A great practical lesson on burr removal. Since you cannot perform something analogous to edge leading strokes with that system a strop is a must and even with edge leading strokes stropping is still the best final step. It's was nice to see a test with a harder steel to see if the product had limits there. - All the best - Brooke
Some alternating passes with light pressure should reduce the burr well while only using the ceramic disc. It's a bit annoying sine you have to reattach the knife constantly but worth the time. Same as you would do on stones, soft single passes alternating sides to reduce/remove burr and then get rid of small burr residues on the strop. After the ceramic you could hear the knife had a quite prominent burr on one side by the sound it made on the strop. Plain leather without compound won't romove that completely. Including some simple steps for burr reduction/removal in the manual would be nice and boost the obtainble sharpness by alot, especially for people who aren't very familiar with sharpening. The stropping afterwars could be also done on jeans or cardboard, including a proper leatherstop would be surely beneficial tho as Greg pointed out. For the untrained user at home including some stropping compound would surely help with burr removal as well.
I am just 12 minutes into the video but had to jump in here and comment on the technique you used. And this is the problem with these systems that focus on just one side of the knife at a time. Horl does not need to offer a strop. Burr removal on a strop is just not necessary if you alternate your passes. But in order to alternate your passes, you have to remove the knife from the holder, switch to the other side, and make a pass. Switch to the other side and make a pass. It was obvious that with your technique of just doing a bunch of passes on one side, and then doing a bunch of passes on the other side is going to leave a massive burr. What I would do is count the number of passes you make on one side and do the exact same on the other. Then reduce the number of passes by 1, and then repeat. So let's say you do 10 passes on one side, 10 on the other, then do 9 passes the next go around, 8, 7, 6 etc to where you do one pass per side of the knife. You can see that flipping the knife around will be a bit inconvenient. But that's how I sharpen freehand, and when you do that, stropping is just not necessary for burr removal at all. There is no burr when doing alternating edge leading strokes, or I should say the burr gets reduced to nothing with alternating edge leading passes. To each his own, I suppose. What I do like about strops is the compound you can use down to sub micron to really refine an edge, but sub micron really is for shaving comfort on your face with straight razors.
I've never doubted this system can produce a sharp edge on a standard chef knife. But it doesn't work with single bevel sashimi knives...nor would it work very well with my antique Sabatier knives with imperfect grinds and slight propeller twists. Which require manipulation of the bevel angle during sharpening. I prefer to produce a slight convex bevel for certain knives...as well as a flat bevel for others. I also don't like the fact that there's no way to resurface the disks as they start to wear out. I like to be able to recondition the surface of my natural stones in order to get different results. To me these systems take all the art out of knife sharpening that freehand sharpening offers. But they're likely a great option for those without the skill set for freehand whetstone sharpening.
Love to see that you tested the original. Being copied that often is a sign of a great invention.
My dude is jacked now. Must be all that sharpening.
Greg you are looking sharp! Keep up the hard work!
Bonk
A great practical lesson on burr removal. Since you cannot perform something analogous to edge leading strokes with that system a strop is a must and even with edge leading strokes stropping is still the best final step. It's was nice to see a test with a harder steel to see if the product had limits there. - All the best - Brooke
Great video,have you ever tried deburring with a block of hard felt?Works great I deburr after every stone.
Cool video thanks !
I think the Takamura sg2 is 62 hrc though not 65 😅
You can impregnate the leader with diamond solution 50k or 100k.
Would be interesting to see a Stone Wars with this system against all your favourite stones, then compare the edge and see how well they preform.🤔
Some alternating passes with light pressure should reduce the burr well while only using the ceramic disc. It's a bit annoying sine you have to reattach the knife constantly but worth the time. Same as you would do on stones, soft single passes alternating sides to reduce/remove burr and then get rid of small burr residues on the strop. After the ceramic you could hear the knife had a quite prominent burr on one side by the sound it made on the strop. Plain leather without compound won't romove that completely. Including some simple steps for burr reduction/removal in the manual would be nice and boost the obtainble sharpness by alot, especially for people who aren't very familiar with sharpening. The stropping afterwars could be also done on jeans or cardboard, including a proper leatherstop would be surely beneficial tho as Greg pointed out. For the untrained user at home including some stropping compound would surely help with burr removal as well.
loved this for my family members…until we get to de-burring, that is a whole other part of getting a sharp knife that currently requires experience 🗡️
Aloha buddy 🤙
I am just 12 minutes into the video but had to jump in here and comment on the technique you used. And this is the problem with these systems that focus on just one side of the knife at a time. Horl does not need to offer a strop. Burr removal on a strop is just not necessary if you alternate your passes. But in order to alternate your passes, you have to remove the knife from the holder, switch to the other side, and make a pass. Switch to the other side and make a pass. It was obvious that with your technique of just doing a bunch of passes on one side, and then doing a bunch of passes on the other side is going to leave a massive burr. What I would do is count the number of passes you make on one side and do the exact same on the other. Then reduce the number of passes by 1, and then repeat. So let's say you do 10 passes on one side, 10 on the other, then do 9 passes the next go around, 8, 7, 6 etc to where you do one pass per side of the knife. You can see that flipping the knife around will be a bit inconvenient. But that's how I sharpen freehand, and when you do that, stropping is just not necessary for burr removal at all. There is no burr when doing alternating edge leading strokes, or I should say the burr gets reduced to nothing with alternating edge leading passes. To each his own, I suppose. What I do like about strops is the compound you can use down to sub micron to really refine an edge, but sub micron really is for shaving comfort on your face with straight razors.
I've never doubted this system can produce a sharp edge on a standard chef knife. But it doesn't work with single bevel sashimi knives...nor would it work very well with my antique Sabatier knives with imperfect grinds and slight propeller twists. Which require manipulation of the bevel angle during sharpening. I prefer to produce a slight convex bevel for certain knives...as well as a flat bevel for others. I also don't like the fact that there's no way to resurface the disks as they start to wear out. I like to be able to recondition the surface of my natural stones in order to get different results. To me these systems take all the art out of knife sharpening that freehand sharpening offers. But they're likely a great option for those without the skill set for freehand whetstone sharpening.
Better off buying a 3 stone combo