How do you sharpen your knives?

I've got a whole bunch of stones, water, aluminum oxide/ India stones from Norton, hard Arkansas, and DMT 6". The past couple years I have become lazy and just pretty much freehand use the diamond plates, and mostly stick to an old hard used blue one that I keep in the breadbox on the counter...I use a loaded strop and sometimes a butchers steel to touch them up. I'll even use some 1500 grit sandpaper for occasional touch ups.
 
To keep my Spyderco stones clean I use an abrasive cleaner like Comet and a Scothbrite green abrasive pad.

When it comes to stropping I glued some leather to some wood blocks. It seems to work just fine.
 
I use a Harbor Freight 1x30 for major sharpening and sand paper for (upkeep) sharpening. I did recently buy a Ken Onion w blade grinder attachment but haven't gotten comfortable with it yet.
 
My generic sharpening routine is a Norton 2x8 100 grit silicon carbide oil stone for heavy grinding and moving metal fast.
Eze-lap 2x6 diamond plates 250/600 coarse/fine for truing, touch ups, and finishing.
Bare denim to clean the microscopic hairy apex.

Sometimes I deviate from this for experimentation or specialty edges, but it's rare.
 
Railsplitter said:
Lately I've been using a Work Sharp system as well. It's the Guided Sharpening System with the stone mount that pivots to keep the angle correct on blades with bellied tips. An area that I always had problems with when freehand sharpening. The Pivot Response System actually works as advertised and is the best feature of this system in my opinion. I used the guides on my first two sessions but now I use the unit freehand.
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:thumbsup: +1 :)
 
Spyderco Sharpmaker. Spyderco Double Stuff for freehand edges. Norton Economy Stone for a quick edge on my kitchen knives.

Edit: i also find it helpfull with the Spyderco Double Stuff to set it on top of a piece of 2x4 and then set that on top of the counter to raise it up a bit.
 
I also use the Work Sharp system. It is a dream! Easy and fast! It trains you how to freehand sharpen if you ever desire to learn the muscle memory skills to be good at it.
 
Worksharp Ken Onion edition. I also have a sharpmaker, and a dmt mag-aligner system. The worksharp works so well, and is so fast and easy, it’s my go-to.

When I first got it, I thought it would only use it for reprofile, etc., and use the sharpmaker for touch-ups. But, I just really like using the worksharp. Belts are easy to change, and I have a variety of aftermarket belts, including a leather belt for stropping. I definitely recommend this system.
 
If I want a real show off edge I’ll use the wsko with bga and pulleys set to the closest position. If I want a real toothy awesome slicer with a lot of aggressiveness I’ll free hand with stones . Stones vary for what steel I have. If you are starting out with free hand I would like to give ya a tip.

Stack a few quarters on the corner of the stone and set the back of the blade on them and start stroking. Check back by bringing the knife to the stack of quarters and check your angle. After a few trial and errors you should develope a nice muscle memory and be getting very flat bevels. I would also invest in a cheap macro lens to clip on your cell phone as it will help you see areas your missing on your edge like this:7261B4ED-51FB-463C-ABEF-FE11000F6A43.png and help you turn it to this: 99A879CC-B255-45A4-BC1F-FFD8323AF3CE.png
 
Spyderco Double Stuff pocket stone and a series of cardboard strips with stropping compound. It's not supposed to be a fast-cutting stone but sharpening my CTS-XHP Cold Steel on it was no hardship at all.
 
Kevin-B said:
Hi fellas i'm looking for a good and affordable way to sharpen my knives.
As for right now i'm a Spyderco Sharpmaker and a leather belt for stropping.
I'm thinking about buying a couple Japanese water stones and a good leather strop

So what do you guys use for your sharpening?
Any recommendations are welcome.
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I guess you need to ask yourself what type of money you want to spend, what type of knives you need to sharpen, and what type of edges you are looking for. Do you own only a few knives and just need a utility edge? Do you have very high end knives and want to be able to put a mirrored edge on them?
I use a wicked edge, but it’s not a cheap system. A wicked edge will give you excellent control over the sharpening grind, but takes a while to learn. You can also sharpen starting at 80 grit and go up to 100,000 with different strops and emulsions.
I have used Japanese stones and those are not cheap either and you need to know how to maintain them.
Spyderco triangle system is good at maintaining knives, but too slow to reprofiled any type of damaged edge. You would need to invest in diamond stones as well.
I have used a KME system but it has a learning curve.
I have several Arkansas stones by Dan’s and they are a good choice, but can get expensive depending on the size and grade of stone.
I think a good starting point is Smith’s trina hone with an Arkansas black stone attached. They have an 8” version that sells for about $170 and gives you two diamond stones 320&700 and a black surgical Arkansas stone that is about 1800 grit.
Whatever you get, just have fun with it. Everyone has a personal opinion on what works best, but there is no real right or wrong answer. Find what works best for you. Get a firm understanding of sharpening basics and practice practice practice. Good luck.
 
Railsplitter said:
Lately I've been using a Work Sharp system as well. It's the Guided Sharpening System with the stone mount that pivots to keep the angle correct on blades with bellied tips. An area that I always had problems with when freehand sharpening. The Pivot Response System actually works as advertised and is the best feature of this system in my opinion. I used the guides on my first two sessions but now I use the unit freehand.
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I’ve been eying that for about a year now. Just haven’t pulled the trigger yet. The pivot response system looks quite sweet.

I mostly use a combo Norton India stone for simpler steels, along with Norton honing oil. Then I move on to a combo Arkansas bench stone. Lastly, the knives get a few passes on an old leather strop that I made many moons ago, loaded with BRKT green compound.

Fancier steels get done on a Sharpmaker. Sometimes a diamond bench stone. But I’m generally not too fond of diamond bench stones. They never seem quite flat enough to please me.
 
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sitflyer said:
I've got a whole bunch of stones, water, aluminum oxide/ India stones from Norton, hard Arkansas, and DMT 6". The past couple years I have become lazy and just pretty much freehand use the diamond plates, and mostly stick to an old hard used blue one that I keep in the breadbox on the counter...I use a loaded strop and sometimes a butchers steel to touch them up. I'll even use some 1500 grit sandpaper for occasional touch ups.
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I've been a butcher for a few decades and that honing steel is the solution to 90% of people's "dull" knife woes imho.
 
Have the KME. Just ordered the Sharpmaker for the wife's kitchen knives, hoping I can get her to use it.
 
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