Organic

Thanks for the detailed breakdown of your stropping starting points. I only have experience with the cow leather and I have been stropping at -1.5 degrees from the sharpened angle. If I sharpened at 20 degrees per side, I change the angle to 18.5 degrees per side before stropping with heavy pressure using the cow leather strops and that gives…[Read more]

The sharpness of the bevel with relation to the primary grind of the knife as it affects product release is not something I had considered before. That’s pretty interesting. Getting a blade with a thin, high performance bevel and good product release is a highly sought after combination for chef’s knives in particular.

I have found that heavy…[Read more]

Cliff just posted the second part of this video where he demonstrates the stropping today:

This thread is ancient, but I thought I’d resurrect it as I am planning on replacing the leather on my WE strops. In my carelessness I have cut them a few times and would like to restore them to like new. Do any of you have any additional tips to offer other than using the heat gun and some goo gone?

That looks like it is going to be a lot of work. My suggestion is to send it to Josh at Razor Edge for a re-grind.

I have the 6, 3, and 1.5 micron diamond films, but I don’t use them very often because I’m a bit of a penny pincher. Also, I have found that the performance difference between an edge finished at 1500 diamond and stropped versus an edge finished with the films and stropped is not worlds apart when it comes to the actual use of the blade (although…[Read more]

This was obviously a lot of work to put together, but will be a valuable thread to point people back to when this topic comes up over and over again. Great work Marc!

Hi Loremipsum,

If you’re not totally satisfied with how the knife cuts you should consider putting the knife back in the clamp and spend a few moments stropping the edge. I think you’ll find that just a little bit of stropping will substantially improve how smoothly the knife cuts paper. I strop every knife I sharpen even if I only go to the 600…[Read more]

Passable USB microscopes can be had for around $25-$40 on amazon. The quality doesn’t get noticeably better until you get into the $200+ price range.

If you don’t want to add a micro bevel and you want to get rid of the chipping left from the 100 grit stone you can intentionally grind down the apex by drawing the knife edge across the face of a stone a few times and then re-apex the knife with the 400 grit stone at the same angle as before. I have done this and it works well.

I like the new style with the additional time on explaining what’s going on. The pictures of the edge looked really good and were very helpful in showing what you were talking about.

I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone go through a whole grit progression with the micro bevel before. What I’ve seen Clay do is to go through his whole progression…[Read more]

Welcome to the forum Josiah!

If I were to guess, I would say that you’re right handed. Why do I say that? It is because I think your issue is the result of spending too much time working on the right side of the blade. Here’s a link to a recent thread where someone else was having a very similar issue. Hopefully you’ll find that the replies are…[Read more]

Hi Dale,

I don’t own the ceramic stones so I’m only parroting information gleaned from time on the forum, but I don’t believe that the ceramic stones will ever give a mirrored finish on their own. Many people have used the ceramics as the last stones in a progression to get a mirrored edge by simply following up with several grits of strops.…[Read more]

Now you just need two sets of your Gatco stones so you can work both sides of the blade.

Very cool! For a filet knife your adapter may actually be an improvement over the Wicked Edge LAA because it also lends some rigidity to the flexible blade by clamping along a much wider portion of the knife. Thanks for sharing!

That blade was in pretty rough condition when you got it. It looks great now. Nice work. Let us know what the owner thinks of it once they get it back.

That was the first one that came to my mind. I think it looks like a great product and I hope to own one some day.

I think that will be a good choice for your first J-knife. It isn’t going to be an ultra performance blade, but as a trade off you get a knife that will be less prone to chipping and will have a sturdy feel to it. It will probably out preform most name brand western style chef knives that cost twice the price and it looks very nice with the wa…[Read more]

Cool video Loremipsum! Your edges will get better with experience and as the diamond plates break in, but I think you’re getting pretty nice results right out of the gate. I’m not even certain if it is possible to get a hair whittling edge before the diamond plates have broken in.

You actually can get other types of abrasives for the Wicked Edge.…[Read more]