Thread: Breadknifing While Honing

How often do you breadknife your razor while honing, and under what circumstances do you breadknife?

When honing on 1K, the edge often feels raspy, and under the microscope the jagged, wiry edge is evident. So, I lightly breadknife and rehone on the 1K. (I breadknife in 3 angles: vertically, and then from both sides with the blade held at 45 degrees.) If it still doesn't feel and look right, I might breadknife again and rehone.

Breadknifing and rehoning takes about 5 minutes. (I breadknife very gently.)

After this, I usually have a sound edge that persists throughout the rest of the honing process. I don't always breadknife. But, it is an important technique for me in establishing the good 1K level edge.

So, now I have bared my honing soul. Tell me about breadknifing in your procedure.

I've done it with large chips and also with serious frowns. Having done a few I decide to follow the advice of some more experienced honers and I doubt I will ever do it again. If it is simply micro chipping or even chips or a frown that can be seen with the naked eye I have found it creates more work than flat honing using circles or perhaps even lifting the spine a bit until the condition calling for it is corrected. YMMV, just IME.

Who ever started this thing about breadknifing should be shot.

Breadknifing is not a normal honing method and probably isn't any honing method. What it really is can be considered the nuclear option when you have a blade whose edge is in such bad shape that if you were to rescue it you would have to spend a massive amount of time because you would have to remove so much metal for a variety of reasons. It's like coming into a city and doing urban renewal by bulldozing everything. That's exactly what you are doing. Your bulldozing the edge and starting again.

As far as I'm concerned if there is any normal way to save an edge you would not breadknife. It certainly isn't some routine operation to be made a part of any normal razor maint. If I was going to do breadknifing the question I would ask myself is "do I breadknife or just throw the blade away"?

I never breadknife.

Maybe I haven't described the procedure I use enough, or possibly I should have avoided the word breadknife. I am not talking about something to correct a frown. More like what JimmyHAD referred to when he said...

...lifting the spine a bit until the condition calling for it is corrected.

Very, very light touch. Just barely touching the blade to the hone, just a whisper across the hone at a raised angle.

Shoot me now!

Yikes !!!!

The "breadknife" your talking about Larry is not what they are talking about, Bart then Harlan from Shapton brought up what you are doing, a while back.
Sometimes referred to as "Jointing" it does exactly what you are trying to do it starts the edge of as neutral... I use this technique after the razor comes off a buffing wheel myself because the edge is UGLY after that, very ragged...

"Breadknifing" is a Restore technique very, very, rarely used for chips and frowns, to give you an idea of how rarely it is used I have honed over 3500 razors a majority of them restores, I think I have actually breadknifed maybe 30 razors and they were very bad... Most of the time you can get there an easier way, but sometimes you can't....

Originally Posted by gssixgun

The "breadknife" your talking about Larry is not what they are talking about, Bart then Harlan from Shapton brought up what you are doing, a while back. Sometimes referred to as "Jointing" it does exactly what you are trying to do it starts the edge of as neutral... I use this technique after the razor comes off a buffing wheel myself for because the edge is UGLY after that very ragged...

Much appreciated! When there was such a vigorous reaction, I suspected my terminology was misleading.

So, when and how is "jointing" used?

Can you replay in a sentence or two what "Harlan from Shapton" said?

Just found a thread that directly discusses this topic...

http://straightrazorpalace.com/honin...ing-razor.html

My apologies for not finding this thread and reading it before sending this new query.

Originally Posted by thebigspendur

Who ever started this thing about breadknifing should be shot.

Breadknifing is not a normal honing method and probably isn't any honing method. What it really is can be considered the nuclear option when you have a blade whose edge is in such bad shape that if you were to rescue it you would have to spend a massive amount of time because you would have to remove so much metal for a variety of reasons. It's like coming into a city and doing urban renewal by bulldozing everything. That's exactly what you are doing. Your bulldozing the edge and starting again.

As far as I'm concerned if there is any normal way to save an edge you would not breadknife. It certainly isn't some routine operation to be made a part of any normal razor maint. If I was going to do breadknifing the question I would ask myself is "do I breadknife or just throw the blade away"?

+1 on the who ever started this thing ....

One reason and perhaps the only reason to breadknife is when the
blade is so bad that four layers of tape are applied to protect the spine
and a temporary bevel is generated after grinding out knicks and chips.
By dulling the blade prior to and after the generation of the temporary
bevel it is possible to assess how well the bevel is set with a thumb
nail test on a coarse stone.

Here is one reason to breadknife. Perhaps the only reason.

I bought it for the scales but when I saw how fine the
original grind was I took a chance and breadknifed it
to the point that none of the chips and cracks were exposed.
Then with four layers of tape I used a DMT and put a bevel
on it. Then with zero layers of tape I put a new fresh
bevel with the same DMT and then worked it through all my
hones to the point I can shave with it. Running it over the
bottom of a glass after the first temp bevel made setting
the final bevel less ambiguous as the burr from the DMT
on the first temp bevel could pass a HHT in places.

It is not needed in the normal honing process.
Back to the topic of "jointing".

This thread is closed by request of the OP it has gone so far of point which was admittedly due partly to using the wrong terminology...

There are plenty of threads in the advanced honing section on Breadknifing and Jointing


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