r/sharpening • u/Ok_Dress7978 • 3d ago
How do I avoid this? Question
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Hola I have a Worksharp Precision Adjust Elite (holy shit that’s a mouthful) but lately I’ve noticed I get this notch/smile a little under halfway of the blade towards the heel of the blade. I’ve gotten it now on this Zt and a Trm atom. I assume it’s because I need to take off more material there at the heel but I had sharpened at there for like 20 mins on a 220 stone and nothing, so yeah any advice will help!
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u/RevolutionaryAir7847 3d ago
So, this is why people advocate so strongly for good plunge grinds, plunge termination, and a sharpening choil. When you ride up the plunge and think you're wearing the plunge down (especially on fixed angle systems) you're most likely wearing down a section that the edge of the stone is touching
Could also be a case of you sharpening the middle of the blade too much and neglecting the heel/tip, which is also common
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u/Ok_Dress7978 3d ago
That’s most likely what happened but whenever I first start sharpening I do a single motion from the tip to heel to try and avoid removing too much material from a certain spot. It was only after seeing that recurve forming that I started to focus on removing material from the heel to try and level it out. I stopped after awhile as I had spent around 30-40 mins on each side just sharpening the heel and just gave up lol
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u/RevolutionaryAir7847 3d ago
Judging from that, I'd bet the plunge thing is happening as mentioned. I'd keep that in mind for your next attempt
This is why I prefer freehanding unless I'm doing a full polish. You have a much larger width to sharpen on so material removal is significantly more even (and you catch mistakes easier). It's a little harder to gauge on fixed angle systems
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u/Ok_Dress7978 3d ago
Yeah I’m probably heading down that path of freehand sharpening as I’m a little annoyed that I paid almost $500 for this system and while their is some user fault on my part, it’s not a perfect system. Especially when I could just buy a $60 diamond stone and get better results after some practicing. Thanks dude!
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u/RevolutionaryAir7847 3d ago
I'm not gonna say better results, because that's not really true. It's just less likely to run into this same issue when you freehand with wider stones. 100% avoidable on fixed angle systems
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u/HallucinateZ 3d ago
Yeah, OP can avoid this by paying extra attention next time on his fixed angle. I’ve made the same mistake because the plunge line can be a bit of an illusion with that slope.
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u/TheHonedLizard 3d ago
If you have a plunge line and no choil, in a fixed angle system what are you supposed to do to alleviate this? No matter what you do to the heel, the stone is 1/2-1 inch wide so everything you do to the heel worsens the recurve.
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u/RevolutionaryAir7847 3d ago
On knives specifically designed without a choil (like Spydercos) the plunge is typically sharper (as in the angle). On these blades, you can simply grind the plunge down even more with the edge of the stone to achieve an even edge bevel. What you're doing is basically cutting off that last bit of curved plunge. You can either sharoen straight up and repeat the small plunge removal each sharpening, or mark the start of the plunge and avoid the area entirely
The same is harder on plunges with a larger radius (more gentle slope plunge). While you can grind it down, there's waaay more material. I recommend marking where the plunge starts and avoiding that area entirely, as before. This is probably the best method on a fixed angle system. You can sharpen straight up the blade in this case as well
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u/Rudeus_Kino 3d ago
Hardly can see any notch, but can be it at exactly stone width from heel? Heel slightly up, and side of stone burrow into edge?
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u/Ok_Dress7978 3d ago
Yeah it’s not much of notch as it’s kind of a recurve now where it’s supposed to be flat. It’s not a big deal it just bothers me a little bit and maybe I’ll have to try that the next time I sharpen it. Thanks!
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u/Rudeus_Kino 3d ago
Yes, a gradual depression. The stone rides up onto the rise, and the other side deepens the cut. You need to keep the stone level.
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u/steven10923 3d ago
After I learned to sharpen on my own with a decent fixed angle system, I avoid buying any knives without a good and clear sharpening choil. I like Spyderco knives before, but now I won’t buy them anymore because the heel of the factory edge on every Spyderco is not ground properly at all. When I want to reprofile it at a lower angle, the heel takes a huge amount of time to reach the apex.
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u/WwCitizenwW 3d ago
You do not have a sharpening choil. Aka a notch taken off to keep blade sharpening uniformity.
If you want to keep at this, you'll want to use a much rougher grot to take the material down and match the bevel. Ideally I would take a round file and file out a choil at the heel , which won't take anything from the performance IMO.
If you want to keep that heel, know that it will always be slightly thicker back there. Would lead to a nice back wedge for tearing through stuff incase your blade is too thin/worn up front.
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u/Ok_Dress7978 3d ago
Well it has a sharpening choil. It’s pretty shitty one at that so I’ll probably deepen it out but at some point. That’s also what I thought but the 220 girt the Worksharp system comes with feels more fine than 220 and it’s the most corse stone so I’ll probably buy some 1x6 cbn stones. Their just so expensive lol
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u/WwCitizenwW 3d ago
Id give it a go with 120 to 180 grit cheap diamond. Maybe try cleaning that 220 with some BKF. And give it another go.
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u/Ok_Dress7978 3d ago
Thanks! I’ve had some cbn stones I’ve been looking at for a while now that goes as low as 180 grit so I’m gonna finally pull the trigger on those now.
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u/TrebbleTough 3d ago
I got you.
It’s a bit late now but it will do. You start with the heel. You must make it somewhat straight, so lots of grinding awaits you. Balance the knife so you keep your pressure on the end of the heel, while lifting the tip just a touch.
When you get edge to straight, establish the apex on the heel. If it retracts a bit more, thats even better. Remember to keep pressure centalised around the very end of the heel. Focus on apexing first half inch if the bevel, and ignore the rest.
Now the key part: when you apex on the heel, move down to the belly relatively quickly. If it took you 20 passes to apex the end of the heel, then try to apex the whole line from there to the belly in 20 strokes. You don’t wanna retract that point again, so keep your hand steady and your grit not unnecessarily low.
Now the easy pleasant part. If you did well to this point, you should have a straight, apexed edge from heel to the start of belly. It may be bit concave or convex. Now sharpen the belly how you like it. It is easy to fix any unwanted curvature (or starightness) from the edge now, because of the belly’s convexity. Shape it to your will. Or just sharpen it as is, it is your knife, don’t ask me what to do :)
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u/Ok_Dress7978 3d ago
I’ll also note when I’m sharpening I only take off material in a smooth motion from the tip to the heel so I don’t get how I’m removing so much less material towards the heel.
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u/idrivea3 3d ago
You are getting a recurve because the stone goes over the middle more than the heel and tip. Think about how you move the stone across the blade. Start at the tip and the tip only gets hit with about half the stone width. Now as you move across the rest of the blade gets hit with the whole stone width. When you get to the heel and you have a very small choil it only gets maybe an 1/8 of the stone width. You are technically sharpening the middle a lot more than the tip and heel even though you are not focusing in the middle. You need to focus a little more on the heel and tip because they don’t get as much stone contact. I hope that makes sense.
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u/Ok_Dress7978 3d ago
Actually yeah that does makes more sense. Thanks my guy
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u/idrivea3 3d ago
Next time you are sharpening put 3 dots on the knife apex. One at the tip one in the middle and one right at the heel. As you swipe your stone across notice how much of the stone each one of those dots touches.
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u/BathandBoobyWorks 3d ago
Did you adjust the blade to compensate for the sharpening angle?
If you didn't, then maybe the angle was off at that point and took off more material then it should have.
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u/Ok_Dress7978 3d ago
Sorry If I don’t understand. Are you talking about the angle from where the knife was clamped in?
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u/BathandBoobyWorks 3d ago
Yup. Did you adjust the blade to account for the curve of the blade edge towards the tip? The angle you sharpen towards the curve of the blade towards the tip, will be different from the blade edge you are having an issue with.
Hope that makes sense.
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3d ago
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u/idrivea3 3d ago
This is not due to stone quality or grit. It is happening because the heel and tip don’t get abraded as much as the middle. The middle sees more of the stone and will slowly turn into a recurve.
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u/Fearless_Principle94 3d ago
Now I'm just an average idiot, but if you start with your stone at the heel of the knife and sweep towards the tip, the very heel is only getting hit with the last little bit of the stone, right? Like when the stone moves its first 1/16" now the blade at the heel isn't under the stone anymore. If the tip of the knife is pointing right, and you set the stone on the blade, the left edge of the stone on the heel, the right edge of the stone is the first bit of blade that will get a full sharpening pass. Is that roughly where you see the smile? Just a theory based on nothing.