Thread: Honing the tip of a smile ?

Chris,

When I'm doing a rolling x pattern I think of how I would have to maneuver the blade as if I were honing on a stone that is 1/8 of an inch wide. If you can visualize what that would look like, then all you have to do is reproduce that motion on a larger stone. The blade only contacts the 1/8 to 1/4 of an inch of the stone along the far right hand side, and any movement you must make to achieve that goal is what we call the "Rolling X."




(find a pencil and a dull razor, then pretend to hone the razor on the pencil, the motion that you must use to cover the entire length of the cutting edge is the motion of the rolling x)

OK, if this is a contest to explain the rolling hone to Chris, here's my entry.

Imagine a super-smiling razor. So extremely smiley in fact that the blade profile is a half-circle. It helps also to picture it as a true wedge. Now lay that imaginary blade on a hone. It doesn't sit flat. The heel and toe taper away, and the middle part is thicker, so it rocks back and forth on this 'hull'.

That's all – you're just rolling it on its hull as it moves down the hone.