Knife sharpening - place to discuss sharpening, sharpeners, and sharpening accessories. Probably not legal in Europe.

[Hamstirer]

First thread so don't mind me if I do it wrong or format it retard cuz muh mobilz.

Let's talk sharpening.

I grew up using pretty mediocre sharpened knives, none were butter knife dull but basically Walmartish kitchen knives sharpened on a pull through or a cheap powered sharpener and then ran over a honing steel. The last few years I've been collecting some actual usable and decent knives (victorinox) and they are in need of some love.


I bought a cheaper stone set a while back and I can put a decent edge on stuff sometimes but I don't get to use it enough to really get the muscle memory to hold the right angle. I've been looking at some sharpeners like worksharp and the rolling diddlers but I really don't know what to go with. I basically just want to be able to rip out a good, quick, sharp, edge on my chef, boning, and pocket knives.



I have enough other projects that I just don't have time to be able to practice and really get the feel for stones. Any suggestions?

 

[Justtocheck]

I also suck at hand sharpening, I have a honing stone. I'm considering buying a pocket sharpener from Smith. May check some reviews in the 'tube. But yeah, hand sharpening is very hard.

 

[Troonos]

I've been hand sharpening on waterstones and diamond plates for like a decade, and I'm still horrible at it. lol

 

[Badungus Kabungus]

If you're new to sharpening but want good results, get a Spyderco Sharpmaker plus a set of ultra fine stones for it, watch on YouTube how to use it. It helps keep the angle consistent and can sharpen serrated edges too.

In the field I just use a small DMT three stone kit and a small strop. Axes get the axe file, nothing fancy. Tomahawks get a file, then ceramics to get a nicer cutting edge.

Wouldn't recommend those pull-through Smith sharpeners, they leave a terrible edge.

 

[Lord Xenu]

I'm no expert, but I've been at it for about 10 years as well. From my experiences, a turnbox type setup is the easiest & cheapest way for an unskilled sharpener. Afterwards, I use a leather strop and clay sharpening compound. But you have to keep on it. If the edge is done or it needs to be reprofiled its not going to cut it.

I've tried a few different things, chinese jig setups (clones of the $300 edge pro system) with upgraded stones get the best edge for me, but they're a bit of a pain to get rigged up and just aren't great for some smaller/larger knives, or ones with an unusual shape. I'd like to keep one set up and bolted to my work bench but I dont have enough room for it right now. When I do, I'll probably use it more.

First I bought this one, but it was hard to do smaller blades.

So I hot glued neodymium magnets to the underside of the plastic deck, and it works pretty good now. It is the best one for small blades because I can move the blade around, so long as Im careful to keep the flat side of the blade flush.

Later I bought this type, because I thought it might work better with clamping jaws for the blade ( protip: use masking tape to keep from marking up the blade).

It does work better on medium sized kitchen knives etc, but as I said, the other one allows you to move smaller blades (pocket knives) around and try to preserve the angle on the belly of the knife. Both of these jigs have a problem where larger knives only contact the corners of the whetstone on the extreme ends of the blade.

When I get around to doing some sharpening I will take and post pictures of the results.

 

[Dr. Ricearoni]

I've actually just bought my first water stone for sharpening, my first attempt wasn't perfect but it's very zen. I might practice on my older knives sometime, see if I can get good at it.

Oh yeah, as far as sharpening goes, I might as well leave some basic information I learned while studying how best to go about it.

First off, these doohickeys

This is not a knife sharpener and I'm told some people think it is, but you should definitely get one if you intend to maintain your knife. This is a steel honing rod and it helps maintain your knife's edge. When you cut things, the edge tends to get microscopically misshapen and a few drags along this rod on each side of the edge straightens it back out. It keeps your knife sharp for longer and maintains the overall health of the blade. I'm told you can achieve the same effect with the bottom of a ceramic plate, but I don't have any so I can't personally attest to that.


This is, in fact, a knife sharpener. They come in many forms but this is the first result on Google and generally it consists of ceramic/steel blades crossed together for you to run the edge along. It will do the job but it will not do it well. It peels away at the edge with force and abrasion and the edge you get from it will be poor and hard to maintain.
Pictured below is a knife edge sharpened through one of these compared to a properly sharpened knife's edge


Ew!

Gorgeous!

It gets the job done quick, but I'd only use it with shitty knives you don't intend to hang onto.


This is a whetstone (i think because it's a porous stone you get wet, or so I'm told) or a water stone as I've heard them called by people smarter than me. This is your manual sharpening tool, you dunk it in water to lubricate it then gently drag your knife at a 22 degree angle all along the edge until it's sharp then flip it to the fine grit and do it again. It takes some time and practice but if you want a knife that cuts well and lasts a long time it's well worth the work. I'm told there's also stones made to be used with oil, but oil is messy so I can't imagine it's any better than using nice clean water.


This is an electric sharpener. It is expensive, noisy, and is basically a meat grinder that is hungry for your knife. Do not use it unless you hate yourself, hate your knife, hate cooking, and hate your wallet.

No matter how you choose to sharpen your knife, for the love of god wash it off before you cut into anything!

There's better ways to get your iron intake.

Anyways, take what I've said with a grain of salt, I'm far from an expert, just very curious about taking care of my kitchenware.

 

[WhatInTheActualFuck]

I hand-sharpen in a manner similar to that used by guys sharpening chisels. I use double-sided tape to attach silicon carbide sandpaper (just buy one of those 400-3000 grit assortment packs from Amazon) to a flat piece of glass and use it as you would any waterstone. Finish with white and then green compound on a strop and you get a nice polished edge that lasts a good long while as long as you give it a few licks on a honing steel and a quick rinse before each use.

It's a bit tedious, but you get a crazy sharp edge that requires very little maintenance.

 

[God's drunkest driver]

There is some big time knife sharpening autism in the already autistic knife communities. Microscope views of the results has shown that honing rods are borderline counterproductive, pull through sharpeners remove too much material for mediocre results, and that nothing really comes close to the results of a graduated grit stone sharpening. Piggybacking off of their efforts that include all sorts of instrumented tests and close ups of blades showing edges and burrs, I've determined that realistically, unless you want to spend too much money for no good reason, something like this is all you need to easily sharpen your household knives, and if you want a more difficult but nuanced solution go on one of the knife sharpening sites or youtube channels and pick up a set of recommended stones. It's just harder to get the angle right with stones than a guided setup which is why I eventually stopped using mine.

(edit)
Don't @ me about how that sharpener I linked won't sharpen your machete or scimitar karambit micro concealable, I said household knives for a reason, because other than a pocket knife that's really all most people have and if you have specialty stuff you obviously need something different.

 

[Badungus Kabungus]

Few years ago after delving into sharpening autism on bladeforums.com I ended up getting one of these through some friends: https://shop.gossmanknives.com/shop/ols/products/gst-gossman-survival-tool-small

Works surprisingly well for a textured chunk of of D2. I tried it with S110V, S30V, VG10 and other steels all with decent results.

 

[Lichen Bark]

I sharpen my kitchen knife once a year on whetstones. I have, and continue to use the spyderco/lansky sharpeners, they are great, and taught me a lot about sharpening, but if you need to bring an edge back, the whetstones can do it a lot faster. Especially if you're working with a long knife, a high hardness steel, or if you need to sharpen woodworking chisels.

If the stropping the kitchen knife on leather didn't bring the sharpness back so well, I would probably sharpen it more. I think the harder steel holds the edge well, and for a much longer time. The downside is obviously cost, but somehow I managed to snag it on a deep discount years ago. The other chefs knife that I have can't hold an edge for very long, the steel is softer, it's quick to sharpen, but depressing when you have to do it often. The whetstones probably cost me more than the knife though. I bought 4 of those fancy Japanese stones, a holder, and a flattening stone.

I found the prospect of using whetstones a little intimidating at first. Especially since I've seen many poorly sharpened knives using whetstones. I thought this guy has a pretty good tutorial on whetstone sharpening, very detailed, but helpful on his method. The key bit of information is understanding burr formation, and what that means when you sharpen. (12min mark first video) It's a bit long, and the method step involves some counting, but it gives nice results. I've manged to apply similar knowledge to a badly abused pair of pruning shears, and the whetstones helped me bring those back from the brink.

Spoiler: Sharpening and polishing videos

 

[Dean Pentel]

I wanted to get good at sharpening anything I'd ever use. I asked one of my friends that's a professional knifemaker for initial lessons. After that I went to thrift stores in my area and bought some knives from them for practice. You can also use local Dollar Tree/Dollar General type stores for this too.

I like diamond stones for hand sharpening. I use DMT and Eze-Lap bench stones. If I need to get into serrations I use DMT folding rods. I also have some of their pocket sharpeners I'll take camping/hunting. They work well. For axes or garden tools I use SVST Superchrome files. Those things are fantastic, I can't recommend them highly enough.

I'll still use bench stones for some stuff, like some of my kitchen knives or my kamisori (throw in a Cold Steel extra fine ceramic stone on that one). I wanted things to go faster so I looked at some powered options. I immediately dismissed the Work Sharp stuff. If you're into it, that's fine, but I think those are fucking gay and lame. I thought about a Tormek T-8, which I've no doubt work well, but fucking hell are those expensive. If I was doing sharpening professionally or something like that I'd probably have one. I opted for a Rikon 50-161 that I setup on a stand I made for it in my shed. I have a lighted magnifier mounted on the cart too so I can check the edge of something closely if need be.

I like to use the belt sander for when I'm sharpening stuff for friends and family, or if something I have just needs a quick touch-up. I also use it to put a convex edge on stuff quickly, an edge geometry I've come to enjoy.

I get my belts from Red Label Abrasives. I personally stop at 240 grit now. I used to go up to 400 grit but that was a bit too fine an edge for what I use most of my knives for.

Here's a picture of my setup.

 

[IdiotPlusPlus]

I like to use the belt sander for when I'm sharpening stuff for friends and family, or if something I have just needs a quick touch-up. I also use it to put a convex edge on stuff quickly, an edge geometry I've come to enjoy.

I have seen people in the past make/buy 'paper' grinding wheels for the twin wheel type bench grinders, where they put car buffing compound on and the combination of paper+compound putting a sharp edge on, dunno how practical is is for normal sharpening tho

 

[Dean Pentel]

I have seen people in the past make/buy 'paper' grinding wheels for the twin wheel type bench grinders, where they put car buffing compound on and the combination of paper+compound putting a sharp edge on, dunno how practical is is for normal sharpening tho

I bought a leather buffing wheel for that side when I put this together in '21. I never mounted it because I needed more hardware to do so. Not long after I saw a video on using bassword boards and diamond emulsion sprays to strop blades, so that's what I use now. The wheel would be faster but I'll get around to it later.

 

[Maori Kiwifruit Growers]

So I got a who bunch of sharpening stuff as a gift from a friend all sharpel stuff. Is there a babys first basic guide to free hand sharpening where they literally "hold your hand" through the whole process? I don't want to fuck up my blades by accident

 

[Frostnipped Todger]

I'm a huge fan of the Fallkniven DC-3. I use it to keep all of my kitchen and hunting/fishing knives razor sharp. Totally worth the (small) investment.

https://www.knifeshopaustralia.com.au/fallkniven-dc3-diamond-ceramic-sharpening-stone?srsltid=AfmBOoq_zA4tjWg1T3BQlTTzwoCClxOVCQQjw6c5qOy58SSRRaqSE9cv

 

[WhatInTheActualFuck]

So I got a who bunch of sharpening stuff as a gift from a friend all sharpel stuff. Is there a babys first basic guide to free hand sharpening where they literally "hold your hand" through the whole process? I don't want to fuck up my blades by accident

I currently use the Sharpal large dual-grit diamond plate. Great for reprofiling (if necessary) and sharpening - just follow it up with white compound on a strop and you're good to go. The videos linked a little bit upthread are a solid resource to get you started, and that Burrfection YT channel is generally worth checking out if you're into knives.

 

[Esope]

So I got a who bunch of sharpening stuff as a gift from a friend all sharpel stuff. Is there a babys first basic guide to free hand sharpening where they literally "hold your hand" through the whole process? I don't want to fuck up my blades by accident

buy a cheap carbon steel blade, smear the blade edge with ink and use a cheap water stone so sharpen it, practice makes perfect so don't be bummed if you fail the first time

 

[Adolf Hulkler]

Been using one that is like this, i stripped and modified it.(can change the direction)
Why?
Because going from 40grit to next one takes 5 seconds. I dont use the belt i have a bigger machine for that, i use the disk.
Good for polishing too because 4000 grit abralon exists but theyre pretty expensive (5 bucks for one disc)
Depends on what im sharpening if i use the machine or just normal stones.

 

[Shroom King]

I have a hand axe with a chipped blade and a garden hoe that is completely dull. Is a whetstone a waste of time for these?

 

[WhatInTheActualFuck]

I have a hand axe with a chipped blade and a garden hoe that is completely dull. Is a whetstone a waste of time for these?

You can go that route, but for stuff like that where I don't need a super fine edge, I like Lansky sharpening stones like this or this.