Thread: I feel like this shouldn't have worked.

Well your one of those guys that could put an edge on it with a brick and finish on a river rock :<0) The average guy would not be wise to try this. Me for example. I was thinking after my last post that the amount of time the edge spends on a round rod compared to the time the whole edge is on a stone would hardly make it worth the attempt. It sounds like it was a great experiment for you and turned out well. Wise to do on a regular basis ?

Apologies, I should have mention that the Spyderco Sharpmaker rods are triangular and I honed it on a flat side.

Definitely unwise to do on a regular basis. More of a novelty in regard to what can be done as opposed to what should be done.

So when you guys sharpen a knife edge, you don’t look at it with magnification?

For razors, sharp is a given… a razor must shave smoothly for comfort. Getting to sharp is easy, it’s the comfort part that gives knife guys a problem. A few second and a 3 dollar loupe will tell you a lot about how it will shave across the whole edge, before you put it to your skin.

I am more surprised, that you don’t look at the edge of a $200 scissor, before calling it good…

I've never encountered a knife that would need that kind of treatment. Maybe the lab techs that use those devices to look at slices of brain matter, but I don't sharpen the blades they use. Even the chefs from the nicer restaurants in the area would lose the work needed to make magnification valid after steeling. The same applies to the meat cutters I know. Do you know of any knife wielding professionals that need, want, or expect that? Much less the average home cook with their $50 set of Cuisinarts?

Nerve endings in the fingers are sensitive enough to detect up to a nanometer in variation. After feeling edges for that many hours you know what the right edge for the job feels like.

Odd, that it would not shave comfortably, against the grain…

Doesn't seem odd to me Marty. After all, that is the true test of a smooth edge for me. And I never heard of looking at any kind of edge under glass until I started honing straights. Almost a must do in that case because there is no way to see the edge without it. When I was learning knives it was all about thumb pad. My Pop said you either get it so sharp it's doesn't stay that way long or you get it just sharp enough to do the job. Needless to say I can sharpen my own just enough to do the job :<0)