Aldeer.com Forums Alabama Deer Talk Aldeer General Forum New Knife Sharpener

I love sharpening knives - I honestly believe it could become an obsessive hobby. I have spent a good deal of money on sharpeners, strops, compounds, diamond dust,...etc. I've attempted/used a variety of techniques, edge angles, back bevels,...etc. to sharpen knives in an attempt to find the ones best suited for different applications. I used to do relief carving and made my own knives (generally out of old straight razors that I'd pickup at yard sales - that I would grind down and temper), I always enjoyed making them - but truth be known, you can purchase better knives than I could make - but I always took pride in them.

Works Sharp is pretty good and I agree the purple extra fine (6,000 grit) will do a pretty good job of getting a knife sharp (if you want to take it to the next level - get the leather belts with the sharpening compound, not as good as a strop - but the same principle). Spyderco triangle sharp maker is pretty good all-round sharpening for hunting knives and kitchen knives (the ceramic is what will make it sharp). Japanese wet stones (typically used to sharpen straight razors), once you learn the angle will produce an amazing edge. A guy that I worked with used ultra fine wet sandpaper - once his knife was somewhat sharp, he'd used 10,000-15,000 grit sandpaper to polish the edge and they were pretty sharp. A good friend of mine's dad used the window on his truck - he swore by it, I've never tried that technique.

But, IF you really want to get a knife scary sharp ("remove the wire edge" - it's not practical, unless you are doing wood working or shaving AND definitely not useful in the kitchen or for hunting) - using a leather strop (you can also use jeans) with the correct compound, you can literally hold a hair between your thumb and index finger and cut the hair multiple times just by dragging the hair across the blade.

A good test of a knife blade (edge is not rolled) is - put very little weight on it, drag edge across your fingernail, it should be smooth as silk with no catches.