LF 200 ish grit stone ideas?

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Hay Guys,

Need some advice for a portable low grit, something in the 150 to 220 range.

I sharpen quite a lot of knives for other people at their premises. These tend to be German steel Chef's posing as butter knives often with scalloped edges. Got to love a sharpening rod in the hands of the masses.

Am currently using a DMT 200 ish mesh plate. It works fine except... its wearing out and I'm not a fan of how diamonds feel so am looking for a stone to replace it.

Needs to be portable, a splash and go, and durable. A lot of these poor knives are scalloped so the stone needs to be able to grind down those lovely German bolsters as well as reprofile the blade without dishing and getting mangled.

So what do you guys think?
 
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shapton glass 220 is probably the fastest 220 I have used and it also travels very well

personally I think SG220 is a really nice stone, for a synthetic.

also the big pink 220 from JKI could be a good option, as well.
 
220 is nice, but dishes fast and is shapton glass thin, so you’ll need to replace it soon. I also like the SG 120, which doesn’t dish as fast. Some people think it loads too much tho.

But yea, for bolster work something more aggressive would help.... I’d hate to reduce a bolster on a low grit stone. Waste of stone...
 
Hay Guys,

Need some advice for a portable low grit, something in the 150 to 220 range.

I sharpen quite a lot of knives for other people at their premises. These tend to be German steel Chef's posing as butter knives often with scalloped edges. Got to love a sharpen rod in the hands of the masses.

Am currently using a DMT 200 ish mesh plate. It works fine except... its wearing out and I'm not a fan of how diamonds feel so am looking for a stone to replace it.

Needs to be portable, a splash and go, and durable. A lot of these poor knives are scalloped so the stone needs to be able to grind down those lovely German bolsters as well as reprofile the blade without dishing and getting mangled.

So what do you guys think?

shapton glass 220 or pro 220. these are really good and fast stones. there is about 7-8mm stone on the glass.

pro 120 might be nice too sometimes. maybe glue a 120 to a 220 and have a good dual coarse stone for cheap?
 
Yeah, the shapton stones are going to be your best bet for portable coarse stones. They cut fast, and stay flatter than others.

For reducing bolsters I use an atoma 140 personally. Will always be flat, cuts a bolster down no problem, and has other uses like flattening, its worth the money imo. The file is a good cheaper option.
 
for actual german "full" bolsters, the best would be a coarse file for the heavy lifting.
 
I have been using a shapton pro 220 the last two weeks, on some old forgecrafts. I'm enjoying it thus far...I will be watching close to see how fast it dishes.
 
what about one of those small belt grinders for the bolsters? "work sharp" i think.

edit: Knife & Tool Sharpener - Work Sharp Sharpeners
89bux retail.

KTS-Hero-510x510.jpg
 
For a 220 stone pink brick. For something to reduce a bolster either a power tool or file, I’ve done a few sets of these by hand with a file; it needs to be a file for hard steel because even knives that are soft to us are towards the harder end of metal in general. Mine are by Bahco. I just ordered a Baryonyx “American mutt” which looked potentially promising for coarse work but it isn’t here yet.
 
For a 220 stone pink brick. For something to reduce a bolster either a power tool or file, I’ve done a few sets of these by hand with a file; it needs to be a file for hard steel because even knives that are soft to us are towards the harder end of metal in general. Mine are by Bahco. I just ordered a Baryonyx “American mutt” which looked potentially promising for coarse work but it isn’t here yet.
Where is the American mutt in stock?
 
Where is the American mutt in stock?

Looks like the manafactures website has them.
https://www.baryonyxknife.com/baamubest.html
Mine are by Bahco. I just ordered a Baryonyx “American mutt” which looked potentially promising for coarse work but it isn’t here yet.

Thing looks great. Def order one. Its cheap. I love the description of it. Looks like their brain trust got together, looked at what abrasive compounds where available and said, "throw it all in there".
 
BYXCO also have a stone called a Manticore that looks ultra aggressive ( 60 grit SIC ). As cheap as these things are, no reason not to try them. Will order that with one of the Mutts.
 
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Got the Mutt today. It’s pretty wicked; grinds about as fast as anything. I’m doing a repair I thought I’d never actually get done at least with hand tools. It loads somewhat fast but doesn’t dish nearly as fast as either a pink 220 or a Sigma. Doesn’t make a terrible sound and will flatten with an Atoma, although we’ll see how long it takes to kill it. And it’s cheap - can’t ask for much more than that. Kind of thirsty but not super messy and certainly no worse than the other two.
 
Update: I thought it was in this thread but must be in another one where someone mentions that the mutt gets slick and won’t release abrasive. I noticed this after getting through the first surface and needing to dress it; lapping with an Atoma made it too smooth, SG 120 and coarse Crystolon not much better although they leave their own grit behind. Regular dressing stones/synthetic nagura type things just grind down and don’t help.

The answer was a Norton stone fixer, dark green SiC grooved one - that does the trick quite admirably.
 
I thought it was in this thread but must be in another one where

Yup, got a Mutt and a Manticore to play with.

Found the Mutt glazed really fast as I couldn't apply enough pressure to get it to release fresh abrasive. Like you, I also found the 140 diamond plate left the surface too smooth for it to cut well.

The Manticore was better but released abrasives in clumps which ultimately lead to a super raggedy edge.
I did try it from a thinning perspective on a beater and it left random deep scratches. How deep? Deep enough that I'm not going to try to get them out with stones, rather the knife will find its way onto the belt grinder in a few days.

One test where the Manticore did do well was in grinding down bolsters. It grinds pretty fast without getting gouged so I'll add it to my sharpening kit for knives like that.

My conclusion is that they are decent and affordable "grinding" stones where you can apply enough pressure to make them work, am thinking axes etc, but for kitchen knives, very limited uses.
 
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Me thinks you need two solutions. Fixing, reshaping, any other work on edges, are the provence of a good low grit stone. My preference is SG220 but there are plenty of others. To work on a bolster begs for a different solution, a diamond plate, rasp file, belt, etc will do the job better and will save life on your stone. Been there, done that, killed a stone trying to keep some Henks bolsters in-line with the blade edge.
 
Don't have a Mutt but do have a Manticore. Fantastic stone but I agree that it has limited applications in the kitchen knife world.

I bought mine for re-profiling pocket and hunting knives where aesthetics aren't important. It chews through steel like a beast and can leave a serviceable edge even if you don't go up (though I surely would).

These stones have a strong bias for the brush tool and sporting knife industry.
 
Are they soaking-stones or splash-and-go?

Sorta in between.

I use mine with oil so it doesn't matter. However, Benjamin (inventor) uses water. He makes his stones in bench and scythe form. For the scythe stones, he also offers a belt-worn plastic case that is designed to hold a little water so the stones are always soaking up a little bit. But that's largely because you're in the field for long periods and needing to touch up your soft-edged tools.

The Manticore is so coarse I don't see it really holding water all that well. I suspect Benjamin would say splash and go would work but can't say for sure.

Because it is so coarse, I wanted to prolong clogging as long as possible and chose oil.

BYXCO "Manticore" Bench Stone
 
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