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Hello. I was curious is the honing angle of the blade to stone, not the spine would affect sharpness one way or the other. Meaning if the blade is honed heel leading with the grain of the scratch paterns going in that direction would that be better worse or the same as opposed to finishing straight on. I haven't found that to be the case although ive heard knife sharpeners talk about it.
Watching vids of this one and that one, seeing a local honemeister, I've seen guys do it at various degrees. Almost at a 90 to the stone and maintaining that, but with an X so the scratch pattern won't be @ 90. I tend to hold the razor at maybe 20 to 30 degrees and still do a pronounced X. Lynn says that on big wedges 45 IIRC (it's in the Wiki) works if there is inordinate spine wear. The advent of the circle technique, where the scratch pattern has to be random, makes me wonder if it matters that much whether it is at one angle or another. I always hone heel leading but YMMV.
This should be interesting to hear the different views. Personally, I don't know and hone everything heel forward X pattern with no complaints.
Bob
Jimmy makes a good point about the circle strokes. I've always gotten the impression that most guys follow the circle strokes by using some degree of X stroke for the final finish. This works well for me.