tcmeyer

Billabong:  My question to you is what possible advantage to you see in a press-fit threaded stud as opposed to a dab of epoxy?  Wicked Edge either buys their rod-end couplings with a special stud mounted by the manufacturer or they very precisely fabricate studs of their own design.  Try to fabricate your own press-fit version and take the ri…[Read more]

Rod-end couplings are available at my local farmer’s outlet for about $8US.  I buy 12-inch lengths of 1/4″-28 threaded rod (sometimes called “all-thread”) and cut it into 3-inch segments.  Grind the ends flat and set them upright in the bore of a rod-end coupling with a dab of epoxy.  Perfect alignment is not necessary because alignment  lat…[Read more]

After a few attempts which produced a lot of blather, I decided to leave out a lot of the details, so I hope the final result is clear enough.  I chose to name it “The Wicked Edge Files.”

If there’s enough interest, maybe we should move to a separate thread.

Hi Timm:

Well, I’ve done it.  File mounted on Wicked Edge system with at least some success!  Video to come soon.

Regarding bugs and stuff…

The first time I started up my first USB ‘scope, I looked around for stuff to look at.  The videos and ads show coins and insects, so I picked up a fly I’d swatted earlier in the day.  I quickly called my wife to show her that the fly was actually still alive.  His (or her?) abdomen was pulsing as though it were br…[Read more]

Very impressive, Marc:  Do you mean the thickness of the blade where it enters the handle is 1.5mm?  Is it fairly constant along the spine?  What is the thickness at the shoulders?

I made a couple of simple kitchen knives out of 0.093″ steel with the blades about 7″ long and 0.015″ across the shoulders and I think they’re way too thick.  I’m reg…[Read more]

I’ll take a stab at the actual screen image width being actually about 5.25 mm wide.  If your laptop screen is 13″ (330mm) wide, then the magnification is about 63X (330/5.25).

Hi Timm:  Actually, your photos are looking real good.  I guess my only question would be if 12 dps matches what the factory had done, although I’d suspect that someone had subsequently installed the straight bevels.  I’m under the impression that all handmade Japanese blades are hand-sharpened to a convex profile.  The one knife I have came wit…[Read more]

I’ve got a couple of the very inexpensive ‘scope and have not been happy with them.  The first wouldn’t hold focus and the software for the second wouldn’t work on my older laptop – or I’m too dumb to make it work.  The third was a Carson and wouldn’t let me rest it on the edge without a clunky adapter.  My first ‘scope was a 5MP Celestron wh…[Read more]

Here are the Amazon links.  For the arm and clamp, you have to select the size:

1.   The  suction cup mount.  
2.   The long arm.
3.   The small clamp.

The black plastic clamping schemes are from the “RAM” family of mounts.   You can find most of their stuff on Amazon.  I  have the vacuum mount part numbers somewhere if you’re interested.

I’ve been sharpening my Victorinox to 17 dps @ 1500, then convexing the bevels to 13 dps (4 steps).  I don’t recall if I’d added a microbevel this last time, but if I did, it was at 20 dps and 1000 grit.

In my experience, honing and sharpening have been used to describe the same thing, although I think that maybe honing has evolved to mean the final stages of sharpening.

I think of burnishing to mean a process which treats the surface of steel by using the malleability of the steel to smooth out surface scratches and burrs as a means of polishing…[Read more]

Doesn’t sound anything like my Gen 3 Pro.  My cam follower is a flat plate.  You might try taping off the exposed areas of your vise.  Here’s what I did:

If you are a reloader, you might also try lubricating the cam and follower with resizing lube.  Other lubes will help, but will lose their effectiveness fairly quickly.  Resizing lube is desi…[Read more]

There’s a couple of good reasons to use downward (edge leading) strokes.  The major advantage is it reduces the chance of breaking away fragile bits of the edge.  Imagine a tool machining a groove across span of steel.  When it reaches the far edge of the span, it will tend to break away any particles of steel which might not be held solidly in th…[Read more]

I don’t believe in the loose abrasive theory.  The scratches are too uniform for that.  What are the chances of catching a piece of loose grit and wiping it down the side of the blade so as to cause such a scratch?  And then repeat it almost exactly?  And exactly what was it that wiped the side of the blade in such a manner.  If it wasn’t the ston…[Read more]

I’d like to give a shout-out to the memory of Mark76, the OP of this thread.  Mark de Weger, a citizen of the Netherlands, was a moderator of this forum and a blogger whose website can still be visited at https://moleculepolishing.wordpress.com/.  Mark was also a professional photographer and a gentleman who we lost far too soon when he died on a…[Read more]

Actually, your ‘scope work looks pretty good.  And your method of centering the belly of the blade over the center of the vise is exactly the method I use for my skinners.  Skinners are one of the specialty blades where I deviate from the more common 20 dps bevels.  I’ve gone as high as 24 dps with a highly polished bevel with a 1000-grit mi…[Read more]

It sounds like a good idea and I sure hadn’t thought of it.  I think that maybe it might not work for some percentage of blades which are too hard.  When hardening blades, the one basic test used to tell if you’ve been successful is to touch a file to the edge.  If the file doesn’t “bite,” you’ve got a hard blade.  Now the question is do you dra…[Read more]

Timm: I sent you a PM