Re: Sharpening S30v
Guess I lied about sharpening that Zero Tolerance knife. The new smaller knife has 154CM stainless steel, which is softer than carbon S30V. The 154CM sharpened quickly on a 25 degree angle.
I do agree with what someone said about figuring out the correct angle. The printed material that comes with the Lansky somehow made me think that 22-25 degrees will work for a good big field knife. I have however found that most good, big field knives come with 30 degree edges, and a medium grit stone at that angle works best, and only takes a few minutes.
Learned this after working on a big Kabar. The big soft blade lets you see the results of what you're doing in a hurry. I had been working for a while on a 25 degree angle and nothing much was happening. Switched to 30 degrees, and it got sharp in just a few minutes.
Applied what I learned to sharpening the big Zero Tolerance, CPM3V steel, and it did the trick. 30 degrees for the big field knives is the key. Having said that, I realize that a 25 degree angle is going to cut better than a 30. And, you can take advantage of a good steel like 30V by going to 25, 22, or even 20 degrees. The problem comes if the blade comes from the factory at 30. You spend an hour sharpening before you even get to the actual edge because you are changing the angle, removing alot of steel.
I think the reasoning for going with 30 degrees on the big knives is that you have so much leverage with a big knife that you can cut what you need to without having a razor edge. The downside is that all that leverage can also be used to ruin the edge, so they go with the super-durable but less sharp 30 degrees. I have found that the medium sized folding pocket knives with thick blades usually come with 25 degree edges, and the smaller ones with 20 to 22 degrees.
The following website was a good source for me for learning about the different kinds of blade steels and their properties.
http://www.zknives.com/knives/articles/knifesteelfaq.shtml
According to that site, the S30V carbon steels are so wear resistant that you can still get a durable 22 to 25 degree edge on a large knife. At least thats my interpretation. Some day when I have alot of time, I may change the 30 degree edge on my big CPM3V blade to a 25, just to see how truely sharp it can be.
I'm still learning.
