finishing at 1k?

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demirtasem said:
Do you guys use a leather strop after 1k? ... Then I jumped on...,but this time it didn't bite, it slipped.
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Yep. 1K to .5u strop compound, or to 6k and same very minimal stropping. So I’m thinking super light finish on 3k and minimal stropping/maintenance with 4u compound on balsa or hard leather.
 
inferno said:
is this the regular white rod? (do they have black ones too?)
would you say it puts on a 1k-ish edge?
does the rod clog up much?
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Yes exactly - the white cheap one. It does clog up a lot, but there are ways of taking care of that (atoma treatment being the most efficient one). I have no exact idea of what edge it puts on. I’ve heard that it’s like 800 so a 1k-ish edge sounds about right. 🤷🏼‍♂️
Yeah there’s a black one too (2k finish afaik) and it would be cool to try - but I haven’t found it. Yet! 😎
 
demirtasem said:
Do you guys use a leather strop after 1k? I sharpened cheap Jknife with 54-56 HRC with Chosera 800, but I felt little resistance while I was slicing tomato. Then I jumped on Chosera 3k but this time it didn't bite, it slipped. Lastly I tried to jump to a fine leather strop (with Herald's green compound on it) after Chosera 800, this time I felt way better, smoother cuts. I wonder it makes sense or it's delusion.
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Stropping with leather, loaded with abrasives is like stropping on a finer stone. So it is not a true 1k edge...
 
Benuser said:
When maintaining my carbons I rarely have to go back to 1k or lower and perform a full sharpening. I normally use a small piece of Belgian Blue Brocken, or Hard Arkansas. A few edge leading strokes as if you were deburring is all you to need to revive an edge — almost at the level of fresh from the stones.
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I am in camp "Arkansas"....love these stones!
 
As little as possible. Sometimes just my jeans, tight against my thigh. Otherwise I tend to use a hard leather, or balsa with a fast cutting compound. I strop as the last step no matter what knife or chisel or grit I sharpen with because no matter how careful I am, there's either a minor burr or wire edge to contend with. Also considering moving from .5u boron carbide to a 4u diamond compound to see if the edge stays a little more aggressive over time.
 
demirtasem said:
Do you guys use a leather strop after 1k? I sharpened cheap Jknife with 54-56 HRC with Chosera 800, but I felt little resistance while I was slicing tomato. Then I jumped on Chosera 3k but this time it didn't bite, it slipped. Lastly I tried to jump to a fine leather strop (with Herald's green compound on it) after Chosera 800, this time I felt way better, smoother cuts. I wonder it makes sense or it's delusion.
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That makes sense to me. the Choseras finish above their stated grit rating, compared to other stones, and tomato needs some teeth.
 
demirtasem said:
Do you guys use a leather strop after 1k? I sharpened cheap Jknife with 54-56 HRC with Chosera 800, but I felt little resistance while I was slicing tomato. Then I jumped on Chosera 3k but this time it didn't bite, it slipped. Lastly I tried to jump to a fine leather strop (with Herald's green compound on it) after Chosera 800, this time I felt way better, smoother cuts. I wonder it makes sense or it's delusion.
Click to expand...

I have really been liking my Chosera 800 followed by a denim strop with diamond micron spray. I get longer lasting results with my 800 followed by my rikka 5k but but it's not as toothy. For me even though this may seem backwards my carbon steals do better at the 800 and strop. I find that Hap40 and BD1-N do really well with the 800 and 5k. I also stopped doing edge trailing strops on my stones but do a good amount of edge leading to remove the burr and this has helped a lot.
 
Ok so after some work and finishing at different grits. I most def prefer a higher grit finish on my Shirogami knives and lower grit finishes on my ****** stainless knives.
 
I've been experimenting a little lately with lower grits. SG500 -> 1 micron balsa strop. Which could be replaced with cardboard or something...

I've only used it for 2 days on my Gengetsu, so I haven't completely made up my mind.

I do like my other good knives finished on SG4k or Gesshin 4k and that's it though..
 
M1k3 said:
I've been experimenting a little lately with lower grits. SG500 -> 1 micron balsa strop. Which could be replaced with cardboard or something...

I've only used it for 2 days on my Gengetsu, so I haven't completely made up my mind.

I do like my other good knives finished on SG4k or Gesshin 4k and that's it though..
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I'm looking at getting a Gesshin 4000, i like a toothy edge, either that or the synthetic natural.
 
ian said:
I've been enjoying Cheerios boxes recently. Might have to branch out and try some different cereals, though. I wonder if there's a different quality to Special K stropping.
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try cracklin oat bran!

 
Last weekend, I spend a few hours sharpening a whole bunch of knives, using Suihiro Cerax 1000 and 3000, and Suehiro Rika 5000 stones. The knives included Wüsthof, Opinel Carbone, Aogami #2, White #2, SG-2, and HAP-40 steels.

I figured that this would be a good opportunity to figure out what grit finish I prefer for what kind of knife. Here are some observations.
  • For the Wüsthof knives, a 1000 finish followed by a few swipes on a strop with green compound is more than adequate. They get really sharp, somewhat toothy, and following up with a 3000-grit stone doesn't make them cut any better. (If anything, slightly worse for tomatoes.)
    The one exception where I do like a finer edge is for my boning knife and my (flexible) fish filleting knife. There, it does pay to go all the way to 5000. But I'm not cutting tomatoes with those knives.
  • For the Opinel knives 1000-grit grit is plenty enough. Stepping up to 3000 grit doesn't really make much of a difference.
  • With powdered steel knives (SG-2 and HAP-40), I found that they cut well after the 1000 stone and better after the 3000 stone. Still going through tomatoes perfectly. I then tried a 5000 finish. The knives were objectively sharper, slicing through paper with less effort and less noise. But they didn't work that well for tomatoes anymore. There was this tendency for the blade to glide on the skin before starting the cut. After I roughed them up a little on the 3000 stone again, they worked better for tomatoes.
  • The Aogami #2 and white #2 knives kept improving. Very good after the 3000 stone, and even better after the 5000 stone, both with paper and with tomato.
So, this is my take-away:
  • For Wüsthof, Opinel, and similar soft-steel knives, 1000 is the sweet spot. 5000 will make them cut a little better with proteins, so this is worth doing for something like a boning knife.
  • PM steels do get sharper at 5000 vs 3000 (at least when cutting paper) but, to me, don't work as well for waxy skins, so 3000 is the sweet spot for me. (3000 also works a treat when they lose the edge just a little, to freshen them up.)
  • The Aogami #2 and white #2 knives just get sharper as I follow the progression. 5000 is the sweet spot for me, except possibly for my Yanagiba, where I tend to go to 10000 because I can (but I'm not sure that the difference is really all that noticeable).
 
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Michi said:
Last weekend, I spend a few hours sharpening a whole bunch of knives, using Suihiro Cerax 1000 and 3000, and Suehiro Rika 5000 stones. The knives included Wüsthof, Opinel Carbone, Aogami #2, White #2, SG-2, and HAP-40 steels.

I figured that this would be a good opportunity to figure out what grit finish I prefer for what kind of knife. Here are some observations.
  • For the Wüsthof knives, a 1000 finish followed by a few swipes on a strop with green compound is more than adequate. They get really sharp, somewhat toothy, and following up with a 3000-grit stone doesn't make them cut any better. (If anything, slightly worse for tomatoes.)
    The one exception where I do like a finer edge is for my boning knife and my (flexible) fish filleting knife. There, it does pay to go all the way to 5000. But I'm not cutting tomatoes with those knives.
  • For the Opinel knives 1000-grit grit is plenty enough. Stepping up to 3000 grit doesn't really make much of a difference.
  • With powdered steel knives (SG-2 and HAP-40), I found that they cut well after the 1000 stone and better after the 3000 stone. Still going through tomatoes perfectly. I then tried a 5000 finish. The knives were objectively sharper, slicing through paper with less effort and less noise. But they didn't work that well for tomatoes anymore. There was this tendency for the blade to glide on the skin before starting the cut. After I roughed them up a little on the 3000 stone again, they worked better for tomatoes.
  • The Aogami #2 and white #2 knives kept improving. Very good after the 3000 stone, and even better after the 5000 stone, both with paper and with tomato.
So, this is my take-away:
  • For Wüsthof, Opinel, and similar soft-steel knives, 1000 is the sweet spot. 5000 will make them cut a little better with proteins, so this is worth doing for something like a boning knife.
  • PM steels do get sharper at 5000 vs 3000 (at least when cutting paper) but, to me, don't work as well for waxy skins, so 3000 is the sweet spot for me. (3000 also works a treat when they lose the edge just a little, to freshen them up.)
  • The Aogami #2 and white #2 knives just get sharper as I follow the progression. 5000 is the sweet spot for me, except possibly for my Yanagiba, where I tend to go to 10000 because I can (but I'm not sure that the difference is really all that noticeable).
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Thanks Michi, I just got a set of Cerax, 320, 1000, and 5000, looks like I may get a 3000 now ;) For yanagiba sharpening do you think the 3000 is needed or, using the stones you have, do you need the 3000, or ok to jump from 1000 to 5000 to 10000?
 
Have a question to you all.

I used to work with house knives at restaurant. Couple days ago I bought a MAC MTH-80 to try at work. On restaurant type polyethylene board I used it two days. At first, out of box performance was really good. No chips nothing. I worked on let's say 10-30 lbs of brussels sprouts, zucchini, squash, red/green bell pepper, onions, 40 lbs of each idaho, sweet and red potatoes. I do this process 2-3 times in a week. (I only used black MAC hone 2-3 times.)

Now it resists cutting a bit. I don't want to say dull cause it's not. It's still in decent shape (now I understand to MAC's reputation) but for example I can't easily cut tomatoes.

I can not say I'm experienced with AUS-8 steel and don't know where to stop.
So here's my question what would you suggest me:

1) Sharpen it on Chosera 800 and Strop (Herald's Red Compound)
2) Sharpen it on Chosera 800+3000 / with or without strop?
3) Thin it (cause it's brand new) and go with option 1 or option 2 above?

Thank you.
 
dafox said:
Thanks Michi, I just got a set of Cerax, 320, 1000, and 5000, looks like I may get a 3000 now ;) For yanagiba sharpening do you think the 3000 is needed or, using the stones you have, do you need the 3000, or ok to jump from 1000 to 5000 to 10000?
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I won't speak for anyone else, but I'll state that I go 800 -> 3000 -> 8000 on single-bevel knives, and that I'm finding that changing the pressure can be of use here. Considering that the correlation between grit ranges and the effects on sharpening aren't an exact science to begin with (and grit-ratings cease to be applicable above JIS 8000 anyways), I don't see a reason a priori why you can't go 1000 -> 5000 -> 10000 if you so choose. Is it the best way to go, or better than some other way? I don't know.
 
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dafox said:
I'm looking at getting a Gesshin 4000, i like a toothy edge, either that or the synthetic natural.
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If you like toothy, you'll love the Gesshin 4k. I was using the Gesshin 6k (and Shapton Pro 5k before that). Been finishing with the 4k for about a month and haven't had much desire to go back to the others (although the 6k is very nice as well, just noticeably less toothy).
 
dafox said:
Thanks Michi, I just got a set of Cerax, 320, 1000, and 5000, looks like I may get a 3000 now ;) For yanagiba sharpening do you think the 3000 is needed or, using the stones you have, do you need the 3000, or ok to jump from 1000 to 5000 to 10000?
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I initially bought the 1000 and the 5000. I added the 3000 only because I wanted a touch-up stone for re-sharpening knives that were getting a little dull, but not so dull that I'd want to put them onto the 1000.

I see no problem with going from 1000 to 5000, that's perfectly fine if you want a 5000 edge.
 
Michi said:
I initially bought the 1000 and the 5000. I added the 3000 only because I wanted a touch-up stone for re-sharpening knives that were getting a little dull, but not so dull that I'd want to put them onto the 1000.

I see no problem with going from 1000 to 5000, that's perfectly fine if you want a 5000 edge.
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On another note, do you have the Shapton glass 3000, I wonder how it compares to the Cerax 3000 for R2, paper and tomatoes?
 
demirtasem said:
Have a question to you all.

I used to work with house knives at restaurant. Couple days ago I bought a MAC MTH-80 to try at work. On restaurant type polyethylene board I used it two days. At first, out of box performance was really good. No chips nothing. I worked on let's say 10-30 lbs of brussels sprouts, zucchini, squash, red/green bell pepper, onions, 40 lbs of each idaho, sweet and red potatoes. I do this process 2-3 times in a week. (I only used black MAC hone 2-3 times.)

Now it resists cutting a bit. I don't want to say dull cause it's not. It's still in decent shape (now I understand to MAC's reputation) but for example I can't easily cut tomatoes.

I can not say I'm experienced with AUS-8 steel and don't know where to stop.
So here's my question what would you suggest me:

1) Sharpen it on Chosera 800 and Strop (Herald's Red Compound)
2) Sharpen it on Chosera 800+3000 / with or without strop?
3) Thin it (cause it's brand new) and go with option 1 or option 2 above?

Thank you.
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I'd say, alywas finish on a strop, no matter what. It's more for cleaning the edge (removing tiny burr and removing 'loose' particles) then it is an 'extra polishing' step.

Thinning is your own preference. Do you think your edge retention is good enough? You expect (want?) it to stay sharp longer? Dont thin it.
Do you want it to cut even better at first, but you are willing to touch up more often? You can thin it.
Beware of what the steel allows though. Too thin and your edge might not hold at all.

Try both finishing at 800 and 3000. You will notice what you like better. Both ways are easily adjustable if you dont like it and none of the gritts will ruin your knife...

For me, an 800 gritt finish is too coarse to call my knife 'sharp enough'. Also, the lower gritt your finish on, the better you have to become at removing burrs.
A 800 burr can't easily be stropped away. A 3k burr is easier to remove with a strop (because its much smaller and nimble)
 
Kawa said:
Try both finishing at 800 and 3000. You will notice what you like better. Both ways are easily adjustable if you dont like it and none of the gritts will ruin your knife...

For me, an 800 gritt finish is too coarse to call my knife 'sharp enough'. Also, the lower gritt your finish on, the better you have to become at removing burrs.
A 800 burr can't easily be stropped away. A 3k burr is easier to remove with a strop (because its much smaller and nimble)
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Thank you. If it was a softer steel or a German knife I would probably stop at coarse stone + strop. But I don't know yet where to stop on AUS-8 steel that's all. I'm gonna try both ways then.
 
demirtasem said:
Thank you. If it was a softer steel or a German knife I would probably stop at coarse stone + strop. But I don't know yet where to stop on AUS-8 steel that's all. I'm gonna try both ways then.
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Although the logic behind sharpening soft ss on coarser grit is sound, when hardened enough it’s not so much a matter of steel as of preferences. I mean that your AUS-8 (something like ~58 HRC) can take an edge to your liking within reason (I think 5K is the mark here), so you could decide that you like one from 800 grits best, and I sure don’t see no reason why you couldn’t take it up to the 3K if that’s what you prefer.
 
ModRQC said:
Although the logic behind sharpening soft ss on coarser grit is sound, when hardened enough it’s not so much a matter of steel as of preferences. I mean that your AUS-8 (something like ~58 HRC) can take an edge to your liking within reason (I think 5K is the mark here), so you could decide that you like one from 800 grits best, and I sure don’t see no reason why you couldn’t take it up to the 3K if that’s what you prefer.
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That's good to know. Thanks.
 
There's also the option of get sharp on low grit. Then a few passes on your higher grit, not fully smoothing out the previous stones teeth.

EDIT: It's basically what I was talking about previously. When I strop, I just do 2 passes per side.
 
I think it’s the best method with softer and med steels, when you don’t like that sharky edge out of coarse, but I was wary to say it. A couple of light edge leading strokes is my way, would you advise rather for trailing?
 
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