 |
Amazon Link To the same Item https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B08TZQF2PD/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&th=1
|
There are elaborate devices that can help you sharped a knife, (see this Youtube Video from Project Farm) "RUSSIA vs USA Knife Sharpener? TSPROF vs Lansky, Wicked Edge, KME, Tormek T-8,Work Sharp Ken Onion" for examples but the classic grind stone (image above) makes the best tool, as your eyes & hands & the knife & stone with some water become one in a dance of moves that restores a sharp edge to your cutlery food preparation excellent tool of choice. Blades are made of steel alloys with a balance of a flexibility & strength, a hard but flexible edge & even the edge you hone no matter the method can be either a larger angle like 22 deg that is stronger & holds up better or a sharper 17 deg angle that dulls faster, requiring more frequent sharpening.
Whetstone Sharpening Blades Easy
Sharpening a blade not hard & you do not need a lot of special equipment, a whetstone & wet towel & bowl of water & some time & patience; go slow & careful at first & drag the bevel edge carefully across the whetstone at ~45 deg angle *looking downward relative to it*. The stone should be laid such that it runs lengthwise perpendicular to your body, so that your grinding strokes bring the blade away from you & then back to you. Hold your wrist at the angle you want the blade edge to hold & use your other hand to apply 2-4 lbs or 1 to 2 kg of force to the top face of the blade.
If you are doing a light polish sharpening, you do not have to develop a ribbon burr, but if you are creating a new edge profile angle, you need to work the burr back & forth, with 6 to 20 stokes on each side, then with the higher grit# whetstone or strapping leather or cork, remove the burr. Using the 6000 grid Whetstone I was able to clear the burr off the blade edge with alternating careful lighter strokes, thinking of the action as polishing carefully instead of grinding the edge. Slow & careful at first & focus on form & feel & look & developing a procedure that you can convert into generalized muscle memory with long term mastery skill development.
My First Sharpening Session
I started sharpening with the kit above (title image) last night, putting it on a wet towel & going very slow & careful since it was my first time using a whetstone on a blade. The Chinese SOG polymer grip *drab green* with black painted steel blade that I carry as my EDC self protection & utility blade had more than 100 edge defects that I observed using a 20x & 40x Jewelers loop. I soaked the 1000/6000 grit stone in a glass pan full of tap water for about 20 minutes while I was cooking dinner last night.
A Wet Whetstone ("whet" means to prepare, while "wet" which means to add water or H2O)
After cooking, eating & cleaning up, I took the stone out & placed it on a wet cloth towel in the counter & then placed my blade such as to find the natural bezel angle of the existing blade, which was around 20-25 deg. I did about 12 cycles using the 1000 grit, on each side, then switched to the 6000 grit side & did about 20 cycles, alternating from one side to the other each time. I rotated the curved blade during the stroke to evenly grid the profiled bevel across the length of the blade. I sharped the tip of the blade too. I added a splash of water to the stone & rubbed away the wharf with each stoke. I took about 20 minutes to bring the damaged dulled blade to a nice crispy clean sharp restored edge & clean bevel profile & did not damage the black paint on either blade face. I washed it with warm soapy water & then dried it carefully & its ready for EDC use again :)
The best video I found as a primary on the subject of manually sharpening a knife (click hyperlink -> https://youtu.be/kSKpz1UqIl4 & check out their website http://www.houseofknives.ca -"When used properly, whetstones can be the most efficient way to sharpen your knives. Watch the video to learn about the differences between stone types, grits, and sizes, as well as how to use a whetstone."
Learning Online Cool
Please, watch the videos in this posting. This guy that runs Project Farm YouTube channel buys all the stuff in his videos with his own money & does not even accept sponsorships or promotional gifts. He tests real world products to get the facts about what is best with real testing & science methods for finding the facts to distinguish the value of each product relative to the other products that compete for sales.
Whetstone + Skill = Longer Blade Life
Wether a precision guided tool or power tool or a whetstone that you use manually use to hone your blades. The art of sharpening a knife a skill that you can refine for years to achieve mastery & become a master blade sharpener or advanced novice or hobbyist or whatever title you want to give yourself as you "sharpen" your skills at sharpening blades, knives & other tight metal edges to cut things with, be that a shank in prison sharpened on the concrete floor or a medical tool to scrape plague off the teeth of patients at a dental office; there is something for everyone.
Cutting Tiny Teeth into the Blade Edge
Knife blades have little teeth too, smaller if you use a finer grindstone to hone the edge & bevel angle. The finer the cutting or polishing material, the smaller the teeth on the sharp edge of the knives will be. Very small 6000, 10000 even 20000 grit & low 12-15 deg angles are idle for super smooth sushi cutting, but they require regular honing to reading the weak thin little teeth. A less fine edge fine better for other materials with tough skin like tomatoes where slightly larger stronger teeth can get some bite, ground on a 800-1400 grit stone. You can hone a knife edge from dull to sharp with a 4000 grit stone, but it will take longer as each pass removes less material than if you use a 400 grit stone. I like 1000 for main grinding after doing research. Its not as fast as lower grit, but alone produce a sharp edge! 6000 side of my stone really a polishing layer!
Automatic Knife Sharpeners Eat Your Knives Faster
Automatic electric knife sharpeners typically spin ceramic wheels as you drag the blade edge through them, but they remove a lot of your knife edge materials (wharf) on each pass. This is fine for a cheap knife, but you probably want to avoid such aggressive sharpening that could damage a finer expensive knife. The main problem is that the heat of grinding above 200 F or 90 C can actually remove the blade tempering, which means your blade will dull super fast after being heated too much. Never put a fine knife in the dish washer, as the high temps will ruin the blade tempering.
Manually grinding & honing your edge on some whetstones the simplest, natural, oldest & highest skill based method that produces results relative to the focus & effort your put into your sharpening activity. I love it. The slow precision hand grinding also keep the blade edge cool to preserve the metal tempering which makes the blade material tougher & resilient.
I can focus for hours on something cool like gradually perfecting the art of sharpening a blade using water, stone, my eyes & coordination. Its fun & engaging & easy to get started with lots of room for long term improvement & years of learning as you delve deeper into the art & science of blade edge perfection & sharpening dull blades to exceptionally precise edge with applied skill, focus & effort!
Key Blade Ideas
Remember that wider or bigger blade bevel angles are stronger, for an axe or cleaver & smaller or narrow blade bevel angles are better for precision food prep knives used to cut onions with less cell rupture to make your eyes water less by releasing less of that sulfuric acid forming onion fluid vapor that a dull knife produces by crushing the onion cells. A dull knife dangerous because it requires the user to apply more force to make the cut happen & that increases the odds of slipping & accidentally slicing the hands or fingers or arms.
Also watchWhich Knife Sharpener is Best? Let's find out! https://youtu.be/KBINMUdlJ14
$9 vs $900 Knife Sharpener? Let's find out! Wicked Edge, Lansky, Edge Pro Apex, Spyderco, Rada https://youtu.be/uEDyYJJ6f9M
No comments:
Post a Comment