What did you hone today? -Knife and tool edition

[Multum in parvo]

Regular maintenance on the Kevin Wilkins Petty - Soft Ark
And some minor chip removing and getting back into action on the Due Cigni - Norton fine/coarse India followed by the Soft Ark

 

[2bit_collie]

At my mother’s for dinner. While washing her gyuto after dinner I noticed that it was pretty dull. So I took it home and put a quick edge on it using a Shapton Pro 2k and a coticule with some light slurry. It cut a paper towel, which considering my paper towels, is quite surprising.

The knife by the way is a Kohetsu Blue #2 with stainless cladding. One of the house brands of ChefKvivesToGo. One of the least expensive Blue #2 options I’ve ever seen. As you can see my mother has put quite the patina on it. Very easy to sharpen.

 

[Dnallehekaj]

Lots of sharpening today. I got a returning visitor!



I love this little folding knife. I took the chips out when I first started asking people to sharpen their knives. My buddy that owns it uses and abuses it all the time, and I had a bunch of new chips to take care of.

The first time, I just had a King 1000. Either the King 300 is a loooooot faster, or I'm a lot better. I guess it could be both.

I went with a larger angle in hopes that the edge will hold up longer. My friend doesn't seem to care either way, so I can do whatever.

I showed a friend how to use her Arkansas stones, and got to use an Ark and oil for the first time. It was part of a Best Made set. There were three, but the knives we worked on didn't need anything really coarse, so we used the hard Ark.

I taught her on patina'd carbon steel knives. It's really good for showing you your angle is too high or low. It's like a built-in Sharpie trick.

I took a few knives home, and spent a couple hours so far on repairs. I still have a bunch of time to put into the other two knives, but I took out most of the chips and have the edge profiles almost how I want them. One needs a tip repair, and I'm going to take that to some concrete before I bring it back to the stones. The K300 was taking forever!

Making stuff sharp is cool.

 

[Legion]

Lots of sharpening today. I got a returning visitor!

View attachment 1650954

I love this little folding knife. I took the chips out when I first started asking people to sharpen their knives. My buddy that owns it uses and abuses it all the time, and I had a bunch of new chips to take care of.

The first time, I just had a King 1000. Either the King 300 is a loooooot faster, or I'm a lot better. I guess it could be both.

I went with a larger angle in hopes that the edge will hold up longer. My friend doesn't seem to care either way, so I can do whatever.

I showed a friend how to use her Arkansas stones, and got to use an Ark and oil for the first time. It was part of a Best Made set. There were three, but the knives we worked on didn't need anything really coarse, so we used the hard Ark.

I taught her on patina'd carbon steel knives. It's really good for showing you your angle is too high or low. It's like a built-in Sharpie trick.

I took a few knives home, and spent a couple hours so far on repairs. I still have a bunch of time to put into the other two knives, but I took out most of the chips and have the edge profiles almost how I want them. One needs a tip repair, and I'm going to take that to some concrete before I bring it back to the stones. The K300 was taking forever!

Making stuff sharp is cool.

I have a similar Higonokami that lives on my workbench in the shed. They are a handy little utility knife.

 

[Dnallehekaj]

I have a similar Higonokami that lives on my workbench in the shed. They are a handy little utility knife.

Heck yeah, thanks for the name! It's a heck of a lot easier to find something when you know what it's called!

 

[2bit_collie]

Usually I cut my homemade gravlax with an actual lox cutting knife - think a slicer with a long, flexible bade. But today, because I have one, I pulled out my yanagiba. Which did a very meh job due to not really being that sharp. So I decided to put it to the stones. The main question was where to end the progression in terms of grit. I ended up opting for 2k, 5k, then hard Ark (not true hard, its about a ~2.4 stone). At the 2k stage there was quite a bit of slurry and the end result was that the kasumi polish was impacted. I tried to fix with a Belgium Blue slurry stone used as a wet stone, but didn’t really seem to help. A talk to leave for another day, I know my King 800 will do a good job, but wasn’t in the mood to use it and then leave it on the counter for a week waiting for it to dry out. Finished it up with a few strokes on a ceramic steel. Definitely an improvement when touching to my thumb, we’ll see how the gravlax reacts tomorrow.

 

[Pack line]

Been maintaining my work knife on this piece of local sandstone for the past few weeks. Really enjoying the edges i get.

 

[Pack line]

Homemade kiradashi, took it back to bevel set on a 1k shapton pro. Then erased the 1k with some Pennsylvania soft slate. Will be some more finish work, testing out some other stone but that will be another day. This is some very hard steel, vintage Nicholson file that i did not temper back. Takes a very fine edge and holds onto it.

 

[Legion]

Homemade kiradashi, took it back to bevel set on a 1k shapton pro. Then erased the 1k with some Pennsylvania soft slate. Will be some more finish work, testing out some other stone but that will be another day. This is some very hard steel, vintage Nicholson file that i did not temper back. Takes a very fine edge and holds onto it.

I’m going to make one of those when time allows.

 

[Pack line]

I’m going to make one of those when time allows.

Probably one of the easiest knife making projects. Hardest part is not overheating the steel when you grind it. If you start with a file that is.

I am left handed so i have to make my own. Apparently we are regarded as evil in some cultures...

 

[Legion]

Probably one of the easiest knife making projects. Hardest part is not overheating the steel when you grind it. If you start with a file that is.

I am left handed so i have to make my own. Apparently we are regarded as evil in some cultures...

And fair enough. At least you are not a ginger. Left handed gingers have brought ruin to many a medieval village.

 

[Wid]

Bit of a touch up

 

[2bit_collie]

I used my Watanabe petty and nakiri today to chop up some veggies from the farmer’s market. Not too impressed with the cutting so decided to sharpen and for good measure I pulled out my Watanabe gyuto as well. The stone of choice was my “hard” Washita, which has an SG = 2.4. The petty literally just required a few strokes on each side. The other 2 took a few minutes each to raise a burr, but in under an hour I had all 3 sharpened, steeled and stropped.

Will chop up more of the same vegetables for dinner, that should give me a good idea of what the improvement was.

 

[Tanuki]

Honed my Collins grub hoe - Nicholson 'AXE' file, my current favorite. Medium coarse double cut on one side, fine single cut on the other. Flat self-handle with an eye, rather than a thin tapered tang - safe and secure to carry in the right leg pocket of my Carhartt overalls. Did I mention that, even wearing calk boots, I fall down not infrequently in logging slash? Getting stabbed by my file is inadvisable, but a fat file handle catches on a lot of brush.

Also honed the concave edges of my light brush wacker using a short 5" Hewlett diamond tri-hone. The coarse (270) and medium (600) curved surfaces are perfect for putting a killer edge on this tool. Death to the invasive reed canary grass and thistles on my forest property!

 

[thp001]

Cheap White #2 Nakiri and Higo on Amakusa.

 

[Dnallehekaj]

I have a higonokami on its way to me, sometime next week. It's SK steel, nothing fancy, but I plan on abusing it and asking for something nicer for Christmas or something if I use it all the time.

 

[thp001]

I have a higonokami on its way to me, sometime next week. It's SK steel, nothing fancy, but I plan on abusing it and asking for something nicer for Christmas or something if I use it all the time.

The higo I posted is in SK steel (only the Nakiri is in White steel). It keeps a very fine, sharp edge. Abrasive materials will dull it back but if you keep the angle low the cutting ability is still very high despite blunting. Mine came with a quite rough microbevel so put mine to the stone and took the grind down to zero.

 

[Legion]

Cheap White #2 Nakiri and Higo on Amakusa.

View attachment 1675748View attachment 1675749View attachment 1675750

You reminded me I had an old Nakiri sitting in the shed that needed doing as well. Washita and a Turkey stone.

 

[Mr Bedlington]

A few chisels on the Ark, a slow and laborious process makes me realize why I wouldn't invest any money in natural stones.

 

[Legion]

A few chisels on the Ark, a slow and laborious process makes me realize why I wouldn't invest any money in natural stones.


View attachment 1676402

If that is a surgical black, it would definitely be slow, unless the chisel is 95% honed already. Even for razors we don’t usually go to those until the blade is already shave ready.