r/sharpening

Hi, everyone!! How are you doing?? I'm Yuichiro! I'm currently based in Japan and working on a project to help foreigners who use Japanese carbon steel knives and have problems with maintenance.

I know Japanese knives are amazing but they can be also high-maintenance for first-timers... I want to understand the real pain points people face!

For example..

・Did you struggle with sharpening a Japanese knife?

・Did you accidentally chip the edge on something? etc..

Anything is fine!! Tell me your story and experience. It would be super helpful.

Thanks!

I'm considering buying either the 400 or 1000 grit cheefarcuut pro diamond resin stone. Or both. Does anyone recommend one grit over another?

Also for flattening what grit SiC powder should I be using on float glass? I don't went to ruin the surface.

Thanks in advance for any advice.

There's a big sale I want to take advantage of and would appreciate recommendations for my first sharpening stone. I already got great advice a few days ago but these are now new better-value options I'm weighing.
My budget is €50-€80 and I will be sharpening mostly softer-steel kitchen knives.

Atoma 140 replacement plate: €49 (would have to glue it to something flat)
Atoma 400: €55
Shapton Rockstar 500: €43
Shapton Glass 500: €30 (obviosly thinner than Rockstar)
Shapton Rockstar 1000: €44
Naniwa Chocera Pro 400: €35
Naniwa Chocera Pro 600: €47
Shapton Pro 1000: €29
* plus various lapping stones by Naniwa for €17 to €37

Will I be reviving very dull knives and setting new bevels or just maintaining sharpness? Well, the former would be nice but if it requires getting a stone that won't be used much or passing up on the perfect setup for maintaining sharpness, then I'm content to just do the latter.
The ideal setup might be getting one of the Atomas plus the Shapton Pro 1000, if it's fine to use the Atoma for both setting a new bevel occasionally and for flattening regularly. Or maybe Glass 500 plus Atoma 140. I could also perhaps forgo an Atoma and get one of the cheaper lapping stones plus a middle-of-the-road stone like the Rockstar 500 or one of the Choceras...

Thanks in advance!

We have three bread knives. A Miracle blade (bought 25 years ago via TV commercial), A local custom made one and this Ikea 365+ bread knife.

First two cuts beatifully and i only occationally strobe them. Although i was happy with them, I want to buy the Ikea one during a homemade sourdough bread frenzy during pandemic.

Right out of the box the teeth of the knife were too long spikey like a shark jaws. for the first month it cut very well but then those spike teeth become rounder. A few months later it became dull and start crushing instead of cutting. My usual strobing did not worked. I tried to to sharpen each scallop with diamond pin files. I started with the extra fine grit to be gentle. Did not help. I moved up one by one up to coarse grit. Once I saw removal of the steel, I went back to conventional coarse to finer grit then strob routine. Altough each individual scallop feel sharp and able to cut paper, the knife still can not cut bread without stucking and crumbling. Also It seems like the teeth are not at same height either, which might be the reason for stucking.

Leveling teeth with blunting it first then recarving the scallops may help but I am not a pro sharpener and i have neither have tools nor skill for a full restoration. My knives and my wife's knives are separate as she likes smaller and duller knives. If I can restore this one to a usuable level I will give it to her.

https://preview.redd.it/1elv7j871h2h1.jpg?width=1536&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=f489d376dea32fd130913eb133359a8b6894da90

Hi everyone, i have a vg-10 knife and a vg-1. trying to decide on a honing rod but there is so much option i wondered if anyone had specific recommendations?? Thanks in advance!

I had previously posted about a bolstered knife, I managed to remove a decent chunk of the annoying bolster using a file and a coarse diamond plate.

But now I am stuck getting it sharp, I think my technique is decent, I have a matching 8” Wusthof chefs knife that I have got and kept sharp enough to cut newspaper against the grain. However, this pairing knife I simply cannot get it sharp.

I’ve got a large burr using a 320 grit diamond stone, using roughly a 14-17 degree angle, flipped the knife and got the same on the other side. At that coarseness, it’s incredibly easy to feel for the burr. Then progressed onto a 1000 grit Naniwa, carefully polished with four strokes on each side, to upgrade the scratch pattern. Now I spend a long time to remove the burr. I use a flashlight between each single pass, switch sides each time, doing edge leading tip to heel passes. An eternity later, the burr was completely removed. Then a few passes on a 1-micron infused leather strop.

After all of this, the knife simply isn’t anywhere near as sharp as one would expect, not even close to it’s larger 8” cousin. It can barely start to cut through cheap A4 printer paper, it’s hopeless to even attempt to test it against some newspaper, and not a chance in hell it would ever cut against the grain.

So, I tried again, using only the 1000 grit stone, created a burr down the edge, flipped and repeated, again the painfully slow burr removal, tested it and it’s still what I, and the rest of you, could consider blunt.

Can anyone point me in the right direction. Are my angles all messed up, is the knife beyond repair – given how much material has been removed from the original edge, or am I missing something else obvious?

I went through and sharpened all my knives with my WSPA, making a list of all the knives and corresponding angles. I got them all shaving sharp, but now that I'm going back to resharpen I thought it would be as simple as setting the angle and mounting the knife in the same spot.

I thought I would be able to just start at 600 grit and it would be super easy to get them back to hair shaving, but it's taking a lot more than I expected and I ended up having to go back to the 300 grit stone to get a proper burr.

Obviously when mounting the knife it would be almost impossible to get it back to the exact spot it was in the clamps the previous sharpening, but am I wrong for thinking it would be an easy touch up from 600 up?

Time after time, I get into a conversation with a friend where I just don't really have a solution. I'm happy to sharpen their knives for them, but I can't always do that of course. I know they're not going to invest the time into learning on stones. So what do I tell them is a good solution? I know there are tons of fixed angle and other gimmick sharpeners, but I haven't paid them any mind over the years. Are there actually good ones for the average joe?

Thanks for the thoughts and suggestions, guys!

I just want to get some perspective on peoples preferred finishing stone/grit. Also whether or not you stop with compounds.

I currently work at a knife shop (TKO), and they do 800#, 3000#.

It seems a lot of people finish on 2k. Mainly the green brick of joy.

I get that it depends on the feel, steel, use case and so on.

I'm still quite new to sharpening and would just like some perspective.

I currently do a 1k, 3k (rockstar) progression, followed by leather with green compound mostly influenced by my workplace.

I'm considering if I should buy a 2k since people seem to enjoy finishing that.

Other considerations:

Suehiro rika 5k

Im trying to sharpen my demko 20.5 in 20cv after I chipped it, I've gotten rid of the chip and I'm at 115 pases on each side but it will not form a burr. Im sharpening at 20° with a worksharp precision adjust using the 320 grit diamond.