Question on Murray Carter's honing technique

This probably doesn't belong in a razor forum since it's a knife question, but this is the only place I know of where there is a plentiful supply of honing gurus who give reliably good information.

In Murray Carter's videos, is he holding the angle of the knife freehand? Or do Carter knives have a large bevel that serves as an angle guide when laid flat, as Swedish Mora knives do?

I ask because I am unable to hold the knife the way he does. When I try, I rock the spine subtly while honing, thus (severely) convexing the bevel. I do a much better job when I hold the knife in one hand with my index finger on the blade for stability, and describe circles on the hone. I'm not perfect, you can't shave with my knives the way Murray does, but you can cut tomato slices thin enough to see through, so they're sharp enough for all practical purposes.

Note: I don't own any Carter knives, nor have I ever seen one up close. My knives are very old carbon steel Chicago Cutlery.

I never heard of him so I probably ought to keep my mouth shut...... but since I seldom do ..... is he the Tiger Woods of knife sharpening ? I have a putter but I just can't get the ball in the way Tiger does. :D

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Originally Posted by JimmyHAD

...I have a putter but I just can't get the ball in the way Tiger does. :D

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Try sleeping with more women.... :D

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Originally Posted by BingoBango

Try sleeping with more women.... :D

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Hadn't thought of that approach but I'm open to the suggestion. :rock:

I haven't seen Carter videos but usually i hone our knives freehand. It comes natural, but it needs a some amount of practice. So do not start practicing with your best knives.
Some large knives and specially tools like plane or chisel blades have bevels so wide that it is easy to feel the right angle when honing. With narrower bevels it just comes in time.
There's also some honing guides available (Veritas etc), but i've found them too impractical. Tormek and some other makers has a bulletproof systems for honing any kind of tools but that is of course totally different than honing freehand.

your question will be very well answered here
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its where the kitchen knife nuts reside

I have never paid much attention to him. I would think his knives are not mora like. It just takes practice.

I'm not sure what you are describing but i think i sometimes do similar. Some I do 1 handed.

I am not shaving with my cutlery either but they do work well enough.

I have seen one gizmo at Hida tool that clips on the blade. you could probably come up with something similar a couple narrow strips of wood with some electric tape. that would get you bevels back to flatness and then practice freehanding again.

@JimmyHAD: In fact, yes, Murray *IS* the Tiger Woods of sharpening. His videos are the only ones I've seen that aren't (a) flat-out wrong, or (b) missing vital details. However, he's also a bladesmith & I am wondering if his instructions subtly favor his own knives.

@maniaman: Thanks for the link. I usually start with people I know & trust (i.e. the people here) but if all else fails, I'll try there.

@Sailor: I've gotten pretty good at freehanding it too, but Murray can shave with his knives, and I cannot shave with mine. Carter hones by holding the blade in both hands and using a back-and-forth motion, straight forward & straight back, on a 1000/6000 waterstone. So either Murray is a human sharpening machine, or his knives have a very wide bevel that's very easy to lay flat. I don't know which.

@kevint: I did fix the bevel I wrecked by starting again with 220 grit wet/dry and holding the knife the way I know: one-handed grip. index finger extended. But I can't get the results Murray gets. I'm wondering if maybe those results are impossible when you're freehanding with the spine in the air. Again, that's why I'm wondering if Carter knives have a Mora-like design.

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Originally Posted by Johnny J

@maniaman: Thanks for the link. I usually start with people I know & trust (i.e. the people here) but if all else fails, I'll try there.

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no problem, thought to give you a link since a lot of talk about knife sharpening happens there.

Murray Carter has been doing that kind of thing for most of his life. Heck he is the 17 generation of a promonent Japanese family of knife makers. It's all on his website (carter cutlery).

I've talked to him at shows and watched as he sharpened peoples knives at shows, amazing skills there. His knives are crazy thin and very well made. This pic is my Nakiri he made for me, longer and custome fit handle, that I stropped up and for the hell of it I shaved the parts I could see over/around the blade with. Scary smooth shave but not something i'd do again... I had problems with the blade sticking into the cutting board till I put a micro bevel on it :p

His videos had a lot of info in them, and his first one will put insomiacs into a comma... But they are great for learning to free hand sharpen.

If all your used to are western style knives you may not need to know all the things or use all the skills Carter talks about. But if your into Japanese steel, you will at some time or another use them all.

Oh ya, by mid summer he will have razors showing up :)

I dont think I could fix a bevel one handed on 220 paper.

Do you in any way index your body position so that you can feel the constancy of the angle throughout the strokes? fingertips(though you dont want constant rubbing. touch points. I catch myself looking out the the corners of eyes at forearms, watching the wave of slurry. And at the end I cheat by raising a small micro bevel if it might need it. With razors you know how to do. with knives you have to be the spine,:gwh:

I do polish down the whole bevel on my mora each time I sharpen it. It never gets much sharper because it has a microbevel. every so often i do reset it all the way

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Originally Posted by kevint

I dont think I could fix a bevel one handed on 220 paper.

Do you in any way index your body position so that you can feel the constancy of the angle throughout the strokes?

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I've been practicing this quite a lot. I put the stone on the counter (with a towel under it so it doesn't slide around), wet it with water, and lay the knife across the stone at about a 45 degree angle so I can pretend the stone is wider than it really is. I am left-handed, and I do both sides with my left hand. Suppose I were holding the knife straight out in front of me, edge down: I will call these the left and right sides of the knife.

When I'm doing the left side of the knife, I lay my index finger along the spine. When I do the right side of the knife, I lay my index finger on the upward-facing left side of the knife. This is for stability.

I place the knife on the stone and initially find the angle by looking and feeling with the fingers of my right hand. Then I make circles on the stone, slowly drawing the knife from heel to tip. (I don't bend my wrist, I use my whole arm). When the angle is just right, I can feel a suction effect like there's honey smeared on the stone, from the two wet, flat surfaces rubbing together. This is exactly the same feeling I get from arazor on a wet Swaty.

I finish the Murray Carter way. I backhone a couple of strokes to put in a tiny primary bevel & remove the burr. Then I lightly draw the edge through soft wood to remove any burr remnants. Then I backhone a couple more strokes. That's it.

From Dwarven Chef's picture, it looks like the secondary bevel is very uneven and is not meant to be used as an angle guide a la Mora knife. So Murray really is freehanding it with both hands, back & forth. Well, his way may be better than mine, but I can't do it the way he does it. My grip might be weird but I'm used to it, for good or ill.

Hope that was comprehensible.

Murray's last newsletter mentioned he was going to start making straight razors in the near future.

Yup both western and Japanese :)

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Originally Posted by Johnny J

I've been practicing this quite a lot. I put the stone on the counter (with a towel under it so it doesn't slide around), wet it with water, and lay the knife across the stone at about a 45 degree angle so I can pretend the stone is wider than it really is. I am left-handed, and I do both sides with my left hand. Suppose I were holding the knife straight out in front of me, edge down: I will call these the left and right sides of the knife.

When I'm doing the left side of the knife, I lay my index finger along the spine. When I do the right side of the knife, I lay my index finger on the upward-facing left side of the knife. This is for stability.

I place the knife on the stone and initially find the angle by looking and feeling with the fingers of my right hand. Then I make circles on the stone, slowly drawing the knife from heel to tip. (I don't bend my wrist, I use my whole arm). When the angle is just right, I can feel a suction effect like there's honey smeared on the stone, from the two wet, flat surfaces rubbing together. This is exactly the same feeling I get from arazor on a wet Swaty.

I finish the Murray Carter way. I backhone a couple of strokes to put in a tiny primary bevel & remove the burr. Then I lightly draw the edge through soft wood to remove any burr remnants. Then I backhone a couple more strokes. That's it.

From Dwarven Chef's picture, it looks like the secondary bevel is very uneven and is not meant to be used as an angle guide a la Mora knife. So Murray really is freehanding it with both hands, back & forth. Well, his way may be better than mine, but I can't do it the way he does it. My grip might be weird but I'm used to it, for good or ill.

Hope that was comprehensible.

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Rather than extending the index on the spine try keeping it on the bottom side, more of a pinch grip with the thumb on top. and x strokes rather than circles. might help.

Hey Kevin, I like to grind my secondary bevel at a pretty steep angle, so there's no room for my finger under the blade. Also, I agree that the X-stroke is much easier to keep a consistent angle, but the circles hog off more steel faster, which is important because most Western knives seem to have a fairly obtuse single-bevel grind, so I have to put in that acute secondary bevel by hand, from scratch. After fixing all my knives this way, I had so much practice doing the circles that the circle stroke began to feel natural.

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Originally Posted by Johnny J

Hey Kevin, I like to grind my secondary bevel at a pretty steep angle, so there's no room for my finger under the blade. Also, I agree that the X-stroke is much easier to keep a consistent angle, but the circles hog off more steel faster, which is important because most Western knives seem to have a fairly obtuse single-bevel grind, so I have to put in that acute secondary bevel by hand, from scratch. After fixing all my knives this way, I had so much practice doing the circles that the circle stroke began to feel natural.

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Okay.

I was sharpening last night and thought" hey where's that finger reference- point you tried to convince Johnny of?" Angle too high.

with your secondary bevel though you should not need to hog off a lot of metal, and really I am unconvinced circles are more effective than back and forth xs

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Originally Posted by Johnny J

Hey Kevin, I like to grind my secondary bevel at a pretty steep angle, so there's no room for my finger under the blade. Also, I agree that the X-stroke is much easier to keep a consistent angle, but the circles hog off more steel faster, which is important because most Western knives seem to have a fairly obtuse single-bevel grind, so I have to put in that acute secondary bevel by hand, from scratch. After fixing all my knives this way, I had so much practice doing the circles that the circle stroke began to feel natural.

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Its time to convert to the dark side and start using Japanese knives, they take the most amazing edges a knife can.

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Originally Posted by mainaman

Its time to convert to the dark side and start using Japanese knives, they take the most amazing edges a knife can.

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I've never seen a jp boning knife, nor a paring knife that I really liked, or their cleavers. Some of those old occidental knives are really quite lovable. one of each of those and a santoku sums up my kitchen knife needs.

If I really wanted to cut down, pare down to necessity. It'd be the bridge cutlery clever and the santoku.

(im not really sure it should be called a cleaver. 1.5 inch at the heel. 2 inch at the toe. being thickest at the hilt and distal tapered to both ends it is really well made.)

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Originally Posted by kevint

I've never seen a jp boning knife, nor a paring knife that I really liked, or their cleavers. Some of those old occidental knives are really quite lovable. one of each of those and a santoku sums up my kitchen knife needs.

If I really wanted to cut down, pare down to necessity. It'd be the bridge cutlery clever and the santoku.

(im not really sure it should be called a cleaver. 1.5 inch at the heel. 2 inch at the toe. being thickest at the hilt and distal tapered to both ends it is really well made.)

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I have used a petty knife that is very thin and convenient for deboning small stuff, but for true debonig and filleting the right specialized knife should be used.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Johnny J

I've been practicing this quite a lot. I put the stone on the counter (with a towel under it so it doesn't slide around), wet it with water, and lay the knife across the stone at about a 45 degree angle so I can pretend the stone is wider than it really is. I am left-handed, and I do both sides with my left hand. Suppose I were holding the knife straight out in front of me, edge down: I will call these the left and right sides of the knife.

When I'm doing the left side of the knife, I lay my index finger along the spine. When I do the right side of the knife, I lay my index finger on the upward-facing left side of the knife. This is for stability.

I place the knife on the stone and initially find the angle by looking and feeling with the fingers of my right hand. Then I make circles on the stone, slowly drawing the knife from heel to tip. (I don't bend my wrist, I use my whole arm). When the angle is just right, I can feel a suction effect like there's honey smeared on the stone, from the two wet, flat surfaces rubbing together. This is exactly the same feeling I get from arazor on a wet Swaty.

I finish the Murray Carter way. I backhone a couple of strokes to put in a tiny primary bevel & remove the burr. Then I lightly draw the edge through soft wood to remove any burr remnants. Then I backhone a couple more strokes. That's it.

From Dwarven Chef's picture, it looks like the secondary bevel is very uneven and is not meant to be used as an angle guide a la Mora knife. So Murray really is freehanding it with both hands, back & forth. Well, his way may be better than mine, but I can't do it the way he does it. My grip might be weird but I'm used to it, for good or ill.

Hope that was comprehensible.

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I don't know who you are talking about, but being a chef I've sharpened thousands (well maybe not thousands) of knives usually my own and all by hand. I never understood why some people couldn't sharpen knives (some were so affraid of getting cut and all that). I used to do the finger trick on the spine and angling the knife against the stone to get more steel on the ston at once, but to get some of tose bevels no knives like an old japanese sushi chef taught me to use a smaller stone put the knife on the edge of the table and look for light between the two. It really helped getting those higher angle bevels like some japanese knives. I have seen some angle setting machine where you set the knife and run the stone across the knife. If you need more help try britishblades.com.

Hi Everyone,
I'm new to these forums but not new to Murray Carter or his knives. His knives are almost all laminated steel (or Damascus) with a carbon steel core approaching Rc 64. His geometry is pretty much the same as other knives in the same usage profile. There are two primary things he teaches in his videos:

1 - To 'feel' the taper of the Secondary Edge and adjust it until it seems to vanish between your fingers as you pinch the blade between your fingers and draw them from spine to edge.

2 - To hone the 'final' strokes for the Primary Edge on both the 1000 grit and 6000 grit stone ONLY away from the edge. This is counter to conventional sharpening practice for a straight razor.

The factors that produce a face shaving edge are:

1 - The relationship of the angle of the Primary Edge to the Secondary Edge. It is shallower than you would ordinarily sharpen a 'working' knife.

2 - The honing process goes an extra step to a much finer stone. In Murray's case he is a pure fundamental minimalist and uses Newspaper or Cardboard (after the 6000grit) since the clay content is perfect for final polishing of the edge.

He makes the point several times in his 2 videos that the grits of the stones are not really important until you get to the 'last' honing and that is determined by what you want to use the blade for. In fact, he demonstrates shaving hair on his arm after sharpening with a cement block and cardboard as a final hone.

The last part I have to offer is that the 'flatness' or 'triangular profile' of the Primary bevel is the important one not the Secondary Edge so much. The Primary bevel 'should' be very small, almost a line of light against the Secondary and this is created by your choice of Secondary and Primary geometry. The small bevel makes it 'easier' to hold a constant angle since only a few strokes are required to remove the needed last bit of metal and finally polish.

I hope this helps clarify.

BTW I own a neck knife and outdoor knife made by him and I can, by changing the geometry from working geometry to more acute 'shaving' geometry, shave my face with either of them. In my experience, his knives are unmatched for performance, but that is only my experience and I haven't tried every one out there :)

For those of you who may be frustrated with the honing, it can take quite a bit of time to get the skill down. I watched his videos about 15 times and sharpened over 300 knives before it really started to make sense. So if you want to be a freehand sharpener, practice! You WILL get it if you pay attention to your blade. It doesn't hurt to have his videos too and a dvd player with good slow motion and frame by frame control.

I've heard that Japanese knives are incredible. Maybe someday I'll spring for a Carter knife. At the moment, I don't do any filleting, most of the cooking I do involves slicing or chopping vegetables. My ancient Chicago Cutlery chef knives seem to do that job pretty well, once I've reground the bevels to my liking. But make no mistake, although you can slice tomatoes with them, you cannot shave with them.

lol.. My first set of knives, bought in 1975, were Chicago Cutlery. I still have them. I still use them. They are wonderful knives though there is not much blade left on some of them. You are right though, there seems to be no substitute for a good laminated blade with a carbon steel core. I had no experience with such knives at the low angles used for the kitchen until I ran into Carter Cutlery and now, for me, there's no going back.

BTW Murray once told me that the best straight razor he ever owned/used was a broken kitchen knife.... I can hardly wait for that run of straight razors he's going to make.

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Originally Posted by DwarvenChef

Yup both western and Japanese :)

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I'm curious who else signed up for a kamisori or a western, and what either will look like. He recently told me I'm #2 on the customs list. I -- Can' -- Wait!

I was on the fence and couldn't decide so I just asked him to pick for me. It'll be cool either way.

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Originally Posted by bassguy

I'm curious who else signed up for a kamisori or a western, and what either will look like. He recently told me I'm #2 on the customs list. I -- Can' -- Wait!

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I'm still in talks with him... Most likely going western but not sure of that blade profile yet... I want a stiff blade :)

Well, you guys are the experts when it comes to razors. I shaved for a couple of years with a Wade & Butcher... lol... 40 years ago. After I found this forum I dug it out and started up again and, gee, it still works and the batteries didn't even corrode. So as you can see, my experience is not exactly vast, but I figured that I could learn all I need to get going again here. As to the stiffness, the Japanese style is probably going to be stiffer from what I can see of photos I have looked at on EBay where some of the vendors show cross sections. But I've never held one in my hand. If any of you have any advice on a choice, I'd be grateful for the input since I'm not committed to a particular one yet.

Are the Japanese razors going to have an asymmetrical Japanese grind? One thing confuses me about the Japanese grind. IIRC, only the concave side is supposed to go against your skin? You can do that when shaving someone else, but how can you do that when shaving yourself?

The jp style kamisori is only a razor and it works just like a razor

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Originally Posted by Johnny J

Are the Japanese razors going to have an asymmetrical Japanese grind? One thing confuses me about the Japanese grind. IIRC, only the concave side is supposed to go against your skin? You can do that when shaving someone else, but how can you do that when shaving yourself?

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'Was fortunate to meet and thoroughly enjoy some time with Mr. Carter today. 'Watched him finish a blade that the lovely bride wanted for her bday. I saw and handled a couple of the razor blanks, including one prototype kamisori that he finished the grind and honing on. He's been very busy, so I wouldn't expect many razors anytime soon. I most certainly WOULD be interested when he does get some out. I have no doubt the blade quality will be staggering.

Johnny - I had the same question about the asymetric blade profile. Mr. Carter said - don't worry about it. Use either side against the skin.

Japanese blades are definitely intended to only have one side against your face. It's apparent from the way the blade is ground. Western blades are symmetrically ground so that either side can be used against the face.

Sure, there are lots of guys who say you can use either side of a Japanese razor. There are also guys who say each side should be honed with the same number of strokes. But that is not the way they were designed to be used.

To shave yourself, you have to be a bit creative with your strokes.

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Originally Posted by holli4pirating

Japanese blades are definitely intended to only have one side against your face. It's apparent from the way the blade is ground. Western blades are symmetrically ground so that either side can be used against the face.

Sure, there are lots of guys who say you can use either side of a Japanese razor. There are also guys who say each side should be honed with the same number of strokes. But that is not the way they were designed to be used.

To shave yourself, you have to be a bit creative with your strokes.

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I believe only the wealthy in feudal Japan were clean shaven, and this was done by a barber. He moved around the customer while using the same hand. So a grind that benefited the user and usee (see what i did there with the English language) was employed.
I learnt sharpening from Murray, and my search for more info on the internet led me here.
Now I have severe RAD and restorers itch-I am now looking at a way to set up a forge in an inner city apartment-you guys have totally screwed me up!!!!!

Mr Carter been brought up a few times, he might be the king of knifes, but his methos of honing a razor are somewhat questionable.
Here a thread about him and showing him honing a razor, lots of question and debate about his honing and challenges.
http://straightrazorpalace.com/honin...say-about.html
His comments about current razor honing methods were on the verge of disrespectfull.
Thats all i have to say about that!

Guys, Not sure if your aware, This thread is 2 years old....I really don't want to re visit it.....

Closing as a 'zombie' thread. With 4 pages of replies 2 years ago no more needs to be added.