Recently the old man sent me a link to a knife maker in the US who had a hand sharpening tutorial which I watched and tried and was immediately convinced that it was a better technique than what I was using because it's more flexible than using a fixed jig (and probably even an adjustable jig). You can do anything from a 20mm hobby scalpel to a 10" curved skinning knife to a heavy butchers cleaver or even a single bevel broadhead, and at any angle you please. I also find it so much easier to do curved blades than in a jig, in particular highly curved blades like skinners, but even things like tantos are easily done and the edge seems to hold for a lot longer and is easier to return to sharp.
The only downsides I've found so far are that it does require some/more water and as Murray says in the video, grinding a pad of your finger down is a possibility (I now speak from experience
). It's also changed my perception of what sharp is, in the past shaving sharp took hairs off, but I could feel the blade working whereas now the knife glides over without any feel and a completely bare patch of skin is left. I'm seriously considering trying a cutthroat again now I've got to this level of sharpness (and I could go further as I stop at 3000#). The only thing I do different is that I finish with a leather strop, rather than spending a lot of time on the 3000#, and I'll often start on a 500# on blunter knives to speed up the initial metal removal.
The video is very long, but well worth a watch and I think the production values are excellent (he's obviously an experienced teacher), without any of the waffle bulls**t that seems to come from some 'experts'. I also like that he does it live on camera (look here's one I prepared earlier...somehow
), shows how to fix common problems and clearly knows the topic inside out.https://youtu.be/Yk3IcKUtp8U?si=NPYyrbVDnlVxTHus
