Little something I dreamed up

[CliffCurry]

All I can say is you guys are a wonderfully bad influence on a guy who like to tinker. Thought I’d share for review. DPS currently down to 8.5 & can go even lower with shortened screws on Low Angle Adapter(LAA?)

The vice mod is simple enough, just added the LAA on top, and an extra spacer block on bottom. Swapped to a 3″ long 10-32 screw to hold it all together. I did mark and drill a 3/8 hole through the paper stone base for access to the screw from under the base to swap out the vice without unmounting.

Started with 12″ rods Kyle sent out a few days ago(Thx man!) , cleaned & polished. Added a 1/4″ rubber grommet. Under that are rubber earphone covers I found lying around that cover the locknut and dust baggies.

Pretty sure the fine angle adjustment knob idea I saw first from my Uncle Gib(not sure if it’s his) and I love it! Replaced the fine angle lock down knobs with some from original arm pack. They are smaller diameter and more grippy to me. NOTE: There is a small piece of nylon plastic material behind the lock knob that prevent thread damage to adjustment arm, mine was almost gone so I clipped a bit of nylon off something here and added it to the hole.

Reversed the angle bar, cleaned, smoothed and dry lubed all moving parts etc etc.. Must say I feeling like a Happy camper! Here’s my secret workshop I’ve built over the past few months in back of walk-in storage closet. :whistle::

[Gib Curry]

Nice setup, Nephew…..

(Just between you and me….. I’ve known of only an extremely few creators and their companies that are so willing — encouraging even — to have their device critiqued and therefore, more importantly, improved upon by users.

I’ve even seen detractors comments taken to heart and lead to improvements in the overall machine, techniques and understanding.

I’ve never seen better customer support.)

I told you you would like it here!!

~~~~
For Now,

Gib

Φ

"Everyday edge for the bevel headed"

"Things work out best for those who make the best out of the way things work out."

[CliffCurry]

Thanks Gib. I know the setup can look a bit wonky at first and for sharpening smaller stuff at higher angles it is overkill indeed overkill. :silly:

What I did noticed right away:
With longer arms the radius and sweep were longer allowing for a longer arc and a larger sweet spot on the blade.
The variance in angle from tip to heel appears to be less.
My posture while sharpening is better. I’m not hunkered down but standing up naturally.

Will I keep it like this for daily use? Probably not. What I hoped to do was show the versatility and stability one can get using a combination of Wicked Edge components and it works, the knife is solid and stable in the vice as shown which is just another testimony to the quality of the product.

I do love this system and having the ability to swap the configuration to meet different needs is sweet. It may not be practical to keep like this, perhaps I’ll remove the low angle adapter, or the second riser, or both. With the hole drilled through the bottom this is not a problem.

Here is a Paramilitary 2 at lowest angle I can get without the adapter. The vice is rock solid, just raised an additional inch to make better use of the long rods and full length of the stones. See I’m not completely crazy… I think.

:blink:

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[Josh]

Wait, you two are related?! How cool is that… I was wondering!

Here is a Paramilitary 2 at lowest angle I can get without the adapter.[/attachment]
:blink:

This SO begs the question.. how low can you get with the LAA? 😉

[CliffCurry]

The para2 is in s30V and wont be used hard(I have an Endura in vg10 that I bought for abuse purposes). 😛

Maybe shoot for 10dps? OR should I just go for ALAP(as low as possible)??? I guess if careful I can minimize blade chipping out etc and if it does take it up a degree or 2. Right?

If it works out I have several more Spydeys and Id like to get them all down in the low angle range. All are at the high end of my current budget and are mostly used as tactical box openers!

[CliffCurry]

Here is what I can do according to The Cube…

Left side limited by stock screw…

Thx Josh for the inquiry, your set-up has been a major inspiration for me! Unless someone from the forum chimes in with dire words of warning regarding cpm s30v and angles this low… I’m a gonna go for it tonight! 👿

While I’m thinking of it, has anyone done or discussed elevating the sharpener off the base at least 1/2″ for easy of clean up under the angle bar? I find I’d really like to have a bit more clearance there to wipe down. Aloha 🙂

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[Zamfir]

I am more leaning to thinning out some of my edges and going with a little wider microbevel for the final apex. But I feel right now I can not go any lower than 17 if I am going to use a strop since I need to go 2 lower with the strop. Hence all my stuff is at 17. The price tag for the low angle adapter has been holding me back a bit then waiting for the new vise setup..

so I am curious.. with the Low angle adapter:

how the heck does it work for attaching a full flat grind blade?

and how wide of a blade can you use with it?

I wonder if it will work with the new style vise?

Does it really hold the blade nice and secure so there is no movement?

It just looks so thin and small I just never thought of asking these questions.. But I am starting to feel like I need one. stopping at 17 is not going to be good enough for long I think.

[Josh]

Cliff i say go for it.. you can always put a micro bevel on if it is too weak! =)

I run my Gayle Bradley at ~ 13 dps right now and could take it down to 11 dps probably with it still being stable at the apex.

Eric, you may want to skip the stropping and finish it directly off of your 1k stones… I love that finish =) try it and see if you do!

I need to get other screws to play around w/ my LAA more… they are slightly too long

[Zamfir]

Well, the problem is on some of these knives, if I thin them way out I want to polish the thinned part and then have the 1K micro bevel finish. I also am really liking the edge finish on the 1K for sure. I did a comparison test for a while..polished 17 vs right off the 1K..I liked the 1K finish better for use. But, I kind of dig the shiny bling below the apexed 1K finish ya know?

[CliffCurry]

Well survey says this is a chicken dinner winner!!! Houston we have thin :woohoo:

I went straight flat at 10dps, leaving 1.5 degrees of bottom end wiggle room if something went horribly wrong(it didnt). Ill probably go back and create a natural convex taper for strength with strop compounds coming soon and then drop the old standard 1000 micro-bevel on top at 12dps. I am a big fan of that as well, following the advice of so many others.

To answer Zamfir I found the adapter functions very similar to the standard vise jaw and FFG are equally as “touchy” here. You can see I clamped in on the flat rear part of blade, which didnt give the knife angle I was hoping for and the edge angle widens up very slightly at the tip. The adapter looked weak because its so thin, but the overall lockup and feel was surprisingly solid. I had a very tiny tiny bit of wiggle but could be my own doing fiddling with extra riser or not secured down all the way.

Josh the crazy part is my Uncle and I both became interested in the Wicked Edge about the same time without knowing the other was doing it. He got his first and I knew what much be done! Kinda runs in the family, we are all pretty close and Gibs dad, my grandpa was an old logger, gave me my first knife, an Old Timer, when I was 8 and showed me how to sharpen it. You could say I was infected at an early age! 😛

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[Leo Barr]

Thats a good simple solution to lowering the angle even more.

[Josh]

Duuuude! That turned out nice!

Man… if you haven’t micro beveled it already, I would be curious as to your experience in regards to this post... I’ve been meaning to play around with it myself but haven’t had time. I’ve never actually measured the force when cutting something. You could:

– micro bevel with highest grit stone/tape you used to get that mirror finish and then measure force
– then just a few passes, same angle (as the above micro bevel), with the 1k stones and measure force.

I will be very curious as to how it holds up!

[CliffCurry]

Duuuude! That turned out nice!

Thx man, high praise indeed. 🙂 I ran into a little trouble I’m kicking myself for, wasn’t apexing at the choil area… Then I looked down. Grrrr:

[attachmentment:1]IMG_20141212_111943.jpg[/attachment]

Glad I didn’t try for lower…
Also I had the tip area so nice. It was flat and like a needle… Until I bumped it with a paddle. So thin it snapped off the last 100microns or so. Grrrr. Rounded it over for a bit of strength but not happy. Got me some more learning to do for sure.

Josh, I am on the same page regarding the toothy vs polished questions myself. The research by Mr. Stamp and others I’ve read has directly lead me to seek the lower angles. I’m a rookie in this area but I will take my vg-10 Endura and make it a mule for some basic tests if possible. The Quest for Low Angle Micro-Toothy and the lost TCE? :huh:

Aloha all and thanks for the great feedback to a “relative” new guy!

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[CliffCurry]

So I got to play around with the LAA alot more today. The para 2 seemed to clamp In ok, but I really struggled with the endura next… Until I remembered the other lil gadget I just picked up a few days ago. 🙂

It’s OK to laugh, I did too. But you know what it worked! And instead of fiddling with the LAA and over clamping, and perhaps “adjusting” in a bench vise :whistle: This allowed me to enjoy the process of sharpening. Rube Goldberg lives!

Spyderco Endura vg-10 steel at 12dps. Diamond progression thru 1k, 1.4/.6 ceramics, p2000/p2500/p3000 grit strips, and a quick hit with 1u/.5u kangaroo. Quickly learning to love the roo!

In other news I push-cut a full sheet of newsprint for first time B)
Next up testing micro-bevel with this beautiful mule…

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[Josh]

Rock on buddy!

Dude… I so just ordered one of those tormek jigs because of this post! I have though it was neat in the past but this is just too cool knowing that you can use it with regular knives too lol.

[Author]

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