so i ordered two whetstones, a 300/800 and 2000/5000, because I have a 15 year old Benchmade that hasn't been sharpened in 15 years and has a very rough blade.

I successfully used the 300 grit side to remove all the bumps in the edge of the blade, leaving a smooth edge with what I think is a good consistent angle. However  using the 800 I can't even begin to get the blade sharp. At first I thought that the 800 wasn't fine enough, so I tried wiyh the 2000 grit to attempt to get it sharp enough to cut some paper. Not even close. I can't even get it sharp enough to feel like I'd xut myself- I can easily run my finger down the blade with some pressure and not even come close to feeling any sharpness.

Other than time and tons of practice, anyone have any tips? I watched numerous youtube videos and tried all different methods and can't seem to make any ground.

Return them and go buy a Ken onion worksharp it takes no skill whatsoever to get your knife factory sharp

Use a sharpie to color in the bevel/edge of the blade.

It will show you if you're sharpening at the right angle and hitting the apex of the blade.

Raise a burr down the entire length of the blade on one side, then do the same on the other side.

Then move on to the higher grit stones and repeat the process.





Japanese Knife Imports on youtube is a great resource.

Lansky

My advice is to shitcan the stone and get a Lansky

This is a good video too.

This.  Color down to the very edge on both sides.  Take a few strokes, striving to keep the angle constant, then inspect the edge.  If you see shiny metal where the color used to be, you are hitting the edge.  Keep working one side until you have raised a burr along the entire edge, then do the other side.  Repeat with finer grit.  If the knife hasn't been sharpened in a long time, you've got your work cut out for you.

I am not a fan of conventional whetstones.  I much prefer the diamond plates such as DMT or Smith's.  I am not a fan of the Worksharp electric sharpener, though I do have a Worksharp hand sharpener with diamond plates.  It does okay.  You can ruin a blade in short order with the electric one if you don't know what you're doing.

I used to practice on whetstones a lot, got pretty good at it.

Then I got a lansky and got rid of all my whetstones.

Now I'm too lazy for even the lansky, a pocketpal sharpens every knife I own just fine.

Should be sharp after just the 300#.  Go back and keep honing till it is.  Then a little bit on the 800#.   The other ones aren't really useful for knives.  Maybe a bench plane blade or a straight razor where you need a finely polished edge, but not for any kind of knife.


I don't understand the mortal fear of conventional stones here.  It's not that hard.  Use a constant angle.  You can go in a circular motion if it helps.  Use a light touch on the blade.  300# should cut a new bevel pretty frickin' quick unless the edge has been grossly misused.  If I was just killing time, I'd set the bevel, strop the blade, then give it a handfull of strokes on the 300#, then go to 800# for maybe a dozen or so passes.


My only big tip is to set the stone up at the right height and direction to make it easy to get the angle right.

Plus 100

Buy a guided system.  That was my solution.  Freehand sucks IMHO.  I know there are people that can put stupid sharp edges on freehand, but I don't have the inclination to learn it well enough to best using a guided sharpening system.  I LOVE having a mirrored trailing edge.

On the cheaper side of things, a lansky can be had for under $100 for a pretty complete set of stones.  

On the more expensive, Edge Pro.  

Factory sharp usually isn't that sharp.

ETA the Worksharp can fuck up a knife in the blink of an eye.

Diamond stones or wicked edge ftw

Get an edge pro or a kme

FPNI AGAIN!

I use a DMT 8000 grit hone. It cuts in well and gets things sharp quickly.

Too toothy also.

I ain't going to say I'm determined to learn it but growing up around the old men at my uncle's country store has me thinking I don't want to 'cheat', plus I'm not ever really in need of the razors the one old guy could attain(split a hair lengthwise for a short distance). That being said, I have the tri-hone thing I try to sharpen on. One thing that would help me personally is if I had wider stones to keep from making that errant stroke along the edge of the rock. I can feel myself making several good strokes only to scrape it down that edge and ruining all my good work.

My issue with "conventional"  stones like the Arkansas stones is they aren't hard enough to sharpen modern steels without ripping out carbides or leaving them until sharpened.

Buy diamonds and never worry about it

A sharpie is your friend, whatever you sharpen with....
The edge of a coffee mug or a guided system etc .

Interesting. I haven't heard of that before, but it seems plausible.

You referring to steels like M390 and S110V? 

Where is the threshold with steel vs conventional stones?

With stones there are 2 methods: trailing edge or leading edge. ....or you can go circular.

Check out this guys blogspot
http://sharpener-pete.blogspot.com

Be wary about taking off too much material with the automatic systems.

The benefit of stones is you only knock down the material you need to make it sharp.  

I can't tell you how many knives I've seen from people that use "automatic" kitchen knife sharpeners like the one on many electric can openers. You can take off a lot of material real quick.

Likewise, if your knife doesn't need it (i.e. you've maintained the edge with periodic honing and it's not as dull as a brick) then you don't need to start with 300grit.  You could start at 600 or 800 even.

Bare minimum you need 3 stones: coarse, medium, fine.

I'd suggest a jewellers loupe as well. Either 10x or 16x. I have a 16x.

1. Work your stones coarse through fine grit.  

1.A. Do enough strokes to create a micro wire on the edge thats not on the stone. Do the same number of strokes on the opposite side.  

1.b. use lighter pressure and do same number of strokes both sides.. some say theres 5 pressure levels. Do what works for you. I sometimes do 1 and sometimes 2 levels. Hard then soft almost glide across.

1.c. use jewellers loupe to examine bevel faces.  They should be equal in size and the edge should be middle on the blade thickness. . If blade is off center do extra strokes to correct it.

1.d. change to next higher grit stone. Repeat steps 1a-1d.

2. Get an old leather belt or commercial hone. Do 10 to 20 strokes on each side a couple times. (E.g. 10 leftside 10 right, 10 left 10 right. Or 20, 20, 10, 10, 5, 5,) This breaks off the final wire edge you developed through the successive sharpening steps.

3. Check sharpness against arm hair, back of palm or rubbing thumb perpendicular to edge while nodding your head up and down like you know what you're doing.


Note you don't have to use the loupe but it does help you see the micro abrasions go away and understand how the stone is polishing your microsurface. It also helps to keep an eye on the centeredness of the edge.

Go up to 5000 grit for sharp yet toothy. 6000 for sharp but begging to get polished. 8000 is really more for polishing not necessarily for sharpening.(I think OP said he had an 5000 so that's good enough.)

200 to 600  coarse for setting bevels and for super dull blades.
1000 to 5000 is where the sharpening occurs.
8000 to 15000 is where mirror polishing occurs.

One tip is to create a slurry on the stone while tour sharpening. This aids in the process. If you use a naguru? stone you can creat a slurry before you start with the knife by rubbing the naguru stone on your sharpening stone in small circles. This helps speed things up.

If you're doing edge-leading strokes, pretend you're slicing off a piece of the stone. Like slicing cheese. Keep the angle consistent and try to get one full stroke heel to tip on one pass on the rock. Don't do one side on sections. Keeping the angle consistent is more about feeling the blade than anything. Takes experience. Once you have it done muscle memory carries you through.

Most importanly: don't cut your self. Know where your blade is travelling and keep your fingers out of the way. I-ve seen a few accidents by the inexperienced.

I spent a lot of time practicing with stones and I can get a pretty good edge.

I watched a lot of videos on the worksharp, then finally bought one and a leather belt for it to strop with.

There's a learning curve to using the wroksharp, but once I got the hang of it I can make knives ridiculously sharp really quickly.

I use it on my axes, lawn mower blades, etc too.

My advice is to get a knife that is made of decent enough steel, but that you don't care about.  Learn to sharpen it before you move on to knives you like.

You have to keep the blade-to-stone angle very consistent through the whole process.  Gentle and equal force through the whole sharpening stroke, every time.

Even steels as old as D2 will resist soft arkansas stones that's where the bad rap came from. Soft stones vs high chromium and high RC.

Chromium, vanadium carbides, tungsten carbides and niobium carbides are all harder than the noviculite arkansas stones use to abrade/ polish steels.

This and you're not aiming for a number of strokes you sharpen a side until it develops a burr then flip it over until that side develops one then you move up in the grits. Higher grits will make a finer burr

You can feel the burr on the opposite edge when you run your finger down the bevel.

When you're all done strop at the same angle with diamond compounds and you get a scary sharp edge.

I've gotten pretty good at sharpening using stones, but I had some trouble getting the hang of it. Others have covered the process.

What worked good for me before I learned to precisely control angle on stones was sharpening on belt sander belts clamped in a barber's strop, finished on the strop with green compund. This also gives you nice convex edges that hold up better to hard use because there's a little more metal supporting the edge.

Also, it's really difficult to learn to sharpen knives properly on cheap, soft stainless knives. Get something cheap and reasonably hard, like a mora, to practice on.

sharpmaker works well.

I use the wicked edge and have a razor sharp edge without any issues.  Just burr one side and burr the otherside. Go to town on both sides after the burring . I use a angle cube to get precise angle measurements.

This

When you see Vanadium over .5% or any Tungsten in the chemistry.

Lansky guided is the best if you want to go cheap.

Dad has a Worksharp and I can't decide if I like it or not.

I am not the best on a whetstone or crock sticks (Lansky turnbox), but I can put a respectable edge on my knives.

Have you tried a little water or very light oil to keep the stone from loading up.
It really helps to keep the stone clean .

I use paper wheels quite a bit.  I don't think an edge is finished coming off of the rouge wheel.  I also load the grinding wheel with 320 grit instead of the 180 they come with.  I don't sharpen every knife I make this way (some I do) but almost everything I resharpen for people I do on the paper wheels.

I still finish with a hard back strop and chromium oxide compound (green).

Won't help if the steel is harder than the stone.

I still worry about removing too much steel and not actually sharpening carbides but polishing the matrix  around them and ripping them out.

Yep.  That's what I did and I'm never going back.

I got one as a gift. I use it on generic knives I don't care about.

Any knife I care about, I do by hand.

And that's a lot of knifes.

Even the diamond stones need to stay clean.
I'm still trying to get better with my HF 1x30" belt sander with 200 and 800 grit.
I still need a leather belt.

use a mousepad

https://dmtsharp.com/sharpeners/guided-sharpening/magna-guide-kits/

This is what you want.  Sportsmans warehouse carries then for around 80 bucks.
You want the one with 2 bifolds, and one must be the extra extra fine.  Use the guides til you get the hang of it.
You can sharpen almost anything with them.

I scrub my diamonds afterwards with hot water and fish soap.

Hopefully this week I'll get to a 4" piece of M390.  That steel will take a scary edge and is loaded with very aggressive carbides

Once I get the edges set I strop one leather loaded with diamond paste down to 1 micron.

It's a very tactile process and you can feel the sweet spot where there is a little drag when you hit the edge. I like that. I can feel it.

I get where you're coming from. I don't like the Worksharp either. I have one and I'll run a batch of knives through it I'd I don't care.

When I do my or a friend's knife I like being in control of the situation. Although when you said Silicon Carbide I got interested, I like super hard abrasives for sharpening.

Buy something cheap and practice.

BTW. This can be a rabbit hole, I currently have an Edgepro with factory stones, a coarse DMT diamond plate for it, a set of homemade blanks with 3M microabrasive on them. A full set of the 8" DMT plates. A set of Arkansas stones. A Worksharp 3000. A Worksharp Knife and tool sharpener. A ceramic hone. a set of Spyderco ceramic hones. And a Stropbat with 4 grades of abrasive.

I think I need some strops and diamond paste, and the Worksharp Ken Onion, and I wouldn't mind a wicked Edge. I also want one of those 1x30 belt grinders for working knives(I won't put my good stuff on one).