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To start, i need to convey that this is not about "honing" your knives. this process is only to be done when you need to remove material and essentially "reshape" at least a portion of your knife. this may happen over time, when a person cuts on a hard surface such as granite, concrete, etc., or when a knife is abused. in my case, the knives are a cheaper set that were never truely sharp in the first place. as these knives have been used over the last few years, they ended up looking like this:
it's hard to tell from the pictures, but there are actually chunks of metal missing from the cutting edge. this being said, it's not hard to imagine that they are pretty useless for cutting anything.
the first thing we do is assess the situation and decide upon which "patients" need to be operated upon. in my situation, we have about 6 or 7 various knives. the steak knives rarely get used (we have a better, serrated set), so i mainly worried about my utility and butcher knives.
the next step is to take them to the bench grinder. this is not for sharpening, but mainly getting the shape into the steel. we will bring the cutting edge back to a stable and solid portion of the blade. I take one smooth, consistent, even swipe of the blade on each side, taking a very small amount of metal off at each time. this ensures that I take only the absolute minimum amount of metal off.
one note that needs to be remembered here is that if you are discoloring the metal, creating sparks, or feeling heat in any way on the blade, you are either pressing too hard, going too slow, or are doing something else wrong. the goal here is to remove metal, but not cause the temper or hardness of the blade to be removed. if you are discoloring the blade, you need to remove all the metal back to the point of no more discoloration in order to minimize the risk of having a brittle or otherwise weak blade. for that reason alone, I try to keep the blade as cool as possible.
after the blades are primitively re-shaped, we go back to the kitchen. take note of the direction of the "grooves" on the blade at this point. as the grinder spins, it makes small marks on the blade that should be running perpendicular with the knife edge.
the best knife sharpening tool that I have ever owned is a knife sharpener that was a spur of the moment, $8.99 purchase. I have seen them at walmart, home depot, etc. I think i picked mine up at Cabela's.
the shaft portion is a diamond-coated part that is for serrated knives. the few serrated knives that I have used it on have turned out great. the carbide and ceramic "V"'s are what I use. I actually don't use the ceramic part, but that's just me. the carbide gets 99.9% of the use. another great thing is that due to it's construction, it works the same whether you are right or left handed. it also fits in a pocket and works great for quick sharpening jobs in the shop, kitchen, field, etc.
after grasping it firmly, we drag the blade through the grooves like such:
If you pay close attention, you will notice that the grooves in the metal that were created from the grinder are now being removed and replaced by grooves that are parallel to the edge.
this would be a good time to explain that this should be done away from open food containers or other things that you don't want metal shavings in...
At this point, the knives are ready to cut and slice. However, I always try to finish the sharpening job with a fine-grit honing stone. After a few quick swipes on each side, feel the knife edge by dragging your thumb nail perpendicular to the blde. if you can shave a portion of your nail by dragging the blade either way and the edge feels similar in both directions, you should be good to go.
when I was done, i was able to do this with a good swipe from the 8" butcher knife. lol
anyway, there are obviously thousands of tools out there to do the same things and get the same result... this is just the way that I go about it. I have found this method works best for me with the tools i have.
Later,
Andy
it's hard to tell from the pictures, but there are actually chunks of metal missing from the cutting edge. this being said, it's not hard to imagine that they are pretty useless for cutting anything.
the first thing we do is assess the situation and decide upon which "patients" need to be operated upon. in my situation, we have about 6 or 7 various knives. the steak knives rarely get used (we have a better, serrated set), so i mainly worried about my utility and butcher knives.
the next step is to take them to the bench grinder. this is not for sharpening, but mainly getting the shape into the steel. we will bring the cutting edge back to a stable and solid portion of the blade. I take one smooth, consistent, even swipe of the blade on each side, taking a very small amount of metal off at each time. this ensures that I take only the absolute minimum amount of metal off.
one note that needs to be remembered here is that if you are discoloring the metal, creating sparks, or feeling heat in any way on the blade, you are either pressing too hard, going too slow, or are doing something else wrong. the goal here is to remove metal, but not cause the temper or hardness of the blade to be removed. if you are discoloring the blade, you need to remove all the metal back to the point of no more discoloration in order to minimize the risk of having a brittle or otherwise weak blade. for that reason alone, I try to keep the blade as cool as possible.
after the blades are primitively re-shaped, we go back to the kitchen. take note of the direction of the "grooves" on the blade at this point. as the grinder spins, it makes small marks on the blade that should be running perpendicular with the knife edge.
the best knife sharpening tool that I have ever owned is a knife sharpener that was a spur of the moment, $8.99 purchase. I have seen them at walmart, home depot, etc. I think i picked mine up at Cabela's.
the shaft portion is a diamond-coated part that is for serrated knives. the few serrated knives that I have used it on have turned out great. the carbide and ceramic "V"'s are what I use. I actually don't use the ceramic part, but that's just me. the carbide gets 99.9% of the use. another great thing is that due to it's construction, it works the same whether you are right or left handed. it also fits in a pocket and works great for quick sharpening jobs in the shop, kitchen, field, etc.
after grasping it firmly, we drag the blade through the grooves like such:
If you pay close attention, you will notice that the grooves in the metal that were created from the grinder are now being removed and replaced by grooves that are parallel to the edge.
this would be a good time to explain that this should be done away from open food containers or other things that you don't want metal shavings in...
At this point, the knives are ready to cut and slice. However, I always try to finish the sharpening job with a fine-grit honing stone. After a few quick swipes on each side, feel the knife edge by dragging your thumb nail perpendicular to the blde. if you can shave a portion of your nail by dragging the blade either way and the edge feels similar in both directions, you should be good to go.
when I was done, i was able to do this with a good swipe from the 8" butcher knife. lol
anyway, there are obviously thousands of tools out there to do the same things and get the same result... this is just the way that I go about it. I have found this method works best for me with the tools i have.
Later,
Andy
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