Mid Stage Sharpening Methods

[cadberry]

Hi All,
I wanted to find out what methods other knife makers used to get there knives down to the final edge. My own method has been to use a belt sander to get down to around a 1/32 and then finish on stones. I just purchased an atoma 140 but previously i used a dual sided hardware store stone to perform the last bit of metal removal. It takes a lot of time and hard work. Many makers here seem to post gorgeous pictures of finished knives on a regular basis and I wonder how they seem to do it so quickly. Many Thanks. - Anthony

 

[jessf]

I can only speak from my experince. Belt sand down to less than 1mm. I do this without gloves on to be mindfull of the heat then water stone the rest. The stonning takes a few hours at most. I get a useful 1200 grit edge then try it out for the week and usually go back to take the edge up to 5000.

 

[cheflivengood]

Hi All,
I wanted to find out what methods other knife makers used to get there knives down to the final edge. My own method has been to use a belt sander to get down to around a 1/32 and then finish on stones. I just purchased an atoma 140 but previously i used a dual sided hardware store stone to perform the last bit of metal removal. It takes a lot of time and hard work. Many makers here seem to post gorgeous pictures of finished knives on a regular basis and I wonder how they seem to do it so quickly. Many Thanks. - Anthony

What Grit belt do you use for final grind? You should be able to go from the belts to a 3-4 stone progression pretty quick, if your knives are thin behind the edge that is, and double bevel.

 

[Beau Nidle]

I take the edge down to around 0.4mm and then go to a 400 grit stone. See if I need to fine tune the grind anywhere and then go 1/5/8k. Then 12k if I'm feeling bored. :biggrin:

 

[cheflivengood]

Id recommend a 150-220 to set the bevel faster. My 400's are great scratch removers but dont kill metal like a atoma 140 or pink brick.

 

[cadberry]

Thanks for the replies. When I get close to the final edge I start to move up to a 120, a 240 and maybe a 320 grit belt. I try to keep things slow and cool. The knife I am currently making is a petty with a single bevel or a single chisel grind. Sometimes I am lacking in all the correct terminology. I will try to post some pictures. I am working on the wa handle and should have it glued up in a few days. This is my first completely single ground knife and it seem to take a little longer than when I have put on a little bevel at the end which feels kinda like cheating. This is also the second knife made of 52100 that i have worked on.

 

[cheflivengood]

How are you grinding the hollow on the backside, the "Ura"

 

[cadberry]

I am not grinding the backside, I don't have the tools to make a hollow grind at this point so I am only flattening it.