need help with stropping technique

U

utmts4me

Joined
Aug 3, 2001
Messages
585
I am trying to sharpen INFI and an asymetrical edge for the first time, specifically my KB. After getting some great sugestions on my previous post on stropping INFI, I ordered a Lee Valley two sided strop with the Veritas compound. But while I await it's arrival, I went out and picked up some of the wet/dry sand paper Buzzbait sugested and put it on an old mouse pad and gave it a shot.

Now I'm having flashbacks to when I learned to use my sharpmaker when my knives ended up duller after sharpening than when I started! :mad:

I am trying hard to resist temptation to resort to the sharpmaker where I am comfortable and know I can get a shaving edge back.
I think I need help with the stroke and esp. the angle while drawing it back. Am I raising the spine to far? I was careful to raise the edge first off the strop at the end of each stroke. But I confess that out of sharpening habit I stroked both sides before I remembered I was only supposed to do the flat side :confused: oops.

I should also say that when I began the edge was still cutting sharp just no longer shaving and I just wanted to bring it back to shaving. Also I was using a black sharpie to color the edge as I usually do when sharpening to see more clearly where I am hitting with each stroke.
It really seems to me that it needs something more than a strop. I was using a 1000 grit paper. If I got the angle right I think it would only take 10-12 strokes on the sharpmaker to raise the burr but it doesn't look to me like there is enough edge to get it back to shaving by stropping only.

Anyone have any helpful ideas?
 
me to, i can strop most everything including the razor my wife used to shave her, her, her puppy with last nite but when it comes to asymetrical edges i usually get them duller? i follow the busse instructions but to no avail. i'm using a hanging canvas/russian strop and before i used a hard flat strop. maybe its the hanging thing, rolling back the edge? i get razor sharp using a couple passes on the old spyderco. i'm now afraid i'll dull the edge on my new Surgeon General after i win it. whats the deal??:confused:
 
Thanks Stinky, misery loves company!:p
Now who's going to come to the rescue of the Rocky Mountain Dull Busse Club :eek:
Hey maybe it's the altitude.
 
could be the altitude but most likely the lack of help, not many people to talk to when there's only 2 people for every 400 square miles. i got to go feed my chipmonks my wheel is slowing down and the computor is running out of power. brb
 
It is possible that the damage caused by sharpening the convex side did mess things up badly. I accidentally did this to a convex ground Marbles one time, near the tip. It took about a century to get it back, and required using a bench stone with the same stropping motion.

But fear not if it is your stropping motion. Here's a little diagram that I made, showing a proper stropping motion. Just make sure to turn the blade as you strop, and feel for that extra little bit of friction as you hit the sharpened edge. When you feel that friction, stop turning and go straight.

convex.gif


PS - I should have a full web page explanation up by the end of week. :)
 
ed fowler uses convex blades like marbles or fallkniven. here is a picture of the largest knife ed has ever made, i bought it a couple weeks ago form him in eugene or. thought you might like a comparison pic with some of my other large "camp" knives. it's made from 52100 bearing steel. also is a clip of the instructions ed give with the knife like busse gives with there's. convex is convex, i do not have a problem with marbles or fowler's. somehow its the asymetrical i'm goofing on. sorry for the mega pic.
3camp.jpg
 
sorry for the big ass pictures, i still haven't got this scanning, sizing stuff down.

Buzzbait, nice diagram!
 
buzzbait,
in your other posts you always seem to request a zero grind. after reading most all your post i get the impression you really like convex zero grind blades, and so do i. i believe they are a cut above the rest for a real hard using blade. the question i have is this, do you not like the asymetrical grind as much as a zero grind for performance reasons or for sharpening reasons? why do you lean to the zero? are they easier for you to sharpen or to keep sharp vrs. the asmetrical? they seem to be easier for me to keep "hair popping sharp"
 
I really do dig the Zero grind. This grind is high enough to slice extraordinarily well, yet still strong enough to handle some good abusive chopping. I’m a very big advocate of convex grinds for outdoor work.

A Zero grind also is easy as pie to maintain. Holding an exact angle with a bench stone can be very challenging with a standard edge grind, where a convex grind just uses the grind itself as an edge guide. With a very small amount of practice, a convex grind is drop-dead simple to maintain in the field. I keep an old mouse pad now, along with a couple sheets of wet/dry paper in my pack. I don’t need any bulky and heavy stones to maintain a perfect edge.

I’m sure that the asymmetrical grind is very good, and chops well. It looks like it just takes a bit more to sharpen, requiring mastery of both methods of sharpening to fully realize the blade’s full potential. It also appears that the asymmetrical grind favors right handed people, where lefties may get the short end of the stick when shaving wood, unless they draw the knife across their bodies. I’m not a lefty, but seriously prefer as much versatility as possible.

Hey. It’s a personal choice. I happen to think that convex grinds are easier to maintain, cut more efficiently, and are stronger than other grinds. Our grandfathers knew what made a knife work well, back when convex grinds were the rule of thumb for outdoor work. This is back when knives were commonly used, and actually depended on as tools.

Manufacturers can produce v-grinds more cheaply, as they take less skill and time to create, and they can later sell expensive gizmos to sharpen them. Consumers are now used to v-grind edge bevels, and have no idea what to do with a convex grind when they get one. They most often take a v-grind sharpening system to the convex edge, destroying everything the manufacturer did right in the first place, not realizing that they HAD a superior cutting edge.

Well…… that’s my rant for the day. I could literally run at the keyboard for hours on this subject, but I’d probably have a small army of v-grind ninja assassins headed toward me if I did. I have similarly strong feelings about using carbon steel in the outdoors, so beware of my next rant!!!
 
When sharpening a convex bevel, and wanting to keep it convex, you have to follow the curvature along its entire length. If the entire bevel is convex, as illustraded in the above picture by Buzzbait, you basically grind along the entire knife. However on the Busse blades, the convex bevel is just on the edge, and thus it can be matched easily enough if you just use a soft backing to the stropping medium. There is no rolling of the blade on the stroke. You just press down firmly enough so that the backing indents to match the curvature and then pull back drawing the blade along the strop sideways so as to cover the entire length.

As always you use a marker to check that you are in fact grinding on the edge. If you are not then you either need a softer backing, or just press down harder. Busse does use a hard high alloy steel, so cheap sandpaper or buffing compounds will not work, and in fact will just blunt the blade. Use decent SiC sandpaper which is designed to cut hardened steel, and CrO buffing compound. Lee valley sells both, so do lots of other places. When stropping you do have to grind both sides of the blade. Otherwise you will just create a very large burr.

Thanks for the picture of the Fowler, note Ed puts a v-grind edge on his blades, only the primary grind is convex. The blade profile looks sound, and that point structure is exactly as I would have it for a heavy use knife. I would not want that large choils though, you lose too much cutting edge and it generate a large torque disadvantage. I also would not want the upper part of the guard. Is this intended to be a user? If so I'd appreciate hearing your thoughts on it after working with it for awhile.

-Cliff
 
thanks cliff,
yes the choil is large on this knife but it is a huge knife and probably has more edge than i could use anyway. the handle is a tad large but fits well with winter gloves on. at this time i don't know if it will be a user as it is the most expensive and hardest to obtain piece i own. i have some other fowler's that get everyday carry. i sure wouldn't be afraid to use it for hard use. once this knifes gets moving it's hard to stop it. after closer looking i see what you mean about the convex/v vrs. the full convex.
this might be getting to scientific for me as this blade and busse's are razor sharp and stay that way for a long time. i'm going to try the pad and paper thing on the asymetrical edge and see if i do better.
fowlerfamily.jpg
 
Um, are those Fowlers all yours?

(No wonder they're so darned hard to find...you own them ALL.)

;)
 
For the longest time I could not seem to put a truly hair popping edge on my Busse's, but I finally figured out that I was not using a steep enough angle for stropping.

Now my basics are truly sharp...
 
yes they are all mine, i bought the center one about 8 years ago and was my user, then the chainsaw damascus, then on and on. the far left is my wifes. now i got to go strop my busse at a steeper angle to see if that helps. now busse's are putting a dent in my fowler funds! i guess i will have to start doing their dishes for knives?
 
Thanks for the help people.
Well after Buzzbait's post with the VERY NICE and helpful diagram (hey Buzz, I see a book in the making here STROPPING FOR DUMMIES)I was able to improve my technique on the sandpaper/mouse pad combo and raised a slight burr and then stropped the convex side to remove it and now I'm back to a sharp edge but still not shaving sharp yet. In reading the posts my search on the Busse forum under stropping, I read frequent mention of AVOID OVER SHARPENING and that is why I stopped and removed the burr when i did, but since it's not back to shaving yet, I was wondering if I should have kept after it a while longer and raised a more substantial burr? I also noticed Cliff on some other post from my search, mentioning that stropping does very little edge re-alignment and thought maybe tonight I would first try steeling the edge that I put on it last night and see if that helps.

Now some general Q's for Buzzbait and Cliff.
You guys seem to be using different techniques and I'm going to experiment with both. So far I've been using Buzzbait's style and here's my Q on that style: I can't yet feel the increased drag at the edge you described, but I do notice an increased scraping SOUND when I think I am at the edge, do you notice that as well? and second, I find myself rotating up to the edge in ~the first 1/4 of the draw stroke and then I am on the edge the majority of the stroke. Am I correct that, this is ok for stropping the "flat" side of the Busse asymetrical edge but on a convex bevel the rotating up to the edge should be more even and consistent throughout the draw stroke?

Cliff,
My main question for your style is, if you simply lay the blade down and then press enough for the mouse pad underneath to contour to the entire edge bevel including the very edge, wouldn't this round off the edge? If not, then this would seem to be nearly, dare I say, foolproof:D and would eliminate the questions I just asked Buzzbait in the above about the rate at which you raise the blade throughout the stroke.
Also Cliff, do I understand correctly, that the way you use the strop, while you are pressing down and drawing away from the edge, you ALSO draw the blade from heel to tip with each stroke, so you are actually covering the entire blade length with each draw stroke???

Thanks again for all the help

Hey Stinky, GOT KNIVES? :p
 
The techniques that have been mentioned are a little different, but the same basic premise is there. You want to work the entire convex area of the blade. The real truth probably lies somewhere between the “perfect world” results of each technique. While the soft mouse pad method that Cliff explained works very well, I do find that there is some small amount of blade rotation required for best results. And my harder surface diagram does not show the slight cushion provided by a thin mouse pad or strip of leather.

As to whether a large amount of cushion can round the edge, the answer is no. It doesn’t happen because you are dragging the knife toward you. If you were pushing the edge into the cushion, it probably would tend to round off the edge a bit.

Yah. The scraping sound you hear is caused by the same increase that you might feel in friction. As long as you sense the change, you’re doing it right.

Again, in a perfect world, the stroke would abrade the convex area of the knife evenly. The real world truth is that you often work the very edge a bit more than the rest, just to save a time. If you gave equal attention to the entire convex area, the job would take two to three times a long. The good news is that if the knife is stropped often enough, you can pretty much cause equal wear to the entire convex area, without undue loss of play time. The key is not to let the convex edge get too dull before stropping.

Well….. At least that’s my take on the whole issue. :p
 
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