"Dishing" or frowney face curve in blade

[polo_gratitude278]

Hi,

I have run into an issue when sharpening with my T8. Let me start by saying that I am new to sharpening with the tormek. Ive watched a ton of videos on setup and technique. When I sharpen my kitchen knives I have been grinding out a curve that is around the last 1/3 of the blade (closest to the handle).Ive gotten pretty good at doing it consistently and I cant figure out where I am going wrong. My general procedure is to set the angle then I start by placing the handle side of the blade on the stone, then moving to the tip, I then pick the blade up and start back at the handle side, I usually, alternate sides 1:1 or 2:2.

I have not found any videos addressing this particular problem, any suggestions would be appreciated.

Thanks!

Steve

[Royale]

From my personal experience:

1. When I used the T-8 standing behind it, I used to have the bad habit of resting my hands on the knife, with more pressure on the handle. This often made the blade "see-saw" across the grindstone, as well as applying uneven pressure during sharpening. This would often cause gouges along the blade, and uneven sharpening near the heel/tip of the knife.

2. I also used to speed up moving the blade across the grindstone when starting from the heel and finishing at the tip. This often created slow areas of progress along these two spots.

What I do now:

a. Instead of standing behind my T-8, I sit in front of it with an LED lamp overhead, shining directly onto the grindstone. This broke my habit of resting my hand on the knife handle, and I could see very clearly when the knife began to "see-saw". This also allowed be to monitor the water that gathered in front of the blade, and really helped me start with the heel of the knife fully squared against the grindstone.

But in summation, maybe look closer at how you've been applying pressure as the knife moves across the grindstone, and develop a setup that works best for your work environment and body.