Knives vs. scalpel

W

wvdavidr

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Mar 21, 2007
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I asked my doctor for a scalpel, explaining that I wanted to see if I can beat it for sharpness. He gave me one in it's package. I compared it against a few knives that I have sharpened with the Edge Pro and Sharpmaker. I sliced and slowly push cut phone book paper and push cut a single strand of hair. I also examined the edges under magnification. My conclusion was that the knives were much sharper! The knives can be slowly push cut with no snagging and not much sound- the scalpel, not as much.

I am just curious if others have tried this comparison and if you had the same results? I know many of us can beat this scalpel, so my question is if you are surprised the scalpel is not that great?

Good sharpening,
Dave
 
Its mission specific. How often does the topic come up "coarse vs fine" and it comes down to application, a scalpel is no different.

My father in law told me he once toured a scalpel production line, they hit both sides to 400 grit and then bright finished one side. When my F in L asked why not polish both sides they replied "we need it to cut!"

The thinness of the blade stock makes a big difference in how well it performs to begin with, the rest comes down to what edge finish works best on the target material - in this case, skin and soft tissue.

From an industrial standpoint, edge finishes for specific tasks aren't whipped up capriciously. If a finer edge worked better (and it very well might in some cases) then the supply shops would be giving surgeons a finer edge finish as a default. I'd be very surprised if all scalpels were finished the same, but there has to be an average, and a reason why.
 
I've used scalpels before for manufacturing work and knives would certainly not have worked at all. I used scalpels to cut various wires and shape plastics under a microscope. you couldn't do that with a knife. There was hardly a day when I didn't come home with a bandage on at least one finger and plenty when I had bandages on all my fingers on the left hand.
 
Disposable scalpels are exactly that and are therefore left 'sharp enough'. There are, however, very expensive scalpels made from obsidian that are so much sharper than any steel knife that there's simply no comparison. Like most things, scalpel encompasses a range of surgical tools of varying quality, so it's not a great baseline comparison.
 
The people I know who "cut" bulls say the more refined the edge, the quicker it heals.
 
Most scalpels are used only to cut the skin at the beginning of a surgical procedure and do not need to be hair-whittling sharp. Scissors are much more useful for most surgical "cutting". Specialty scalpels, such as those used in eye and vascular surgery, are designed with more consideration to shape and pointedness than sharpness. Occasionally, the sharpness of a disposable scalpel (essentially all modern scalpels) is so poor that even cutting skin requires excessive force, and it may be rejected by the surgeon. Amputation knives, used to transect large tissue masses when shaping an amputation stump, resemble slender chef's knives and do require regular edge maintenance to be effective. Even those edges do not compare well to those obtained by hand sharpening with even modest skills.
 
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no, as said before almost all scapels today have disposable blades that are "sharp enough". once initial cuts are made, they have all sorts of toys to use. the one that caught my eye was the sterile mini-machine shop that was used to cut, drill, and shape my left femur, tibia, fibula, and kneecap for installing a steel knee. for some fun, get a piece of 1/32" tool steel, HT to Rc63-54, and see what kind of slicer you can get.

scott
 
I used scalpels every day for many years.
They are certainly not as sharp as our knives but still cut you.

The good thing is instead of sharpening you can just pop in a new and sterile! Blade.

Also they are thin and light and if you cut all day long your wrist will thank you.

The all metal handle is easy to autoclave or to soak in ethanol and light up to get rid of all the little bugs.
 
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