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Hi Louiesdad,

The answer to your question is explained thoroughly in the video...

Lovely to read - thank you for sharing John. 

Schleifjunkies.de

Or

Knifegrinders.com.au

Hi All,

FYI - Some of you may have already come across this, but a very fascinating project is underway by Australian Knife Magazine and Knife Grinders (forum alumnus Wootz). 

Really interesting to see knives put through their paces straight 'out of the box'.  I like the concept - assessing quality in the total absence of marketing. 

https://www.australianbladeforums.com/vb4/australian-knife-magazine/46339-independent-catra-testing.html

The work is funded by donation, and donors can even request brands to be tested.  For now it's focused on chef knives but eventually other types including EDC et al will be run.

https://youtu.be/bhkk8gbzryg


Early data has Global in pole position, but let's see how this unfolds.  I'm intrigued!

http://knifegrinders.com.au/CATRA-report.htm

Thank you both.  Nothing like a Tormek to keep one humble, eh?

In the end I ran out of time for trouble shooting so went to 20dps and it cleared the problem (previously I was working at 15dps).  I think I'm pretty good at keeping the blade edge aligned with the jig, but perhaps the knife was slightly tilted within the clamp? Nothing I could see with my eye, but the answer must have been there somewhere...    This is my fifth Global this week - first four <60BESS, and then 3+ hours on this quagmire...  I originally thought maybe my DC250 was worn out, but then switching to the SG250 had no effect.

Al - I did try moving the jig along the blade too - but you're right that in the photo I'm a bit close to the heel...

Hi All,

I'm going in circles this morning and hoping that the forum can spare me from an afternoon of frustration.  I've been working on a Global, and for some reason I can't figure out I can't seem to get to the apex of one bevel about an inch from the heel and two inches from the tip.  See photos attached showing the problem area, plus the opposite side of that same part of the knife (with a clean edge)... I've also attached a shot of my jig set-up.  I've tried flipping the knife around 180 degrees, moving the jig forward and backwards along the knife and even deeper and shallower within the jig. 

I'm currently on the SG-250, coarse graded, but have also tried my DC-250 without success...

Does anyone have ideas or experience this where one part (and one side) of a blade just won't take an edge?... 

Thank you in advance for any help or advice. 

1.0 micron diamond paste on the leather wheel here, and quite a lot of it.
Works like a charm.

Seconded.  (Forgot to mention in my reply above...)

I have a recollection that Wootz mentions in his book that leather doesn't hold on to diamonds as well as felt.  So it will work, but require reapplication more often than felt...

When holding the adjustable stop of the SVM45 in one hand and the clamp in the other there is some play between the two (ie they can move laterally by a few mm independently of one another).  This happens with all five of my SVM45s, so I assume its a constant feature.  Given the precision of all things Tormek I was wondering if anyone has tried to prevent this movement via o-rings, thread tape or other ideas?  I have to say I don't notice any performance issues with this, and grinding in one direction across the stone means would be consistently pushed to one side...  It's just that with all another aspects of sharpening needing to be millimetre perfect, this jiggle seems like an outlier to me.

Thanks!

I thought about this thread this morning as I restored a very old kitchen knife   It was taking me a long time to sharpen. What I discovered with this dull knife is that someone had sharpened it a long time ago,I am guessing by hand. What I discovered was that the back 8 inches or so sharpened pretty quickly while the final 2 inches were not. Inspecting the edge with my glass it became obvious why. The 2 inches of tip had different angles on each side and neither matched the back 8 inches. It was not a huge difference but enough to matter.i returned to the wheel and sharpened until the entire blade was uniform on both sides. After honing it was extremely sharp from tip to heel. It made me think thatt little things like his can make for longer sharpening 6times.

On a related note, I get a lot of knives belonging to chefs that have been honed with a steel to oblivion, and when I put them on the goniometer the whole spectrum lights up in a smear.  Sometimes when I sharpen these I get what looks like a nice bevel on each side, but sharpness wise is rubbish. I think what's happening is there is a bevel, but then a flat spot at what should be the apex (so two bevels, but not meeting at the tip).... It can be deceiving because it feels like there is a burr. 

Nowadays when I get this sort of knife I try to remember to work on the bevel until I can feel a burr, then I make sure it 'flips' from one side to the other as I do alternating passes.  That way I know I've got a true apex.  I don't have this practice down as a habit yet though, so once in a while I forget to check for the flip and go all the way through to honing only to find BESS at around 300...  Each time this happens I have to go back to the start again, and my hourly rate for the knife in question gets cut in half, so hopefully I'll soon learn my own lesson;)

BeSharp:  Great, thank you!  Just trying to picture the setup...  Sounds like it would be:

1) Grind on machine 1.
2) Remove stone on machine 1 and hone on composite wheel with FVB, then:

3) Switch to machine 2 with leather wheel + chromium oxide

4) Hand back knife to smiling customer 

Part 2 of Vadim's video on the CW-220 (see link at post #3 above) includes a summary of six different protocols and resulting BESS values:

Note that Protocol #2 is the fastest method with a BESS score of less than 100 (wired edge removed). That is the method I replicated above.

Impressive work BeSharp! 

Is there a way to mount the composite wheel and the leather wheel on one machine?  Just thinking for maximum efficiency it would be nice to not have to remove the SB-250...  So Protocol 2 could be done with two Tormeks - one for grinding and one with the composite + leather wheels... 

... Everything must be Sharp   

Thank you all - some good advice and tips here. 

Part 2 was uploaded today and comes to a surprising conclusion.  Very interesting!! 

https://youtu.be/tVTg0HVgoKo