sharpening and stropping - advice needed

[farmershort]

Hi all,

I'm after a bit of guidance about knife/axe sharpening.

Up until now, I have always sharpened my axes and bill hook with an old motorised stone grinding wheel. It does tend to make a bit of a mess of the edge though - but gets them very very very very sharp. For smaller knives, I tried using the long sharpening stick tool thing that everyone has in the kitchen - Either I'm doing it wrong, or it's not very good... or both.

Anyway, I was sort of content with this until I found an old sharpening stone. So, I got out my trusty farmers pen knife and tried sharpening it on that, with a little bit of oil on the stone. This appeared to make bugger all difference to the sharpness of the knife. I can get them so that they're sort of sharpish... enough to cut string etc, and perhaps I wouldn't have noticed... but then I found BCUK and bought a couple of knives from a fellow bushcrafter. These are amazingly sharp, and obviously polished after sharpening as they look like chrome on the cutting edge.

I also keep seeing posts about stropping - mostly to do with strops that people have made.... what on earth do you do with one of them? I've got it into my head that it is a sharpening tool, but how on earth does a bit of leather sharpen a steel knife?

So, there's 2 things really - 1) question about about stropping... 2) the best tools and methods to sharpen knives and other cutting tools.

There have been a tutorial thread of some kind in the past, so I apologise if I've missed it.

Thanks

Adam

 

[Toadflax]

This is my understanding.

Sharpening on a stone will leave a very thin layer of metal at the edge of the blade (you could almost imagine it a bit like a very tiny strip of foil). After a bit of use, this could fold so making the edge less sharp.

Stropping will remove this piece and leave a stronger, sharp edge. I think that repeated bending by stropping will cause tiny pieces of this weak edge to break off.

I believe it can be done by stropping on plain leather, but some people also put on a stropping compound, e.g. a fine metal polishing paste (such as Solvol Autosol).

I may, of course, be corrected by more knowledgeable folk on here.


Geoff

 

[Jakata]

Thats good to know, I stropped my knife for the first time the other day and was a little worried with the flakes that came off, its only a cheap mora but I would like to perfect sharpening before I buy a serious knife.

I used a leather wallet as I do not use leather belts.

 

[Chainsaw]

£5 sharpening kit

Cheers,

Alan

 

[farmershort]

spot on! just what i was looking for! I was pulling the knife... not pushing it!

 

[gazmc2]

thats a superb tutorial :wow1:, i'm off to buy the bits to have a go myself!!

thanks for raising the question farmershort!!

 

[Shinken]

Just remember that sharpening on a course stone can make a knife feel very very very sharp. Which it is, but you create serrations that are a lot bigger that you will get on a fine stone, and they break of easier too. So you need to sharpen it more.

If you have been doing it this way then go to a finer stone it will feel like nothing much is happening for a fair while. But once you do get a good edge it will lasr much longer and only need occasional sharpening.

Hope this helps