less sharpening ability, I have also been very impressed with Rex45 as well. This though...wow!

Pelagic wrote: ↑

Thu Feb 28, 2019 8:57 pm

Thank you for your contribution to the community. Nice job.

Bloke wrote: ↑

Thu Feb 28, 2019 11:08 pm

Many Thanks for your time and effort Connor! :cool:

Great real world review mate and greatly appreciated. :)

P.S. I’m sending you some detergent, degreaser and a toothbrush. :p

The Meat man wrote: ↑

Thu Feb 28, 2019 8:26 pm

The past month I've been doing some cut testing with my CPM REX 45 Military and thought I'd share the results here. Obviously, none of my tests are conclusive or scientific in any way but I hope they can give you an idea of what the steel can take.

The edge was finished at 240 grit diamond, with a bit of stropping (14 micron diamond on basswood.) Edge angle was approximately 15 dps. The edge was very sharp and aggressive:




First, some rope cutting. I was using 3/8" manila rope, making push cuts and going from heel to tip to utilize the entire edge. The goal was to go until it couldn't slice phonebook paper.

Now, according to my notes:

Cuts 1 to 500: almost no loss of sharpness discernable. At 500, it began to have a tiny bit of hesitation when slicing the phonebook paper at 90°.

At 800, paper slicing became a little more ragged but only upon inspection. Push cutting the phonebook paper began to be difficult without being pretty careful.

900 - tore a bit when trying wavy cuts through the phonebook paper.

1,000 cuts:



1,100 cuts - no longer able to push cut the phonebook paper, but..
1,200 - ..still slicing the phonebook paper reliably. Tried shaving some arm hair at this point - definitely lost the bite but managed to scrape shave fairly cleanly after a couple passes. I also tested the force required to cut the rope at this point - averaged about 22 lbs.

1,400 - no longer able to make wavy cuts. Slicing is becoming a bit more ragged, less clean and crisp.
1,700 to 2,100 - steady increase in raggedness of paper slicing. At 2,100 cuts, I started to notice some visible edge blunting.

I ran out of rope at 2,274 cuts. At this point, reflected light was visible along the whole edge. Phonebook paper slicing was getting ragged to the point of tearing a couple times. I tried slicing copier paper and it had no problems with that. I have no idea how long it would've gone on with copier paper.

Back to the sharpening bench for a fresh edge (same finish & sharpness), then on to the obligatory cardboard cutting test. I did this when I was working late one evening.

First sheet:


I cut a total of 1,675 feet of cardboard. I stopped there not so much because it had quit slicing phonebook paper reliably, but I just got sick of slicing up cardboard. Hats off to Jim Ankerson is all I can say.



At 1,675 feet the phonebook paper slicing became kind of ragged - less reliable, and no longer sliced cleanly - but it wasn't quite beaten yet. I suspect that it might have gone on for another 500 to 800 feet yet but that's just speculation.

Next phase (after sharpening it back up) of the testing was on edge strength rather than wear resistance. Cutting through a variety of copper electrical wires:



The smallest cord cut was a standard extension cord. This time I marked off about 1.5 inches of blade and did all the push cutting with just this portion. I made 100 push cuts through the extension cord with almost no loss of sharpness.

On to thicker stuff:





I did a number of loop-and-cut cuts through this thick stuff. After this I could feel some catching on phonebook paper, indicating some micro chipping. Still sliced reliably though.

I made about 20 or 30 push cuts through the rest of that cord, then moved on to this.



First I tried to push cut through it, but only got about halfway, so I finished the cut with a forceful slicing motion. I sawed through this thick bundle of wires a couple more times then called it quits.



After this, it was no longer slicing phonebook paper reliably - too much micro chipping. But it still scrape shaved and blew through copier paper:



The last bit of testing I did was on the extreme side, but I wanted to see what this steel could do. So I cut up a steel aerosol can:



Not surprisingly, this did some damage to the edge, although not as bad as I thought.



Some visible chipping along the whole edge. Slicing copier paper was iffy, but I had no trouble cutting cardboard or shaving wood:




All in all, it's a great steel and I had a lot of fun really testing and using it.

Ankerson wrote: ↑

Thu Feb 06, 2020 11:43 am

Great review. :cool: :D

A lot of work HUH? :D :eek:

The Meat man wrote: ↑

Thu Feb 06, 2020 12:22 pm

Ankerson wrote: ↑

Thu Feb 06, 2020 11:43 am

Great review. :cool: :D

A lot of work HUH? :D :eek:

Thanks! Yes it was - took me a several days all told. :)

Been awhile since I carried that Military. I should give it some more pocket time. That CPM REX 45 is neat stuff!

GarageBoy wrote: ↑

Thu Feb 06, 2020 11:34 am

What's everyone's favorite edge finish on rex 45?