Fine sandpaper for burr removal?

[Django606]

I received my large micarta Sebenza yesterday, and it seems to have a slight wire edge. Apparentally stropping is not affecting it, I use buffing compound rubbed into the rough side of a piece of leather. I think I read somewhere that buffing compound/jeweler's rouge is not coase enough to be effective for stropping. Does it really matter whether the rough or smooth side of leather is used?

I was wondering if glueing a piece of sandpaper (say 2000 grit?) to a block of wood would be a good way to remove a burr? Or should I use my Sharpmaker and stick the sand paper to the rods? All I have is the Sharpmaker and a benchstone with unknown grits, and I don't want to sharpen my new Sebenza on that. Would a few trailing strokes on 2000 grit sandpaper remove the burr/wire edge properly? A different grit perhaps?

All help will be greatly appreciated.

 

[Cliff Stamp]

Generally buffing compounds don't do well on burred high carbide steels. The Sharpmaker can directly remove the burr with the standard rods however this will likely change the edge angle. Sandpaper on a soft media like leather or a mousepad will conform to match the existing profile without changing it.

-Cliff

 

[Django606]

The only other thing I can think of that I have for stropping is aircraft grade metal polish. Can I apply that over the buffing compound, or do I have to make a new strop? Is this stuff even worth using? If I make a new strop and decide to use the metal polish, should I apply it to the rough or smooth side of the leather?

I might not even need to use sandpaper if this stuff is better than the buffing compound. If not, would you say 2000 is a good grit to use? It seems to me like it would be the right grit to gently grind off the burr without really affecting the edge. Is stropping actually grinding off the burr like on the Sharpmaker or sandpaper, or is it flopping the burr straight, so the edge is no longer curled over?

Thanks, and sorry for all the questions.

 

[Cliff Stamp]

Is this stuff even worth using?

I doubt it is designed to work on steels like S30V. Most buffing compounds are actually mixes of elements. If you mix them together you just get something inbetween both of them. Some polishing compounds are chemical in nature land designed to remove rust, this isn't want you want to use for burr removal. You can just try it on a piece of newsprint and lay that right on top of the strop.

If I make a new strop and decide to use the metal polish, should I apply it to the rough or smooth side of the leather?

The rough side is generally for wax or really coarse abrasives.

If not, would you say 2000 is a good grit to use? It seems to me like it would be the right grit to gently grind off the burr without really affecting the edge.

That is a fairly high polish, approaching the finer benchstones and buffing compounds.

Is stropping actually grinding off the burr like on the Sharpmaker or sandpaper, or is it flopping the burr straight, so the edge is no longer curled over?

It is grinding it off. If you just flop it around it tends to break off rapidly, just like if you bend a piece of wire back and forth. This tends to leave the edge jagged and blunt.


-Cliff

 

[Andy_L]

I remove any burrs using 2micron (8k grit I think) paper, it's enough to remove a slight burr on something that is already very sharp

it might be that your stropping with the knife at low which is too low for it to come into contact with the edge

 

[Django606]

it might be that your stropping with the knife at low which is too low for it to come into contact with the edge

Can you elaborate further on this please? I think this may be one of my problems.

 

[wwells20]

I think he meant "at too low of an angle" laying the blade too flat on the strop. I read (here) to lay the blade releativitly flat on the strop so as not to drag the cutting edge along the strop at too high an angle. This is suppose to degrade the edge. I try to do this with low-end steels but on stuff like S30V etc. I cock the cutting edge on up and I don't see any negitive effects. (I don't know if this is helps or not, but I wet the leather and then apply compound)

 

[gud4u]

I find it tedious and non-productive to remove a burr by stropping. The burr gets sharper and flops over, seemingly forever. Even some harder steels, such as ATS34, are a bitch.

I usually use slightly spine-elevated angle slices, at low honing pressure, on the Spyderco Gray benchstone, alternating strokes. If that doesn't work, I simply destroy the burr by slicing hardwood with firm pressure, and just form a new micro-bevel on the main bevel.

If you're having trouble determining whether or not you're actually working on the edge, try some picket-fence stripes across the bevels with a Sharpie pen.

Hope this helps!

 

[redhawk44p]

I usually use slightly spine-elevated angle slices, at low honing pressure,

That is what I do also only I use a fine diamond stone and VERY light pressure to remove the burr. Then I strop a little on smooth hard cardboard lightly coated with boron carbide.

 

[Django606]

What I'm really having trouble with is detecting the burr. I find the method from the eGullet post to be very useless, as an area with a burr feels VERY similar to an area without a burr.

So basically you're saying you just elevate the angle and use little pressure to remove the burr instead of stropping?

 

[Dog of War]

Lots of ways to remove a wire edge .... IMO plain leather is better than a loaded leather strop for the purpose. Jeff Clark's trick of doing a few light passes at elevated angle on the Sharpmaker might be the best of all. Don't overlook the possibility that the knife may need a good sharpening anyway.

I received my large micarta Sebenza yesterday, and it seems to have a slight wire edge....

So much for the Sebenza 'perfection' everybody talks about, I guess.

 

[Django606]

Oh, trust me, the knife is as close to perfection as you can get. I am not even really sure that it is a wire edge, the last inch of the tip just feels different and makes a different noise when I rub my thumb laterally over the edge. I looked at the entire edge under a 10X loupe, and it looks pretty much the same. Could the tip just feel different than the blade without actually having a wire edge?

 

[Cliff Stamp]

What I'm really having trouble with is detecting the burr. I find the method from the eGullet post to be very useless, as an area with a burr feels VERY similar to an area without a burr.

Until you have enough experience it can be difficult to detect burrs by feel. The easiest way is to view it under magnification as deformation burrs are easily visible as one side will look different than the other due to the steel being folded over and thus will show as a dark stripe along the edge. The edge will also simply not be very sharp.

-Cliff

 

[Andy_L]

I strop a knife at slightly less then I sharpened it. I tend to think that stropping may rip the metal off while a fine abrasive paper will cut it off and makes a good inbetween step, normaly I get rid of the burr at a slightly higher angle with a very fine sheet of abrasive paper, even if your wanting a course edge this is fine as you wont polish out the 600grit scratches (for example) with 8000grit paper

 

[awa54]

here's my two cents...

the only jewelers' compound I have found to work at all is black "rouge", this is usually used for either fast cutting or polishing extremely hard metals and it is usually diamond based, it works for an extreme finish edge on a working knife, but most folks won't need that kind of polish on anything short of a razor.

my prefered stropping compound is "Herb's Yellowstone" there are a bunch of places on the web to buy it, it cuts agressively compared to buffing compound and leaves an extremely useful edge without much work.

Pigskin is an ideal leather for a backed strop, but the back side of a tightly grained piece of cow hide can work well if you shave it smooth first. I think that the finished side of cowhide is what usually gets used, just pick a piece with an open enough grain to take in some of the abrasive or it will take forever to condition to the point where is works well without frequent applications of abrasive.

having said all this I usually remove a burr or a wire edge by sharpening edge first ("cutting" toward the stone) with a hard arkansas or a very fine diamond stone using less pressure with every pass until the burr is gone, then I finish on a strop or with a Japanese water stone depending on the knife or tool being sharpened.

a safe way to detect wire-edge is to put the heel edge of the blade into a block of softwood then draw it down as if sawing into the wood from heel to tip, if there are burrs you will feel them catching on the wood and will likely see the tiny flakes of metal in the notch left behind.

it's pretty common for the grind angle to change as it comes up the curve of the blade, that may be why it feels different, the geometry you choose to sharpen to will determine if that's ok or needs correction.

 

[cerulean]

My large Regular Sebenza had a little bit of a burr on it's edge when it was new. I just did a couple of very light strokes, at an elevated angle, on a hard black Arkansas stone to remove it. It's a BG-42 blade, though that probably doesn't make a whole lot of difference.

The Sebenza usually has a slightly convex edge, which may complicate things a bit. The edge angle on mine increases pretty dramatically towards the point. Like Awa54 said, that may be why the edge feels different there. Also, the steeper angle might prevent you from hitting the edge with whatever you use to remove the burr.

I haven't tried sandpaper before, but a lot of people sharpen convex grinds with sandpaper on a mouse pad. If you're not comfortable with freehand methods, then the Sharpmaker would probably be your best bet. Using it will change the edge angle to some degree, but you're guaranteed to eventually remove the burr (as long as you alternate sides and finish with lighter strokes).

It seems to me like 10X magnification should easily be enough to see a burr, though you might have to move the blade around a bit so the light falls on it right. To feel burrs that aren't quite visible to the naked eye, I run a fingernail over the edge and see if it catches.

In the pic below, I'm pressing the nail of my middle finger into the blade, then gently pulling the tip of my finger towards me and over the edge. If there's even a tiny burr present on that part of the edge (and that side of the blade), then your nail will bump up against it and stop.

 

[Django606]

Thanks for the replies everyone. After I was done stropping, I went to slice a small tomato, and was disappointed in the results. So I did a total of four strokes on the flats of the medium Sharpmaker stones. The burr was gone, and now I have a slightly toothier edge which will slice and push cut. I could make very thin slices of the tomato and still push cut newsprint, etc.

I also have a higher angle towards the tip on mine. When sharpening on the Sharpmaker, should I tilt my hand to accomodate this angle change, or should I just sharpen it like I sharpen the rest of the knife?

 

[Cliff Stamp]

After I was done stropping, I went to slice a small tomato, and was disappointed in the results.

Rounding tends to happen on stropping unless a lot of care is taken. Generally I find that a minimal amount of passes tends to be optimal for steels like S30V.

I also have a higher angle towards the tip on mine. When sharpening on the Sharpmaker, should I tilt my hand to accomodate this angle change, or should I just sharpen it like I sharpen the rest of the knife?

Unless there is some reason you want the tip much heavier ground then just regrind it.

-Cliff

 

[Django606]

I've also noticed that my Ares (The one I was talking about in the thread I made called "Burr help") seems much sharper than my Sebenza. Cliff reccomended that I cut into the fish hook groove in the Sharpmaker stones to remove the weak burr metal. I then proceeded to sharpen on the medium flats until a burr was achieved, and then sharpened the other side, then moved onto the whites and did the same thing.

Should I do this with my Sebenza? (Minus cutting the edge off, obviously.) Is there any reason this should make it sharper? It's not like I'm reprofiling the edge or anything, I'm just starting with the medium rods until I get a burr, and so on and so on.

 

[Cliff Stamp]

Burrs will always prevent optimal sharpness. Your Sebenza should be just as sharp as the Ares and I assume the grind is actually thinner so it should cut better. If it isn't getting as sharp then usually it is a burr issue, rarely you can have issues with the steel itself.

-Cliff