Question on thinning and sharpening steps

Not wanting to take anything away from the drama and amusement of the sturm und drang in the current thread on thinning and sharpening I thought I'd ask this in a new thread.

My regular sharpening and thinning process of my double bevel knives with my basic set-up of 3 stones consist of:

1. Sharpening the edge. Most often with a Bester 1200. If there are microchips to repair then I'd use a Beston 400 first, followed by the Bester 1200.

2. Thinning above the edge. Again with the Bester 1200. I thin every time I sharpen even if it's just a little bit.

3. Sharpening (more like touching up) the edge. With the Bester 1200.

4. Finishing up with a Suehiro Rika 5000 on the thinned (scratched) part and then the edge. This also includes lightly freshening up the microbevel I have put on the right/front edge.

5. On the rare occasion I'd follow up by 'polishing' with sandpaper to 800 grit. I have been thinking about getting a finer finishing stone but so far I've chosen to spend my money on knives instead. One day I will . . .

So, basically this but sometimes back and forth a couple of times between sharpening and thinning when I notice some spots I'm not satisfied with.

Am I doing this correctly in terms of the step by step? Suggestions and instructions are very welcomed. Thanks!

I don't see a problem here. I do like to add more toothiness with a light touch to a 400 anytime I touch my edge but I don't try to remove much metal and I like to refine and deburr on a 5k but other than that, I'd say you're doing great as long as your geometry doesn't get too out of whack over time.

Making sure that you are maintaining, or improving, the geometry of the knife every time it touches a stone is the only thing I would suggest.

I'd thin with the 400, its going to take a bit longer on the 1200.

If you're going to polish, I'm not sure what steel you have but consider getting some trizact pads or abrablon pads for that, and flitz or maas.

tk59 said:

I don't see a problem here. I do like to add more toothiness with a light touch to a 400 anytime I touch my edge but I don't try to remove much metal and I like to refine and deburr on a 5k but other than that, I'd say you're doing great as long as your geometry doesn't get too out of whack over time.

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Thanks for replies!

tk, I've read somewhere that very lightly touching up on a coarser stone AFTER progressing to the finishing stone will give the desired toothiness. Well, of course it would. But this sounds very counter intuitive to me. Any idea whether this really should be done?

harlock, Are trizact and abrablon pads the green scourer pads like those from 3M?

I picked a 2 stones for secondary edge regression ( wider bevels or thinning it). 8 inch length x 2 inch x 2mm thickness ( 600 grit Silicon carbide adn 1,000Grit CHina natural stone) as I prefer to place knife on the edge of table and put the stone to the edge. Light pressure used .Iniitially parallel to edge strokes but the final few strokes will be strokes pulling away from the edge at an angle. I find that I have better control with the desired angles to be applied.

At times to thin the blade area just behind the secondary bevel.. sandpaper cut to abt 3/4 inch wide .. have always preferred 3M and I normally use either 400 or 600 grit.

RGds
d



aftet the thinning regular sharpening..

Sambal said:

Thanks for replies!

tk, I've read somewhere that very lightly touching up on a coarser stone AFTER progressing to the finishing stone will give the desired toothiness. Well, of course it would. But this sounds very counter intuitive to me. Any idea whether this really should be done?

harlock, Are trizact and abrablon pads the green scourer pads like those from 3M?

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3M makes Trizact, not sure what's in it though.

Abralon is made by Mirka I think and are made of silicon carbides.

The wet/dry sanding pads found in automotive stores I've found aren't that great for removing the grind marks on the knife (it takes a long time!).

Sambal said:

...I've read somewhere that very lightly touching up on a coarser stone AFTER progressing to the finishing stone will give the desired toothiness. Well, of course it would. But this sounds very counter intuitive to me. Any idea whether this really should be done?..

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I don't see anything wrong with that, as long as you don't have a burr hanging off of your edge. The other issue is how they cut. A 400 grit edge really doesn't cut that nicely to me. Some amount of smoothing out really makes the edge achieve a balance between aggression and clean cutting that suits me, personally. Where your sweet spot is, is really a matter of preference.