WEPS Chosera Stone Progression

[wickededge]

It’s worth mentioning that I haven’t taken the bevel all the way to the very edge of the blade yet. I’m leaving the edge alone since I’m working at a more shallow angle and there is no reason to take additional metal just to reach the edge at this stage. Once all the grits have been applied, I’ll go back and start creating the multi-facets at slightly wider angles before blending them with the strops. The current bevels are set at 16.5 degrees. The final angle at the edge will be 21 degrees and I’ll reach it in just a couple of strokes once I move the collars out.

-Clay

[wickededge]

Now the 1500# Shapton Stones:

When you’re sharpening with these stones, you see within a few strokes how much the bevel is brightening and the edge is getting refined. A quick test of the knife’s edge with a fingernail shows how sharp it is; the edge immediately bites into the nail.

Zoom In – 230x

Approximately 90 strokes per side. Elapsed time: 00:01:30

-Clay

[wickededge]

Shapton 2000#:

Zoom In – 230x

While the jump from 1500# to 2000# seems small, the bevel of the knife is much more polished and the scratches are noticeably smaller. The stones feel harder and appear to burnish the metal as well as polishing it.

Approximately 90 strokes per side. Elapsed time: 00:01:30

-Clay

[wickededge]

After the 5000# Shaptons, the edge is coming along beautifully:

Zoom In – 230x

5000# Shapton Stones – 230x
I went a little longer with the 5000# stones since the jump up from the 2000# stones was larger. The edge looks like a mirror to the naked eye at this point and it’s both polished and burnished. Due to the high polish, the microscope’s camera is starting to have a hard time focusing. I see this a lot with highly polished edges.

Approximately 180 strokes per side. Elapsed time: 00:03:00

-Clay

[wickededge]

Next step was the 8000# Shapton Stones. Some contamination, probably from my mounting plate, seems to have gotten onto the stones, digging some deeper grooves. All in all, the bevels look great and you can see the increasing polish from the finer stones:

Zoom In – 230x

I spent a little extra time on this stone trying to get the deeper scratches out. I’ll probably have to drop down a few grits to fully remove them.
Approximately 240 strokes per side. Elapsed time: 00:04:00

-Clay

[Leo James Mitchell]

How is it possible for scratches that were there earlier to suddenly appear now as Tom suggested. If they were there in the first place, wouldn’t they have been visible earlier. Again I can’t understand…no doubt brain plaque setting in. 😆 To me I think there may have been some contamination as Clay suggested…but no big deal anyway.

Leo the dense

[Leo James Mitchell]

Hmmm! As I drink my morning coffee the fog from last night clears. When I think of it, that knife has been through a lot of use and experimentation with various edges. It is quite possible that I inflicted some deep scratches on that blade early on, even before I got the WEPS. I suspect now that I am the culprit here, not contamination. It definitely was not done by the maker. I examined that blade when it arrived and it was pristine.
Good thinking Tom! Bad Leo! :silly:

Leo

[wickededge]

Good morning Leo 🙂

I took about 10 minutes to go back through the grits, starting at 1500# to remove the scratches. It was definitely some kind of contamination on the stone because I could clearly see the big scratches with the naked eye. Here is the knife at 8000# again after reworking it:

Zoom In – 230x

-Clay

[wickededge]

And finally, the 15000# Shaptons stones:

-Clay

[wickededge]

And finally, the 15000# Shaptons:

Zoom In – 230x

I spent a little more time with the 15k stones to try and ensure that we were only seeing the scratches from that grit.
Approximately 240 strokes per side. Elapsed time: 00:04:00

Here is a shot (for Tom) with the blade slightly tilted so I could get a better focus on the edge:

Zoom In – 230x

-Clay

[wickededge]

Here are a few shots of the TK2 after being sharpened:

Zoom In

Zoom In

Zoom In

-Clay

[Dave Schur]

Yowsa. That’s an egde.

Will the recommendation be to buy all of the grits of the Shaptons (from 220# on up), or will they be able to be integrated as higher grits to the existing diamond and ceramic stones after 1600#. As an example, I might like to be able to add the 2000, 5000, 8000, 15000 shaptons (maybe in stages based on budget) and preserve my existing investment (from 50#-1000# on diamond and 1200# 1600# ceramic), but the switchover on angle due to the thicker Shaptons sounds tricky.

[wickededge]

Yowsa. That’s an egde.

Will the recommendation be to buy all of the grits of the Shaptons (from 220# on up), or will they be able to be integrated as higher grits to the existing diamond and ceramic stones after 1600#. As an example, I might like to be able to add the 2000, 5000, 8000, 15000 shaptons (maybe in stages based on budget) and preserve my existing investment (from 50#-1000# on diamond and 1200# 1600# ceramic), but the switchover on angle due to the thicker Shaptons sounds tricky.

Your thinking on the progression is right – I’d probably stick with the existing diamonds and ceramics and then jump to the Shaptons at 2000#. The switch over shouldn’t be too tough, it’s an almost perfect 3 degree difference. I’ll try to do a knife soon with that progression and document the progress.

-Clay

[Leo James Mitchell]

Excellent results once again Clay. You do such meticulous work and at the same time are informative and clear. I wish I had had you on my teaching staff back when I was in the education business.
Will you continue with the PXL folder and the Choseras tomorrow?
Thanks very much Clay!

Warm regards
Leo

[Dave Schur]

That sounds awesome, I can’t wait to see the stones. I really like the idea of stones up that fine, and a lot less strops.

Any idea if I was gonna refresh the wickededgeusa.com website looking for them what might be a good week to mark on my calendar? :whistle: 😉

My new Richmond Remedy is sitting at home right now with a factory edge. I can’t wait to see it and put it on the wicked edge. It might be number 2 in line though as I also got an S30V Spyderco Military delivered today also. It was a good day for my mailbox.

[Author]

Posts