gc0220
Banned
Shapton Glass 500 would have taken care of it, and produced much better results than diamond plates. That's what I'd use on anything like that if you're starting with a truly dull blade. I typically use the 1000 grit glass to do stuff like hap40, which it makes quick work of compared to other stones, even say a 2k shapton pro, which is what I use for sharpening most things. That aggressive cutting is also why the glass stones, even at 16k, aren't great for delicate edges like carbon straight razors.Ive seen plenty of people debate it.
And in todays age, someone could get diamond plates for just as cheap as any waterstone out there. Having one of the small blue dmt coarse stones, is pretty much all someone would need to get a very nice edge on most of these steels, while taking out a lot of the trouble that comes with sharpening them.
I still remember someone brining me a cpm 10v knife a while back, before i knew anything about this. I tried to sharpen it for them on my chosera 800, which was what i used for pretty much anything i had gotten to sharpen at the time. It was like i was rubbing it on a wet piece of glass. I cant remember how long it took to get a burr but it seemed like it must have been at least 20 minutes if not longer. It didnt help that the knife was extremely dull, but still.
Had i have used something with like a diamond plate, it would have been the same as sharpening a normal steel. At least thats my experience now, when sharpening them using diamonds.
I certainly think anyone that can afford a knife with these steels can afford one diamond plate at the very least.
Honestly Shapton glass stones I think, despite all the praise they do get, are very much under-rated and perhaps misunderstood. The only downside is the price and only getting 5 mm of abrasive.
The resin bonded diamond stones Naniwa sells are also worth a look if you have a lot of knives made of these type of steels. IMO they're especially useful in the higher grits, that's where they really shine. If you're just needing 1000 grit or below, you can get it done on regular stuff like even a shapton pro, or more ideally yet the glass. Without something like that, I don't even bother trying to freehand a high grit polished edge on stuff like hap40 at 65+ rc.
imo this is one of the things that makes ZDP such a genius steel for high end knives. Despite what some people say, and boy is there a lot of bs and misinfo and mythology out there, the stuff readily takes a screaming edge and it's much easier to get there than with basically any other steel that offers similar levels of performance vis a vis abrasion resistance and hardness. So the tradeoff with something hap40 isn't just do you want more stainlessness or more toughness, the ZDP is much more "machinable" and seems to readily take super fine edges, the HAP40 is a damn nightmare to deal with, if you're used to sharpening things to the standards of hair whittling every time at least. It's almost like Hitachi knew what they were doing. There's a reason the ZDP is specifically a cutlery steel and the HAP40 is a tool steel that was repurposed for knifemaking by some people. According to Hitachi blue #1 is the best of their carbon steels for kitchen knives, and I agree with them, which is another little tidbit I'm sure people here know about but isn't otherwise widely known.