Thread: Somebody was doing a lot of breadknifing

I did a quick check on ebay for hones (I need a few more to finish tiling my basement) and came across an interesting Escher. I remember a few months ago Chrisl mentioning that he found a barber hone with grooves in it that he could only imagine was from breadknifing. Well, I'm guessing that this Escher is a slightly more extreme example of somebody doing a heck of a lot of breadknifing!

What is breadknifeing? The only use for those marks must be if you want to turn a razor or a knife into a butter knife...

I assume breadknifing is running the blade edge over a hone to remove the overhoned (wire) edge before resetting the bevel. Somebody must have worn many blades completely away to get that effect on the hone, maybe going throught a new blade every 3 months?

Sheese, you guys don't know anything....it is "in excellent condition showing 4 small defects"



Question & Answer
Answered On
Q: Hi there, would you know which category the stone falls into? Ie. Yellow/Green or Blue/Green Thanx Jan-15-09
A: Of the two Blue/Green Thanks
Q: the stone looks like it has grooves cut into one end of the label side, is this so and if so, do you know why?Jan-14-09
A: Good question I really do not know maybe made during the manufacturing process. Just a guess Thanks

Although I tend to agree with your assessment, here are a few other thoughts that ran through my brain on that extreme example...

Is the other side really well worn???
Perhaps this is an example of an actual "Cutler's" stone??? somebody that did work on other people's razors???
Perhaps this is an example of marks from another tools sharpening process maybe a woodworker who was raising a wire edge, then breadknifeing it off the tool, and using the Escher for a final polish...

Just some thoughts

Originally Posted by ShotgunLuckey

Sheese, you guys don't know anything....it is "in excellent condition showing 4 small defects"

I'd sell it as a "Customised, professional hone with hand-crafted sharpening slots."

Maybe they were sharpening things other than razors? Or for some reason using the hone to shape things rather than sharpen them? I could kind of picture someone that wanted to make a bike-spoke like piece of metal doing that. An artist?

Originally Posted by Stuggi

What is breadknifeing? The only use for those marks must be if you want to turn a razor or a knife into a butter knife...

Bread knifing is a stroke used to rapidly remove nicks from an edge, reshape an edge or remove old oxidised steel. It is not used to remove wire edges, that would be to extreme.

If you assume that the hone is a loaf of bread then take your razor and try to cut off a slice. That is the motion, done very lightly. The result is a clean, chip free edge that is oh so very dull.

There is a debate about when to use it.

My guess is from repairing and honing various woodworking/whittling knives

Thats how they made 3/8 and 4/8 razors back in the day!