Grandpa's knifes

[brucelieb]

I have enjoyed reading the posts and please tolerate a beginner hoping not to embarrass myself.
I want to get better at sharpening using and caring for my grandfathers knifes.

My grandfather was a butcher in slaughterhouses in NYC. We were very close and he passed away when I was a young man in my 20's- 50 years ago. Since then I used his knifes. Misused for decades at first. Relegated to simple yard work: utility farm knifes, fish gutting, slicing bait, rope etc.

As I got older and had a family of my own I developed a deep respect married to a sadness that I did not pay close attention to what he attempted to show me long ago. I managed to get my siblings to give up some of their share and so allowing me to put the knifes to their intended use. They did not deserve to be hanging as decorations. So I carved the thanksgiving turkey and the roast on Christmas and have begun to poorly butcher cuts of meat.

I was too young and stupid 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. Every weekend he came with a huge box of meat he broke down on the kitchen table. Although I was very big and powerful. He was short stocky and a bull who refused to allow me o help carry the boxes. My wrist swims in the watch he worn. We grew up eating meat all the time and good ribeye steaks twice a week- to the point I hated it as a kid. Now my mouth drools just thinking about a steak.

So left me a huge assortment of knifes and saws- Dexters . I'm now an old retired guy, I want to get good at sharpening and using his knifes.
The stones I have, his perhaps? Are old and not well kept. All sorts of oil was used on them. I did clean and soak them with dish soap. I took a toothbrush and scrubbed them so I can put them to use. Mostly I have no clue what I own. No clue if these were his good one. Perhaps they were my dads since one is a Norton two sided thing . The is a nameless tow sider and one is a solid piece that seems sort of fine. I used them with water yesterday not wanting to return to oil.
I think I need to take more passes. I am without schooling only self taught to -good enough sharp.

Question 1: Should I start fresh with new stones? If so which? The Norton IM200 Knife Sharpener? 300 level? Or a just Ceraxs 1000? Do I need another 5000? or should I just use his seemly fine grain old one. I really don' know how fine, having nothing to judge it by..

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 if 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.

[TazKristi]

Hi, brucelieb:
Welcome to our forum. We hope you enjoy your time with us.

Kristi

[twinboysdad]

I have enjoyed reading the posts and please tolerate a beginner hoping not to embarrass myself.
I want to get better at sharpening using and caring for my grandfathers knifes.

My grandfather was a butcher in slaughterhouses in NYC. We were very close and he passed away when I was a young man in my 20's- 50 years ago. Since then I used his knifes. Misused for decades at first. Relegated to simple yard work: utility farm knifes, fish gutting, slicing bait, rope etc.

As I got older and had a family of my own I developed a deep respect married to a sadness that I did not pay close attention to what he attempted to show me long ago. I managed to get my siblings to give up some of their share and so allowing me to put the knifes to their intended use. They did not deserve to be hanging as decorations. So I carved the thanksgiving turkey and the roast on Christmas and have begun to poorly butcher cuts of meat.

I was too young and stupid 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. Every weekend he came with a huge box of meat he broke down on the kitchen table. Although I was very big and powerful. He was short stocky and a bull who refused to allow me o help carry the boxes. My wrist swims in the watch he worn. We grew up eating meat all the time and good ribeye steaks twice a week- to the point I hated it as a kid. Now my mouth drools just thinking about a steak.

So left me a huge assortment of knifes and saws- Dexters . I'm now an old retired guy, I want to get good at sharpening and using his knifes.
The stones I have, his perhaps? Are old and not well kept. All sorts of oil was used on them. I did clean and soak them with dish soap. I took a toothbrush and scrubbed them so I can put them to use. Mostly I have no clue what I own. No clue if these were his good one. Perhaps they were my dads since one is a Norton two sided thing . The is a nameless tow sider and one is a solid piece that seems sort of fine. I used them with water yesterday not wanting to return to oil.
I think I need to take more passes. I am without schooling only self taught to -good enough sharp.

Question 1: Should I start fresh with new stones? If so which? The Norton IM200 Knife Sharpener? 300 level? Or a just Ceraxs 1000? Do I need another 5000? or should I just use his seemly fine grain old one. I really don' know how fine, having nothing to judge it by..

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 if 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.

I am assuming these are carbon steel? Man I get pretty far with Spyderco’s Sharpmaker for any steel S30V and under in hardness. VG10 and HAP40(carbon not stainless) sharpen so easy on brown rods.

[SaltyCaribbeanDfly]

Hi and welcome…I’m no expert but seems to me you should get the Sharpmaker and a new strop…it’s really pretty easy…I’m sure some of the super sharpeners on the forum will chime in eventually

[Bolster]

Welcome!

A likely issue with grand-dad's well-used (natural?) stones may be that they are dished. If not dead flat, the stones would need flattening. It's difficult to do a good job free-handing a decent edge on a dished stone. There are several techniques of stone flattening, and you may wish to search for methods of doing that. (I use a powdered abrasive on a piece of glass.) I'm going to guess that your grand-dad's stones will work fine on your grand-dad's knives, so once flat, you could freehand sharpen (if you already know how) or watch youtube videos if you don't.

I think water as a lubricant only works for stones designed for water, like Japanese water stones and diamond stones, etc. I think yesteryear's oil stones do better with light oil. But I'm not sure, check with others on that.

I gave up on freehanding knives, I didn't have the patience. I purchased a Sharpmaker like Salty suggests, which works well but is slow (unless you buy the diamond rods, which are faster) and finally graduated to an expensive guided system (a Hapstone). But it sounds like you are taking a vintage approach, and freehanding on stones would be the way to do that.

As Salty said, I'm sure some of the super freehand sharpeners will jump in. Watch the thread in the General forum called "Community Sharpening Journal" to pick up tips from experts.

viewtopic.php?f=2&t=84678

Q1 - You probably don't need to start with new stones. You may need to freshen/flatten your existing stones. You do not need high grits (say 1000+) to get good working edges. See the posts by forumite Vivi, who excels in low-grit edges.

Q2 - Blades get worn down to the point the angle of the blade makes for a "thick" or "wedgy" blade, which doesn't slice as well as it did originally due to steel loss over many sharpenings. But old steels should be able to cut as well as they ever did, if the temper hasn't been ruined by heat, grinding, etc.

Q3 - A strop is optional. You could, or you could get very keen edges without, too. Kinda depends on the style of sharpening you develop over time.