I have dulled the edge on a couple of Global Kitchen knives I bought a few weeks back.
They are still pretty sharp but not the razors they were new out of the box.
I bought one of Global's sharpeners (the 3 wheel type you push the knives through) and an 800 grit water stone, I have a couple of 18 degree clip on guides to use with the stone.
I got the Knives back to a reasonable edge but not like what they were when they arrived, any thoughts?
Looking at the blades when they were new it looked like they had been sharpened on a machine from around 3mm back from the edge
I have a Lansky system and other sharpening gadgets.
Your Globals were sharpened, or the sharpening was finished, on a belt grinders at the factory. This results in a convex edge. However,
Global recommends sharpening at home with a straight bevel edge on stones (I think just because it is more common, easier, or available). Click the link above from the makers of your Globals or click here
http://www.yoshikin.co.jp/w/maintenance/maintenance_01.html. You will be fine with a straight bevel but it should be around 15 degrees per side. not the 18 degrees your guide gives you. At 18 degrees you are back to almost the angle of most western knives and loosing the fine 15 degree edge you had from the factory. Don't use the clip anymore. Your stone is fine for starters but you need to continue on to finer grits to get back to the finished the factory had. You could even do a lot better job then they did. If your 800 grit water stone is graded to JIS (
Japanese Industry Standard) it is probably way to course to finish off with considering you want to get back to the fine edge the factory puts on there. If it is graded on the ANSI (American) standard you need to go on to a little finer stone to finish IMO. Your
Lansky system doesn't go down to a fine enough angle either, only going down to 17 degrees at its lowest setting. The Global wheel sharpener should get the angles right but is a little crude and inaccurate it seems to me. How did the finish on the Global sharpener compare to your 800 stone? Unless you have an
Edge Pro or something that goes to down to a 15 degree angle or less I don't think any other gadgets you have are going to work either.
Sounds like you might want to get serious about sharpening. Those knives are worthy of a good polished edges IMO, but would probably work fine if you just got the angles back to 15 degrees and finished off with something a little finer, like maybe a 1200 grit crock stick "steal". and or stropped them on a hard backed leather strop using Cro2 or diamond past.
You have several options. Using the stuff you have you could decide if the Global sharpener puts the correct angles on them and assess the finish. That 18 degree sharpening guide does not. I would be guarded of the Global sharpener too. If your 800 # stone seems finer then the sharpener wheels put out you could go through the process again starting with the sharpener and going to your stone, loosing the clip and going free hand, keeping the angles down to 15 degrees or less. Do you have a crock stick steel like an
Idahone 1200 or a
DMT 2200 grit (which is about the same grit as the 1200 Idahone, I think, as they are on two different grading scales). I think you should get one if nothing else then for maintaining the edge in the kitchen. It would also be nice for finishing off after using your stone. However, if you had more (finer) whet stones most would typically go on to a finer grit like 2000 - 3000 and most here would probably go a lot further then that like 7000 or more (knife nuts). As you can tell though, you get a good usable edge at around 800 and if it were a shallower angle it would probably be great. It would be nice if you could get into an, all stone, free hand approach to sharpening.
One option is you could get wet or dry aluminum oxide sand paper in various grits and glue strips of the sand paper to strips of mouse pad and glue that to a wooden block (like 2x4). A good size for each block and the strips would be something like 3.5"x8.5". Using a stropping action to sharpen on this system would leave a convex edge like the factory did on a belt grinder because the mouse pad gives under the pressure of sharpening and leaves a curved edge. This is very cheap and for a few dollars you could have a great system that would carry you until you get more stones. You have to set your angle a little finer in relation to the paper because the edge comes out a little more acute then the angle you are holding due to the pad flexing and creating the curve. You have to replace the paper more often then you have to mess with stones because the paper wears out. You could start with around 400 grit and go to 600 or 800 and then 1200, 2000 and so one. It would also be nice to end by stropping with a leather pad on a block loaded with some kind of compound like CrO2 or fine (.5mm) diamond paste.
Fastest method option. You could spend about $40 for a Harbor Freight 1x30" belt sander plus the gritted and leather belts for sharpening and power stropping for $30 or so and sharpen your Globals like the factory (and most all other knife makers). For under $100 total investment this would give you the same convex edges they came with. The cons are you could over heat the edges before you figure out what you are doing and since it is so fast you could mess them up (change the angles or over heat it) just as fast. You should practice on cheap knives until you get the hang of it. This method delivers incredible results very fast but it is probably better if you learn how to free hand sharpen with stones first to develop an understanding of what you are trying to achieve. If you can sharpen free hand on stones you can use one of these. If you can't use stones very well you can probably still learn to use one of these in a few hours. You could go from re-profiling a very dull blade at 120 grit (if necessary) through finer belts down to 9 microns (about 1200 grit ANSI, or 2000 grit JIS) and on to belt power stropping at .5 microns on all your Globals in just a few minutes. You could sharpen your lawn mower blades and all the knives in your neighborhood very quickly in little time. I have a Delta 1x42" belt system with slow down pulleys, all the belts, and it is quite amazing.
Best option. You could get more water stones and learn to sharpen free hand. It sounds like you may be thinking that way already with the one whet stone you have. Depending on what that 800 grit stone really is you may only need one more finer one to get started. I have Norton stones. Maybe someone can recommend the appropriate next finer Japanese water stone to compliment your 800. In that case I would recommend starting (re-profiling) with about a 10 or 12 degree angle and finishing with a 14 to 16 degree angle micro bevel for the cutting edge (having a compound bevel, primary and secondary edge or what ever you want to call it). This would make them all easier to resharpen next time as you wouldn't have to remove as much material. It is going to take a little more work now to get back to a 15 degree or finer edge then it did to go to 18 degrees because you are having to re-profile now, removing more material from the shoulder of the edge.
Edge Pro Option. If you are anal about getting accurate angles (a knife nut) or don't want to learn to free hand sharpen you could get an
Edge Pro Apex starting at $155. This is the king of guided systems and you will probably want to spend $205 for the loaded up model with all the stones and the crock stick steel if you go this way. See site for explanation. This system does a great job and is the best of the guided systems. It is hard to do a better job free hand sharpening even for a pro, but it is expensive. If you are a knife nut you will probably get one at some point. I have the pro model.:jerkit: It is awesome. Non of the other guided systems compare or are acceptable for your Globals IMO.
Easiest option. I think the main problem is you have sharpened at to acute an angle and turned you razor edged Globals into a set of Henkels.
Loosing the guide clip and getting back to 15 degrees or finer will get you back in the game. The first thing I would try is getting your edges angle back to less then 15 degrees using your stone or maybe the Global sharpener and the stone if that seems to work. This is a compromise to get you going with what you have available and involves learning to free hand sharpen with your stone to some extent. Adding a a strop and some stropping compound and finishing with that after the stone might be the easiest way to finish the edge. It may be a little bigger jump from your stone to the strop then optimum but it would work very well and you would end up with a very fine edge.
Make a strop like this.
Get compound here also the leather or buy a nice but more expensive one here. Forgoing the strop and just getting a crock stick steel or the Spyderco Sharpmaker the same way (used at the 15 degree setting with the fine sticks) would probably do just fine also. So if you just get one thing get a "crock stick steel" sharpening steel or Sharpmaker.
Also, you could give up, or put off sharpening yourself, and get it
sharpened professionally once. These guys do an incredible job and understand the knife you have. Additionally it comes back looking very nice. It would
probably cost $20 plus a few $ for shipping. Be sure anyone you use understands what you have and is used to sharpening that kind of knife. Basically only use someone that sharpens Japanese knives. Even though this is a Western style Japanese knife it requires someone that understands that it is harder and narrower then a Western knife and gets sharpened on shallower angles. Don't use just any guy in a truck that comes around of you will be back to where you are now. It is a lot nicer if you can sharpen your own though. Plus, you are going to need it again. However, once it is sharp it could be maintained for a long time with a crock stick steel or strop before it will need a full sharpening again. And you could be learning in the mean time.
For a comprehensive sharpening tutorial, philosophy, etc.
read this. This is the first thing I read that impressed me when I got serious about sharpening and started digging into it.
Good luck, I had some time to kill. I hope that helps.
Gary
