Sharpening for kitchen use

[brucelieb]

My grandfather was a butcher in slaughterhouses in NYC..
He left me a huge assortment of knifes- Dexters.
I was too young to ask him to teach me even basic knife sharpening techniques. He used the steels I now own and, if I recall correctly, he used a rather large leather strop. We grew up eating steak to the point I hated it as a kid. Now my mouth drools just thinking about a good steak.

So now, old a retired I want tog et good at sharpening and using his old knifes.
The stones I have, his perhaps? Are old and not well kept. All sorts of oil was. used on them. I cleaned and soaked them with dish soap and took a toothbrush to them so I can put them to use. I have no clue what I own. No clue if these were his good one? Two stones have are two sided and one is a solid piece. A few seem course and some finer? I used them with water yesterday not wanting to return to oil.

Question 1: Should I start fresh with new stones? If so which? The Norton IM200 Knife Sharpener? Or a just Ceraxs 1000? Do I need another or should I just use his fine looking one.

Question 2- Do steels get worn out? He left me three steels. None have texture on them It was beautiful to watch him and i don't aspire to his speed and elegance but would like to use them in it is necessary or worth the effort.

Question 3- Leather strop worth the effort? His is long gone.

Any advice would be wonderful and thank you and Merry Christmas.

[Michael Janich]

Dear Brucelieb:

Welcome to the Spyderco Forum.

Stay safe,

Mike

[Scandi Grind]

Well if your new to sharpening it could take more time than I have to write and be thorough, but I'll try to give you the basics that I have learned in short. Your first objective will be to form an apex, which basically means making the two bevels meet where your edge forms. Most people do this by sharpening until they form a burr, which means that your bevel actually crosses over the opposite side slightly and leaves a bit of metal that you can feel with your fingers, then you want to make sure you remove that burr with light pressure and alternating strokes so that you end with a clean apex.

Before you begin you will have to decide what angle you want to sharpen at, for those knives a good starting point would be 20 degrees per side. You can go down with the angle to get better cutting performance but 20 dps will take less time to get an edge for starters. Since they are likely quite dull at this point, you will want some sort of coarse stone to start with. I use a coarse EZE-Lap diamond plate a lot for Dexters. It isn't always necessary to refine the edge farther, in my experience coarse edges cut meat quite well, but if you want to refine it, I would not go beyond a 600 grit ANSI stone, or a #1000 grit Japanese whetstone, which are close to equivalent grits to each other, unless these are non-stainless carbon, then you could experiment with more polish, but I would keep it simple for starters. Bear in mind when it comes to sharpening there is definitely more than one way to skin a cat so opinions will vary on edge finish and technique.

As far as the stones you have, they may be good to use, but if they had oil used on them previously, water will not soak into them well because of the oil. New stones could be more consistent, but probably not needed for getting going. The only thing I would check is if they are flat with a straight edge. If they aren't you probably want to flatten them to get the best results and not frustrate yourself. Or you could get new stones so you know what you are working with.

If you have more questions, feel free to fire away, there are many knowledgable people here.

[sal]

Hi Brucelieb,

Welcome. This is a good place to get an Edge-U-Cation on sharpening.

First of all, a good professional steel has no texture. When you make a cut, the edge is slightly deformed with microscopic burrs that form on the edge and will eventually break off which dulls the edge molecule by molecule.

A butcher will use a smooth steel every several cuts, to re-align the edge and push those burrs back into the edge so they don't break off. He is not sharpening the knife, but keeping a sharp knife sharp without removing metal.

For sharpening, I would recommend a Spyderco Sharpmaker and a 10X - 12X magnifying loupe. The Sharpmaker will give you a bit of Edge-U-Cation, let you easily sharpen your knives, with a short learning curve. Sharpening an edge on flat stone does have a substantial learning curve. The loupe will give you the power to look closely at the edge to see what you are doing.

sal

[zhyla]

Question 1: Should I start fresh with new stones? If so which?

Those stones will likely last forever. You’ve cleaned them up, I’m sure they will work fine.

Sal recommends a Sharpmaker. I get that he’s recommending that as a relatively foolproof sharpening setup. I don’t love it for large fixed blades personally. But if you find you can’t get freehanding on flat stones to work you could fall back to the Sharpmaker.

Question 2- Do steels get worn out? He left me three steels. None have texture on them

They don’t. Sal explained their use. They make sense if you don’t have access to a sharpening system. Otherwise I would much rather touch up the edge by sharpening when needed rather than bother with a steel.

Question 3- Leather strop worth the effort? His is long gone.

Eh… again, would rather just sharpen when needed.

As noted by others, kitchen knives do really well at medium grit finishes. 600 grit works great. Since you have unknown grit stones you’ll have to make some guesses.

Also choose your bevel angles carefully. Western kitchen knives are often unbelievably obtuse — 30 degrees included angle (15 dps) on up to 60 (30 dps) for cleavers. For knives that never touch bone you want the more acute end of that.

[standy99]

As a Ex-butcher. That still has all my dads stuff and mine.

1) steels are all good as SAL explained above.

2) You should use straight dishwashing liquid withe the stones for best effect. Rinse with water after

3) If the stones are old like my dad’s, they are good stones and worth keeping. If they have a slight groove to them it is a great guide to how they were used. Mine have a definite groove if aligned the right way you can follow the groove for help in sharpening. (Many will say you need flat stones but I have always found worn out stones help in guiding the knife especially short boning knives)

4) You can take any darkness off old carbon knives with a 1000 grit wet and dry sandpaper.

5) Strop, was a butcher for 20 years and make knives myself now and never used or use a strop. But each to their own as many do.

[brucelieb]

Well if your new to sharpening it could take more time than I have to write and be thorough, but I'll try to give you the basics that I have learned in short. Your first objective will be to form an apex, which basically means making the two bevels meet where your edge forms. Most people do this by sharpening until they form a burr, which means that your bevel actually crosses over the opposite side slightly and leaves a bit of metal that you can feel with your fingers, then you want to make sure you remove that burr with light pressure and alternating strokes so that you end with a clean apex.

Before you begin you will have to decide what angle you want to sharpen at, for those knives a good starting point would be 20 degrees per side. You can go down with the angle to get better cutting performance but 20 dps will take less time to get an edge for starters. Since they are likely quite dull at this point, you will want some sort of coarse stone to start with. I use a coarse EZE-Lap diamond plate a lot for Dexters. It isn't always necessary to refine the edge farther, in my experience coarse edges cut meat quite well, but if you want to refine it, I would not go beyond a 600 grit ANSI stone, or a #1000 grit Japanese whetstone, which are close to equivalent grits to each other, unless these are non-stainless carbon, then you could experiment with more polish, but I would keep it simple for starters. Bear in mind when it comes to sharpening there is definitely more than one way to skin a cat so opinions will vary on edge finish and technique.

As far as the stones you have, they may be good to use, but if they had oil used on them previously, water will not soak into them well because of the oil. New stones could be more consistent, but probably not needed for getting going. The only thing I would check is if they are flat with a straight edge. If they aren't you probably want to flatten them to get the best results and not frustrate yourself. Or you could get new stones so you know what you are working with.

If you have more questions, feel free to fire away, there is are many knowledgable people here.

Thanks Scandi! Merry Christmas to you... (I think this is how I reply/respond , as I said I'm new here and only saw the quote option.. But I will figure it out.)

"water will not soak into them well because of the oil." So I should use mineral oil on them? About how much? drops?
B

[brucelieb]

Hi Brucelieb,

Welcome. This is a good place to get an Edge-U-Cation on sharpening.

First of all, a good professional steel has no texture. When you make a cut, the edge is slightly deformed with microscopic burrs that form on the edge and will eventually break off which dulls the edge molecule by molecule.

A butcher will use a smooth steel every several cuts, to re-align the edge and push those burrs back into the edge so they don't break off. He is not sharpening the knife, but keeping a sharp knife sharp without removing metal.

For sharpening, I would recommend a Spyderco Sharpmaker and a 10X - 12X magnifying loupe. The Sharpmaker will give you a bit of Edge-U-Cation, let you easily sharpen your knives, with a short learning curve. Sharpening an edge on flat stone does have a substantial learning curve. The loupe will give you the power to look closely at the edge to see what you are doing.

sal

Thanks Sal interesting gizmo..

[brucelieb]

Wow..so cool thanks to all..I think I want to get good at the stones and avoid a system. For now. Frustration will lead me to new choices I bet. I did not get the groove on the old stone thing.. I have a stone that is NOT flat and has a worn down center, like a ski slope. That night be want you mean by a groove. Seems the old man must have used only the center portion? I love that the strop is not needed. Looked so cool when grandpa used it , like an old barbershop..It has been
40 years since this bald head walked into a barbershop so I don't know if any of those guys still use them either. Got to thank you all...It is sort of thrilling. Knowing the steels are good..I'll use them, for now, just for? tradition? Memory sake? But tomorrow I be ready for that whole rib roast the bride insisted on serving . I will try to layout all grandpa's gear and figure out how to take a pic and actually post it... Ha haha

[WillyK]

Plus one on the Sharpmaker. I have a butcher knife that I could never get a satisfactory edge on. I recently purchased a Spyderco Sharpmaker and introduced the butcher knife to it for some quality time together. I used the knife yesterday to carve a prime rib roast- that blade went through that roast like it was made of butter. Very glad I bought the Sharpmaker and highly recommend it.

[sal]

Hi WillyK,

Welcome to our forum.

Hey Brucelieb,

I think the Spyderco Gauntlet Sharpener would serve you will. It's simple, easy to use and offers razor sharp results. It's another "interesting Gizmo".

sal

[Scandi Grind]

Thanks Scandi! Merry Christmas to you... (I think this is how I reply/respond , as I said I'm new here and only saw the quote option.. But I will figure it out.)

"water will not soak into them well because of the oil." So I should use mineral oil on them? About how much? drops?
B

Merry Christmas to you too! Yes that is one way to reply unless you want to manually address someone to avoid reposting their entire post which sometimes is overkill.

About your stones, I just saw that you said you soaked them with soap, I'm not sure if that or any other method could remove the oil in the stone, I've never tried to do that before, but if you do continue using oil, the amount you use may depend a bit on preference. I have never owned oil stones, so I don't have much personal experience to lean on in giving advice for that. There is some sort of honing oil that stones usually come with, I'm not sure what it is though and for some reason I'm not immediately finding anyone selling the oil by itself. I would think that you could probably use mineral oil, but I can't confidently say, so I defer to someone with more experience with oil stones.

It is natural for stones to dish in the center faster than the outer edges, and if oil stones are similar enough to whetstones, a cheap way to flatten them is to get a piece of flat glass or granite and use a spray adhesive to stick sandpaper to it, then flatten your stones with that. A friend of mine uses a 60, 120, 220 grit sandpaper progression for flattening badly dished whestones, I think that will work with oil stones as well. You may need to use oil to keep things smooth while flattening, and you will probably need "wet or dry" type sandpaper. When it gets close to flat, with a pencil you can draw a grid on your stone, then rub it until that grid disappears, then refine the surface with the finer sandpaper.

[Water Bug]

I sharpen my mother's kitchen knives, especially to get them ready for the holidays. To do this, I use the Spyderco Tri-Angle Sharpmaker (204MF) because I just can't quite get the flat stone sharpening technique down... that said, having used the Sharpmaker for so long has given me some amount of confidence in using flat stones for sharpening...

...Sometimes I encounter one of my mother's kitchen knives that is super dull, so much so that using the Sharpmaker to get an edge is all but impossible, BUT, the Sharpmaker can be converted into a "flat stone set-up" and I've actually been able to get an edge started using the Spyderco Tri-Angle Diamond Stones (204D) in such a configuration. So, I've found using the Sharpmaker has given me some insight into using a flat stone for sharpening knives.

Concur with others who've noted that flat stones typically last, especially if taken care of. My father had quite a few flat stones that he used for years... that man knew how to make flat stones sing when it came to knife sharpening, and he tried showing me how to use flat stones, but I just never got the hang of it. That's why I'm thankful to Sal and Spyderco for making the Sharpmaker available.

My Sharpmaker set-up is similar to what my father had when it came to his flat stones... course, medium, and fine. If I learned anything from him on knife sharpening it was you use a progression of sharpening by using the course stone first to start the edge, go to medium stone to refine it to a working edge, then go to fine stone to get a keen edge.

My father also used sharpening steels and leather strops on his knives while he used them. He wasn't a butcher, but he did a lot of woodworking, and amongst all the woodworking tools he used was a knife... to him, his knife was probably the most important tool for him when it came to fine, detailed work. As he always told me (and as Sal and others noted), the sharpening steel and leather strop help to realign the knife's edge to keep it sharp. As my father would describe it, steeling and/or stropping your knife from time to time extends the duration of the edge, thus reducing the need to sharpen the knife, thus reducing the wear on the knife and thus increasing its useful life.

Another question you asked is about use of sharpening/honing oils or water on flat stones. There are both "water" and "oil" flat stones, so depending on which one you have will determine whether you use water or oil when sharpening with them. When it comes to sharpening/honing oils, there are many brands available, AND, if you plan on using the knives for food preparation then a good sharpening stone oil that is made of natural, highly refined light mineral oil would be a good choice... such an oil is a pharmacopia grade oil, which is safe for use on kitchen tools. Norton makes such an oil and is the one I use when I try using a Norton flat stone for sharpening (please see the link below)...

https://www.sharpeningsupplies.com/Nort ... l-P32.aspx

Hope the above information helps.

Welcome to the Forum!

[brucelieb]

Thanbk you all for the info. I'm soaking the stones and using them with water. Don't know if I'm hurting them but so far , with my limited knowledge - they seem ok?

I'm sticking to hand "stoning" . If I don't try, and keep trying, I will never master it. I'm committed to it.