Stropping on a coffee mug??!!

J

jackknife

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Oct 2, 2004
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So I've been out in California visiting our daughter and her family, doing some trout fishing up in the moutons, and having a great time. We get back down to her place in MIssion Viejo and I'm making some dinner using her set of kitchen knives. They are cutting very well, and I compliment her on how sharp she's been keeping them since we last visited. Jess answered me that she's been stropping them on the coffee mug just like I showed her.

This stops me, as I can't ever told her to strop on a coffee mug, but phone on a coffee mug and strop on a leather strop I made her. Now, I know she sometimes confuses things, and she's blond, but I just had to ask her what she means. She then showed me how she takes the coffee mug, turns it upside down, and the proceeds to strop the knife with edge trailing strokes from heel to tip. She said she likes it bette that way, since she's not afraid of cutting herself that way.

I looked over all her knives, and I had to admit they were very sharp. Went right through a ham, making nice thin slices. Dice up onion? no problem. But this of course goes against everything I ever did. I always sharpened by slicing into the stone or coffee mug bottom, but daughter Jess does it backwards and still gets a toothy wicked edge. In her confused mis-remberinghow I showed her, she reversed it and it still works. I'm starting to believe that it really doesn't make any difference after all.
 
I guess as long as the angle is right, it doesn't matter.
I tend to use a back and forth motion. (I feel like I'm keeping the angle more consistent if I'm not picking up and putting down the knife) So I'm edge leading and edge trailing every other stroke.

 
For you folks out in dessert country, with good swap-meets and flea markets, you can use those old ceramic electric wire insulators too. They work great! And better still, the old ceramic crock pots, ceramic pickle pots etc., that are about 10" in diameter are absolutely incredible for touching up an edge. But with the big pots you don't use the bottoms. Instead, you use the inside of the pot, resting the blade 'flat' so both the spine and the edge are touching the ceramic (maintaining a perfect angle...) and just rub the blade around in circles! Go in both directions to get both sides of the blade. You won't believe the edges you will get!


Stitchawl
 
Hmm, I have a few of those unglazed clay pots on the porch. I wonder if the ceramic in those is hard enough to hone with? I'll try it with a cheap kitchen knife.

 
I have several promotional coffee mugs at work that I've been able to loosely grade into course and fine and use them to put an edge back on coworkers knives and touch mine up if there's a need. I have one that's quite fine and will readily pit a shaving edge on in just a few light strokes.
Plus when they get loaded with steel a quick trip to the dishwasher makes them good as new.
 
jackknife said:
So I've been out in California visiting our daughter and her family, doing some trout fishing up in the moutons, and having a great time. We get back down to her place in MIssion Viejo and I'm making some dinner using her set of kitchen knives. They are cutting very well, and I compliment her on how sharp she's been keeping them since we last visited. Jess answered me that she's been stropping them on the coffee mug just like I showed her.

This stops me, as I can't ever told her to strop on a coffee mug, but phone on a coffee mug and strop on a leather strop I made her. Now, I know she sometimes confuses things, and she's blond, but I just had to ask her what she means. She then showed me how she takes the coffee mug, turns it upside down, and the proceeds to strop the knife with edge trailing strokes from heel to tip. She said she likes it bette that way, since she's not afraid of cutting herself that way.

I looked over all her knives, and I had to admit they were very sharp. Went right through a ham, making nice thin slices. Dice up onion? no problem. But this of course goes against everything I ever did. I always sharpened by slicing into the stone or coffee mug bottom, but daughter Jess does it backwards and still gets a toothy wicked edge. In her confused mis-remberinghow I showed her, she reversed it and it still works. I'm starting to believe that it really doesn't make any difference after all.
Click to expand...

That surprises me too! I believe that edge trailing on hard abrasive (stropping) will more likely create a burr than edge leading on same surface with a thinner apex. If you had a burr/foiled edge however, I would expect you would notice after a few cuts in whatever you want to cut. Did she strop on the leather after the ceramic too?

Maybe the coffee mug has been loaded quite a bit and we see more burnishing than abrasion? That way the ceramic rim would act more like a smooth steel.
 
Could be something to that, Carl. I've occasionally tinkered with both leading and trailing passes on the smooth (glazed) portions of a coffee mug (like on or inside the rim of the mug), or on the back or edge of a Corelle/CorningWare bowl or plate, much as a smooth steel might be used. With the right touch, it does a decent job realigning an edge or cleaning up some light burrs. As with a smooth steel, I've favored using edge-leading passes; but, so long as pressure is appropriately light, I think trailing (stropping) passes could also work.


David
 
awestib said:
That surprises me too! I believe that edge trailing on hard abrasive (stropping) will more likely create a burr than edge leading on same surface with a thinner apex. If you had a burr/foiled edge however, I would expect you would notice after a few cuts in whatever you want to cut. Did she strop on the leather after the ceramic too?

Maybe the coffee mug has been loaded quite a bit and we see more burnishing than abrasion? That way the ceramic rim would act more like a smooth steel.
Click to expand...


There could be something to this. I've noticed there is a wide variety of ring "grit" values, and even in how the ceramic is held together. If you have granite countertops, your mugs will also be polished a bit smoother. They work best when new!

If the ceramic is somewhat friable, backhoning will be less inclined to make a burr that cannot be removed by the same means.

My gut feeling is that there is likely a smallish burr or wire, but in the kitchen that really doesn't lead to a loss of cutting ability very quickly unless banging off of bone a lot, and that tends to dull an edge anyway. Grooved steels and files often will make very serviceable sharp edges that are perhaps not so clean, but still cut great for a few, especially if the geometry is thin to begin with.

Entirely possible she's hitting it just right, stopping short of a burr and ending with a nice edge straight up.

On low RC steel, those coffee cups are great!

I recall when learning to use softer waterstones and using a trailing pass was going against a lot of my assumptions when it failed to immediately raise a new burr and could even remove smaller ones. That was the start of realizing there are a lot of factors effecting abrasive action and pretty much every "rule" is conditional.
 
I've been using an old coffee cup for years to sharpen my kitchen knives. There's something about the broad ring at the base that's gotten even better over time. Can't recall where I read about this trick, but it works.
 
If you've ever been in an Asian kitchen commercial or residential , you'll see some old timers grab those white porcelain bowls flip it upside down and strop there knives and cleavers on it before use.
The bottom does not have the enamel or has worn off and acts like a "stone".
 
r8shell said:
Hmm, I have a few of those unglazed clay pots on the porch. I wonder if the ceramic in those is hard enough to hone with? I'll try it with a cheap kitchen knife.

Click to expand...

I never thought of those R8shell. Thought they might not be smooth enough. They may be on top or somewhere on there. Hey, let me know how you get on.
 
For sure! Ceramics, coffee mugs included are great media for honing knives. Chinese chefs have been using bottoms of bowls for millennia. They actually work better than steel rods that come with most German knife sets. Bowls have a better wider lip for gripping with your non-dominant hand and the bowl itself makes for a great hand guard as well. Just make sure your ceramic media of your choosing has a raw ceramic edge without glazing. All bets are off if the lip with which you are attempting to hone is glazed. Better you chose another bowl/mug.
 
The use of a coffee mug was the first sharpening method I had ever seen. My grandfather would sit out on his front porch and drink his morning coffee, fire up a cigarette dig his pocket knife out of his pocket and flip that mug over and get work done. LOL He usually had coffee drip marks all over his lap but his old hillybilly azz didn't care. ;)
 
Yup I've done this before and it does work. If you ever get stranded without a sharpening stone but can get hold of some china then this is the way to go ;)
 
I haven't tried this but have used the top edge of a car/truck window. I will give the coffee cup a try.
 
Matt R said:
I haven't tried this but have used the top edge of a car/truck window. I will give the coffee cup a try.
Click to expand...

Try the edges of any of the glass bakeware items in your kitchen. This glassware is made from 'borosilicate' glass, the most well known brand is marked "Pyrex" on the bottoms. Same stuff used for laboratory test tubes and beakers. I went to a chemical supply store and had them make a borosilicate rod for me to use as a 'steel' in the kitchen. 1/2" in diameter and 14" long, I think I was charged about $5 for it. Except for a fancy handle, it's the same as was sold by some sharpening outlets for $75... I use it to 'steel' my kitchen knives before every dinner.
 
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