Sharpening ceramic knives with shapton pro?

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TRPV4

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Is this possible, out of interest only
 
It's a generally held belief that diamond abrasives are required to sharpen ceramic blades, but I can't speak from personal experience.
 
I'll let you know in a week or so.
Can I inquire as to the results or findings of sharpeing the ceramic blade?
Just had a session with a chipped up 1.99 ceramic blade.....FML!
Used a atoma 400, 1200 and a surgical arkansas. The issue now is freehand bevel accuracy, not quite a blood letter yet.
 
I got 6 ceramic knives. If the sky doesn't fall on me, I'll get to it tomorrow. I'm aiming to get a more workable approach and using things most people might have. I just realised I don't have any Shapton Pro with me, except 120, but I do have some of the Glass stones and a fair bit of other sharpening stuff. Let's see what can be achieved with Atoma 400 and 1200, Spyderco medium and fine, Norton's India Fine and Coarse, Coarse and fine SiC, Soft and hard arks, some Choseras, maybe a coticule, ceramic and diamond hone (Suehiro) and Dick Micro. Ideally, I would have used a new knife for every test, but I just can't do that. It is what it is...
 
i would aim at above 8k at least, pro or glass. then the cleavage/edge cracking would be minimal just by looking at the micrographs on SoS. i'd say its proven that glass stones will outperform diamonds by far with these blades.
i'm glad i dont have any of them.
 
i'm glad i dont have any of them
I tried one of those quite expensive Kyocera knives at a friend's place a few years ago. I was a bit underwhelmed. The knife was undeniably very sharp, but I didn't like the way it felt and handled. In particular, I thought it was too light, and there was essentially no feedback while cutting. I can see though how such a knife would be useful to someone with arthritis or some such.

My friend's knife didn't last all that long. It dropped off the bench one day and snapped, and that was the end of it.
 
Kyocera and the like are well placed with older folks and those with arthritis that can use them.. Tough to sharpen well but I've made them better than they were with Shapton Pro. Imagine SG would be even better. Typical softer stones would be waste of time.

They do offer lifetime sharpening (and warranty) for the cost of shipping. Definitely not for me but 82 yr old mom likes em.
 
almost all ceramic knife companies will resharpen your knife for you when it gets dull. protip i guess. or do it yourself better on shaptons.
 
I need to order one and try it on my slow speed sharpener with 3m diamond belts
 
Quick follow up, as time was much less than expected.

Knives used - 3 Chinese knives (same type, different sizes), 3 IKEA knives (same type, different sizes and pretty much Chinese, too). I've decided to keep one of each as reference, so I've used small medium size only.

Sharpening - in hand sharpening. I can make constant half a mm bevels like this, did hundreds and hundreds by now. Control sharpening, jig with CBN and Shapton Glass (same results as in hand sharpening, but slower). Just to be sure.

Knives were dulled with tungsten when necessary. One pass made them completely useless. A bit unexpected.

No new knife was able to cut hair, all were able to easily cut paper and tomatoes. I tried to mix them the best I could to get new and already used edges with different types.

Scenario imagined. What is faster for a working edge and for removing small size chipping. Time frame, one initial minute, one more minute after, additional time if needed. Took me a lot of time even like this and would mimic a fast recovery approach. Actually it worked quite well.

One plate created chipping and damaged the edge. I used this as reference. It was the Atoma 400 (and that is well used).

Another plate made visible saw edges, the Venev 400, but also made a working edge. Dick micro also made visible saw edges, but no working edge.

Stones able to remove chipping as good as possible - Atoma 1200 and unknown 2000 diamond plate. Both under a minute. A lot of powder generated really fast.

Stones able to make working edges after tungsten, that would roughly cut paper and cut tomatoes, but far from shaving hair obviously - Venev 400 and 800 (both hard bond), CBN 550 and 1100 (both metallic bond), two different types or very coarse SiC stones, fine SiC, coarse India, soft ark, Shapton Glass 500 (poorly considering the lot), Nanohone 400 (slightly better than SG 500, but poor as well), soft ark + 400 grit finish surgical. All these did not improve in the second time frame, so what I got in that initial minute remained the same. The arks worked better together. The soft ark was really rough. I was amazed it worked at all.

Stones able to cut paper pretty clean, but still no shaving - Chosera 1000 (I added 3k and 5k, but things didn't change much), Shapton Glass 2000 (a bit better than Chosera, but only after second minute and seeing this I gave the SG 2000 another 2 minutes, but no further improvement that I could feel), unknown sand stone, unknown medium coarse SiC (nothing faster than this to develop the edge, 30 seconds as I could see the "powder" already in large quantities). The last two were unexpected.

Stones able to clean cut and shave - none by themselves after tungsten. I shall try high grits someday. All I was able to test for several minutes was the 10000 Super Stone and nothing.

I did find a very very easy combo though - Shapton Glass 2000 + 6000 HR (took me 3 minutes with these to get a shave repeatedly). Shaving with Chosera 1000 + 5000 really questionable. Maybe if I take my time, but who knows. Didn't feel like it.

Best combo overall - Atoma 1200 + Shapton Glass 2000 + 6000 HR. This allowed me to make new bevels as well.

Quite a good number of stones or plates worked to make these knives usable again (except fine India for some reason). Cutting paper translated into cutting tomatoes without struggle and I would imagine most stuff.
 
I've taken a bit of time to test shaving with Chosera 1000+5000. Didn't get it. Maybe is doable, but not in a reasonable amount of time for me.

Chosera 1000 can be used to reshape the bevel for example, it definitely works.
Bevel from previous session.
Screenshot_20200307-131432_Photos.jpg
Reshaping it now, quite fast, as the time from the photos is 2 minutes between them, with me checking a few times, struggling with the photo...
Screenshot_20200307-131518_Photos.jpg
These white marks on the Chosera are from the knife and the surface should be kept clean (from inclusions as well) as this will interfere with the process faster than expected. I tried to zoom in everything, just to be easier to see.
Screenshot_20200307-131546_Photos.jpg
But look what happens when I use the 2000 diamond plate for 30 seconds.
Screenshot_20200307-131630_Photos.jpg
It eats the knife very very fast. I almost lost the bevel there.

All results apply to tested knives. Some various are possible.
Everything above might make things seem easy, but I imagine they are not or will be for everyone. Is it doable? Definitely. Is it easy? With a bit of technique and proper tools, gets easy enough.
I did an entirely new bevel again and sharpen the knife. Tested it with food against the control knife from its lot (that I kept unaltered) and couldn't feel any differences. Same performance as far as cutting goes.
 
With Al2O3 600 sand paper I can get read of smal dents and get it almost sharp.
 
Quick follow up, as time was much less than expected.

Knives used - 3 Chinese knives (same type, different sizes), 3 IKEA knives (same type, different sizes and pretty much Chinese, too). I've decided to keep one of each as reference, so I've used small medium size only.

Sharpening - in hand sharpening. I can make constant half a mm bevels like this, did hundreds and hundreds by now. Control sharpening, jig with CBN and Shapton Glass (same results as in hand sharpening, but slower). Just to be sure.

Knives were dulled with tungsten when necessary. One pass made them completely useless. A bit unexpected.

No new knife was able to cut hair, all were able to easily cut paper and tomatoes. I tried to mix them the best I could to get new and already used edges with different types.

Scenario imagined. What is faster for a working edge and for removing small size chipping. Time frame, one initial minute, one more minute after, additional time if needed. Took me a lot of time even like this and would mimic a fast recovery approach. Actually it worked quite well.

One plate created chipping and damaged the edge. I used this as reference. It was the Atoma 400 (and that is well used).

Another plate made visible saw edges, the Venev 400, but also made a working edge. Dick micro also made visible saw edges, but no working edge.

Stones able to remove chipping as good as possible - Atoma 1200 and unknown 2000 diamond plate. Both under a minute. A lot of powder generated really fast.

Stones able to make working edges after tungsten, that would roughly cut paper and cut tomatoes, but far from shaving hair obviously - Venev 400 and 800 (both hard bond), CBN 550 and 1100 (both metallic bond), two different types or very coarse SiC stones, fine SiC, coarse India, soft ark, Shapton Glass 500 (poorly considering the lot), Nanohone 400 (slightly better than SG 500, but poor as well), soft ark + 400 grit finish surgical. All these did not improve in the second time frame, so what I got in that initial minute remained the same. The arks worked better together. The soft ark was really rough. I was amazed it worked at all.

Stones able to cut paper pretty clean, but still no shaving - Chosera 1000 (I added 3k and 5k, but things didn't change much), Shapton Glass 2000 (a bit better than Chosera, but only after second minute and seeing this I gave the SG 2000 another 2 minutes, but no further improvement that I could feel), unknown sand stone, unknown medium coarse SiC (nothing faster than this to develop the edge, 30 seconds as I could see the "powder" already in large quantities). The last two were unexpected.

Stones able to clean cut and shave - none by themselves after tungsten. I shall try high grits someday. All I was able to test for several minutes was the 10000 Super Stone and nothing.

I did find a very very easy combo though - Shapton Glass 2000 + 6000 HR (took me 3 minutes with these to get a shave repeatedly). Shaving with Chosera 1000 + 5000 really questionable. Maybe if I take my time, but who knows. Didn't feel like it.

Best combo overall - Atoma 1200 + Shapton Glass 2000 + 6000 HR. This allowed me to make new bevels as well.

Quite a good number of stones or plates worked to make these knives usable again (except fine India for some reason). Cutting paper translated into cutting tomatoes without struggle and I would imagine most stuff.
Not quite sure if I understood - was SG better than diamond or the other way around?
 
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