Thread: Knife Vs Straight

Originally Posted by Gasman

Sharper than a straight?
NO! Say it anit so.

No No, Jerry! It was sharper than YOUR straights!

Kidding....Sorry!

Frowning scandi

Too pretty to be a gutter, but that's what it is.....

Originally Posted by sharptonn

No No, Jerry! It was sharper than YOUR straights!

Kidding....Sorry!

Love you too bro.

The difference between the two is in identifying problems. With Razors problems are magnified. Because really, no-one shaves with a knife and all but a few really need a knife that sharp.

Because thing are ubiquitous people think that they are easy, like shooting, driving a car, hitting a golf ball or sharpening a knife. but to compete at a high level, these things become much more difficult.

Yes, some skills can transfer over, and a skilled knife sharpener may be able to hone a razor, but certainly not the cutlery guy with the belt sander. There is one guy locally, that I repair a lot of his “work”.

My brother who is a scratch golfer, once quit his job and went on the Pro golf circuit for 3 years, he said the difference between his skills and the true Pro’s was that they play very well, in the heat or bone chilling cold, in wind or rain, sick or healthy, hung over or sober. The ability to sink a put is not so much in hitting the ball, as reading the green, and you must sink a putt at every hole. Each stroke counts, the one who makes the least mistakes, wins.

Originally Posted by onimaru55

The heavier pressure we associate with knife sharpening is only when re-profiling or removing chips etc.
Even if you sharpen to a burr the removal of said burr & final polishing should be with light pressure or you wreck that edge as easy as if it were a razor.

At least that's how I sharpen a knife.

This is true of how I sharpen a knife now. But that is vastly different from how I sharpened them prior to getting into straight razors.

Perhaps it is more accurate to say that most casual knife owners do not know what a sharp edge really is, or even how to sharpen their knives. Thus they need to unlearn everything they think they know about a sharp edge and come at honing as a whole with a new perspective. Of course approaching someone that thinks they know a lot about something, and saying 'You really don't, forget everything you think you know. This is how it works' will be received differently than, 'Look, sharpening these isn't like sharpening those. Forget about knives, this is how we do it with straight razors.' This separates the two concepts, makes the person more likely to come at it with a fresh perspective, thus more receptive to new concepts they hadn't even considered when honing a knife.

Later on, they can decide for themselves if they want to apply what they learned about honing razors to their knife work.

Looking back, I thought I knew how to sharpen a blade, and had a bit of a chip on my shoulder. Trying to hone a straight razor humbled me. Razors don't care what one thinks they know, if the edge isn't right they're going to feel as if ripping hair out by the roots and it's going to be a bad time.

I'm a stubborn one. It took a few tear jerking shaves for me to come here and ask for help. It took a few more tear jerking shaves to make me scrap what I thought I knew about honing, approach razor honing from square 1, and take the good advice that was given here.

Hi all

To me sharpening a knife is the almost same process as sharpening a razor, cause both have the same main goal: to bring the two bevels met each other along the cutting edge and to achieve a maximum possible keeness for the given steel type and by the given honing-equipment.
You‘re in both cases:
- starting with a coarce stone for bevel setting
- refining the faces of the bevel on finer stones to increase the edge keeness
- lightening up the pressure while refining the edge


This process has certain parameters:
1. Angle: fixes for razor by its manufacturer; freely variable for knife by the honers hand
2. Bevel geometry: fix for razor, miltuple choice for knives e.g. Convex, micro-bevel, even concave defined by honer
3. Stone Grid range: for razors most likely 1k...20k; for knifes - depending on the steel quality. e.g. for my WMF kitchen knife: 400...~5k (Belgian blue whetstone), for my cheep kitchen knife: 400 only; with the forged woodworking knife I can easily go up to ~16k (Zulu-Grey)
4. Pressure applied a) at the coarse stage and b) at the finishing stage. With all stuff I sharpen I do significsntly lighten up the pressure while finishing. Sure the absolute value of the pressure is much higher for knife vs. razor, but the principle is the same.
... perhabs there are some other parameters ...

Ok now why „almost the same process“? The only one thing I definetly never aim to achieve for knifes is the smoothness of the edge to the skin...

I can tell that getting into the razor honing has significantly improved my honing of the knifes, woodworking tools and all other blade-wearing stuff. I do apply the same process for all of them by just adopting the parameters

Vest Regards

Philipp

Well said Phillip.

Yes, they are similar but definitely not the same. The trouble starts when a new user to straight razors who is used to sharpening knives can not accept that fact and adjust their honing methods accordingly. I think post #46 sums that up rather nicely.

Bob

Using a knife or sharpening one looks pretty simple and straightforward business. Even when I explain and show someone what happens to a particular edge, why for how it will be used a particular solution would work better (edges for knives are in many situations as personal as edges for razors), how geometry works, why going higher grit helps even stainless steel knives, what happens when you cut, how to cut, on what and other stuff, it's a bit difficult to accept. Many find it difficult to even answer my simple questions. I've been doing this for a long time now. There is some good news. Every single one was able to feel immediately a knife that cuts well. And I guess this is a win. I've been asked so many times about what I've done to the knife that it cuts like never before. There would be a lot to talk about. I've been writing a big reply on this, but I've realized it was way too big (took me 2 days) and then after cutting it, I didn't like it anymore, just to end up deleting it entirely.

There is a much bigger picture here. It's a lot more about choices in general. Not related to knives or razors at all.

Razors and knives are the same in more ways than they ever could be different. Even if knives will let you get away a lot easier with pretty much anything, while razors are stubborn like that and will not. Since knives are more forgiving, people will use that to justify a lot of things. Then again, if you start adding all the things above and do them right, you feel even a more of a difference than just a sharper edge. It's quite nice to take a knife and glide with it. I've just modified a Zwilling. It took me a couple of days on stones. Full flat on one side, unchanged on the other, but now with a little long convex edge on the outside. The difference is so big, that it cuts on its own. I hardly do anything. It will guillotine through foods like crazy. Prior to this, not only I could really feel the cutting, I was doing the cutting even if the edge itself would shave in the first place.

I've read a lot of good points already. You guys are very lucky and know even more than you might realize. I've started with razors after. And the more I worked with them, the more I realized how many principles I was using on knives.