Making a burr

[mpgtsm]

I’m trying to tidy up the edge on an s30v blade, using the sm cbn rods. There’s a rough and uneven factory grind. It’s looking better. My rookie question of the day is: Should I work one side of the bevel until I find a burr, or just do 4-5 passes on each side until the ugly factory grind marks are gone, and I have a good 30 deg?

[tonijedi]

I'd go with 15 degrees per side and raise a burr on one side, then work on the other side, then finish with alternating strokes. There's a thread about sharpening that everyone should read:
viewtopic.php?t=90520

[Ric]

I recommend using a shapie to see what is going on.

If it's a real user I would do a burr to make sure you hit the apex.

You use 30 or 40 degrees?
As the diamonds are not super aggressive I would do more strokes to speed things up a bit.

[mpgtsm]

I meant 15/30. Thx. I’ll edit the post

[mpgtsm]

I recommend using a shapie to see what is going on.

If it's a real user I would do a burr to make sure you hit the apex.

You use 30 or 40 degrees?
As the diamonds are not super aggressive I would do more strokes to speed things up a bit.

The sharpie is what showed what a mess the factory edge was. It’s a Leatherman btw

[mpgtsm]

I like a 30 degree bevel with a 40 deg edge or micro

[zhyla]

Burrs are evil. Use a sharply to get the angle right. Sharpen until you can feel the edge is sharp. Then repeat until you run out of finer grits.

[u.w.]

Great question.

You are gonna find folks "in both camps" when it come to "making a burr".

Is one way better than another? You decide.

I do make a burr when I sharpen, and that works very well for me.

So, my answer is for what " I " do (as other's answers will be for what they do). I make a burr on one side of the edge, the full edge, and then move to the other side and - "wash-rinse-repeat", sharpen until I have a burr on the opposite side, the full length of the edge - then I de-burr and enjoy my properly apexed/sharpened and deburred knife :-)
They (properly sharpened and de-burred knives) are a true joy to use.

And again - when I say "properly sharpened/apexed, and de-burred" - I'm talking for how " I " do it, and what I've found works well " for me ".

As you get your edge bevel sorted out, you may well end up with a larger burr , here and there, along the edge, until you have the full length of the edge fully apexed. After that initial time though, your burr will likely be much, much smaller, whenever you are sharpening again.

YMMV

u.w.

[bdblue]

I think you should get the edge bevels in good shape before you worry about a burr. You could take a lot of material off of one side, form a burr, then take a little bit off of the other side to remove the burr. Now your edges aren't symmetrical, which probably doesn't matter to anyone but you.
Put the sharpie ink on both sides, then work on both sides until you get the grinds evened up pretty well. When the grinds are in pretty good shape you can then work on one side until you get the burr.
Theoretically if you alternate sides back and forth with a few strokes either side, you could sneak up on sharp without needing a burr. The problem is that parts of the edge will be duller than other parts and will not be sharp when other parts achieve sharpness. Once you work one side until you get a burr, you are on the verge of getting the entire edge sharp.

[Wandering_About]

I typically will just bet both edge bevels to the apex before starting to raise a burr when repairing/reprofiling an edge. It helps me keep the bevel even to switch sides from time to time and watch what I'm doing, how much metal is being removed, and how even the bevel looks. The sharpie trick can be helpful by making things a bit more visible. Once I've gotten down to some form of apex I'll sharpen with my usual method (make a burr on each side then take it off).

[David45]

I can get Maxamet very sharp but have difficulty raising a burr on a Naniwa 800 stone. Perhaps using my Wicked Edge diamonds will produce a burr?