so what do all of you use to sharpen your knives: skinning, fleshing, pelting, etc.?

what about other hunting knives and various tools?


i use everything: the lansky and gatco sets, diamond and arkansas bench stones, carbide and ceramic sharpeners. it all depends on what i need to sharpen. for example... i use a little "2 ended" sharpener made by smith's for my beaver skinner. 1 side is carbide, and the other is ceramic. a few swipes on the carbides followed by 4-5 strokes with the ceramic side, and i'm ready to go again. 15 seconds down time.

so what do the rest of you use?

i use the wheel kind you attach to a grinder ,,, dunn knives is where i got mine , can get them at grizzley too ,, about 30$$ is all and use it to sharpen all my tools ,, quick and easy!!!!

I live in Hot Springs Arkansas within a 30 mile radus of where all Arkansas stone is found. There are four grades or hardness of Arkansas stone: from soft (Ouchita) to the black and translusent the hardest. If one starts with the soft and works up to the black (which actually simply polishes the steel) that will be the best edge you can achieve on any cutting edge) But, that takes a bit of time. Lansky buys all of its natural stone from the Norton Company. Their stone cutting plant (Norton) is about six miles from my house. My best buddy works there, his wife worked for Smith for thirty years. Smith's offices are about 15 miles from here. Smith at one time made a lot of natural stone sharpening products. They still buy some stone from Norton, but most of thier products are made in China and just packaged here in Arkansas. The Dunn system is great, but it usually puts a 8 to 10 degree edge on a knife. Real sharp (like a razor blade), but like a razor blade it get dull pretty fast.

Crowkiller

Japanese waterstones. Grits start at 1000..then the 4000 and 8000. Nothing, and I mean nothing puts an edge on a tool like these. I make my living building guns and carving wood, so have tried about everything out there. Bar none...best thing there is.
I've got boxes of arkansas stones,waterstones, gatco sharpeners and diamond sharpeners....they don't get used since the Japanese waterstones. They will leave an edge like a mirror.

Can you fill us in on the Japanese waterstones, where you get them etc. Thanks.

To finsh I take a wooden board with leather on it and then I oil the leather and put ruse on the leather ,this well polish the eage . The ruse comes from a rock shop , get the powder form. ...... And yes where can we get the Japanese waterstones?

i don't take the time to strop my knives/blades for the most part.

i don't recall where she got them, but my mom has some water stones for her wood carving tools. they ARE impressive!

most everything i own takes a real beating, knives included. if i did delicate work i would think about the very fine stones.

crowkiller....... can you get bench size stones for a good price?

Lansky, sharpening wheels and most of the time a butchers steel....Mac~

I use a Dexter Russell Steel.

Bristleback,
A couple of sources for waterstones- http://www.woodcraft.com/family.aspx?FamilyID=242

http://www.traditionalwoodworker.com/default.php?cPath=34_501

Ron Fry

Ahhh .... JAPAN

or most good woodworking outlets.

I have tried everthing possible. Thre is nothing like those wheels bob custer speaks of. I bought mine fron Grizzly Tool
for $32.00, knives are like razors. shaves the hair off you arm is the best test.

Lansky

I've tried a bunch of different methods.

Lanksy....bench stones...crock sticks...carbides....steels

Now pretty much all I use is a 15" oval shaped diamond steel. It's fast, and it works. There is not a dull knife on the property now.

To anyone who has a hard time sharpening because difficulty maintaining the angle...bite the bullet and buy a Lanksy. reg, or diamond...it matters not. It will be worth every penny.

You can buy the Japanese stones in various "qualities". There are naturally the ones from Japan...which are natural stone...very soft and cost near what a dozen MB 650s will new...OUCH.

Norton has some excellent ones...you can get these at most woodworking stores... they'll run you about 50 bucks and under depending on grit. You can also find them at good butcher supply shops. This is what I am using.

Grizzly tools has some in their catalog for about 20 bucks. I have not tried them...but will be.

NOTE- These are soft stones and must be resurfaced periodically....depending on how good you are at working the stone in a flat position. No big issue....just a piece of glass and some sandpaper and you can get them to flat. Thing I'm trying to point out is these are NOT like a hard Arkansas stone that'll stay flat for nearly forever and stay true. They are designed to make a grit slurry that polishes while you sharpen...so they will wear more quickly than an oil stone.

As to edge...WOW is all I can say. I thought I had razor sharp tools before....I mean if you can shave your arm with a chisel it's sharp...right? That's what I used to get on all the other systems, stones etc. Then I went to the Japanese water stones. Made those edges look dull! If you watch there are sometimes demonstrations at the wood stores where they bring in a factory representative. If so...take your sharpest tool in and have him show you what a water stone can do above what you have...LOL. I bet you'll be impressed.

I just use a steel and keep the edges sharp I dont dull them completley and try to save them

For a long, long time, all I have used is a stitched muslin wheel on my bench grinder loaded with 220 grit polish. Both the wheels and the polish are available from Brownell's. Takes about a short minute to put an edge on a decent blade. I even sharpened my chisels on this rig when I was building gun stocks.