Organic

James, when did you purchase your diamond emulsions? I think that Marc and I are both using the Jende Industries product which has since been replaced with a proprietary WE branded product. This may account for the different behavior of the emulsion that you’ve seen.

Welcome Cate! 

I think the metal should be fine with the adhesive. Like Marc said, its not that aluminum is bad, its just that glass is preferable for most people. In case you weren’t aware, WE also sells blank handles. Since you have access to all of the tools and materials you may be better off just ordering the blanks and then fitting them with the steel…[Read more]

I may be totally wrong here, but it sounds to me like you may be seeing the residue from the diamond emulsion coming off of the strop. If that is the case, this seems to be reasonably common and is not a cause for concern. The diamonds should be embedded into the substrate after a few passes and will continue to work even when the flaky residue…[Read more]

Stropping without changing the angle is just fine, but there are some additional considerations. If you are heavy handed with the strops and you don’t reduce the angle then you will alter the edge profile and will put a micro convex on the apex. This makes the very apex a little more obtuse than your previously applied angle and can make the knife…[Read more]

Once you figure out what combination of angle adjustment and pressure works for you with the strops, I fully expect that your knives will push cut paper. Strops help tremendously with push cutting ability.

Okay, that looks closer to what I would expect. Is it up to the standards of what you had in mind?

Is that how the edge looked after sharpening?

If you follow Marc’s advice and use the full progression that you have access to it should have a pretty good looking mirrored finish.

In case you haven’t seen it, here is the official WE instructional on how to sharpen scissors.

Think of it this way: Wider angles are more like an axe. They are durable and resilient, but not the best for creating thin slices or delicate cuts. The more acute the angle, the more it becomes like a scalpel. It may not be that great for hacking into hard objects (prone to deformation and chipping), but it can slice and perform accurate and…[Read more]

Do you find that this improves your edge compared to how it performed after the strops?

I have only noticed flaking with the diamond pastes. Perhaps I’m being too miserly with my applications of diamond emulsion.  I apply just enough to cover the majority of the leather and it dries right into the strop within minutes. I have never observed any flaking after applying the gel.

When I first started using the strops I did the same thing you did; light pressure and 2 degrees per side angle reduction. Also like you, I concluded that the edge didn’t seem any better than it was after the stones. The combination of light pressure and 2 degrees more acute angle means you’re likely hitting the shoulders and not the actual apex.…[Read more]

Thanks for sharing your work. It looks like the results were very nice, but I can imagine that the time it took to complete the knife was not insignificant. The best solutions I have seen for sharpening serrations are both powered options: a compound loaded wheel mounted to a bench grinder and using the edge of a belt sander. Neither option is a…[Read more]

Wow, that’s a lot more passes than I have been doing with my strops. Is that a total for your whole strop progression, or is that 400-500 passes per individual strop grit?

Beautiful work as always

Bob, I compensate for the blade’s side to side movement caused by the blade flex by either working one side at a time (which takes a long time) or by pressing the handle up against my torso a bit to stabilize it.

I just want to make sure you know that I’m saying to clamp the knife close to the tip with the majority of the blade behind the clamp.…[Read more]

This is an interesting question. I don’t think that having nearly perfectly symmetrical bevels can negatively impact sharpness. I do think that practical cutting performance can be negatively impacted by refining the edge to extreme levels. One of the reasons that people love the finish left by natural Japanese water stones is that they have a mix…[Read more]

French style chef knives are pretty flat in overall blade profile aside until the curve at the tip. I have an 8 inch chef knife like this and I clamp the blade with about 75% of the blade behind the clamp and 25% in front of the clamp. My settings are bottom holes F 3 on the advanced alignment guide. Try that as a starting point and see where that…[Read more]

Other people have shaved down the plastic bezels on the stone paddles to make it easier to get into the heel of knives. I think the only real concern for doing this is that you will have to be a bit more careful to keep your fingers behind the stones while sharpening.

Sorry, I don’t own that knife so I don’t have any setting to suggest. Even if someone does provide you with their recommended clamping position settings, it will only be a starting point and you will probably have to adjust it to suit your particular knife. Thankfully, Marc practically wrote a book on how to adjust the blade and find the optimal…[Read more]