Freehand Honing Microbevel

[Tony Wilkins]

Simple question with probably a more complex answer: how hard is to to maintain a micro bevel when you free-hand hone (I use waterstones)?

[Bob Lang]

Easy if you practice.

Bob Lang

[Ed Looney]

2nd what Bob said.

Ed Looney

[Kees Heiden]

One tactic is not too maintane it at all. Make it very small on your polishing stone only and on the next sharpening remove it first with a coarser stone.

[David Wong]

Generally I do not use micro-bevels, but sometimes on a plane blade, I may put on a steep micro-bevel (~45°) using maybe 3 strokes on my finest finishing stone. The purpose of the micro-bevel is to toughen the edge for a disagreeable board. You do not get the benefit of faster sharpening and easier maintenance of the edge. On the next sharpening, I hone the entire bevel to get rid of your micro-bevel. I sharpen freehand, and do not have the skills to maintain a regular micro bevel.

[Jim Matthews]

If you swipe a Sharpie marker or some other ink across the bevel before honing, you can see how much steel you're taking off.

I'm grinding convex bevels on all my cutting tools, these days.
No microbevel to adjust. Seems to be working, and freehand, too.

[Maurice Metzger]

In my experience it's easy with straight blades, the difficulty increases with the amount of camber (curve).

[Frank Drew]

Simple question with probably a more complex answer: how hard is to to maintain a micro bevel when you free-hand hone (I use waterstones)?

I think you can freehand hone a micro bevel but probably not a truly flat micro bevel; I don't think that human anatomy is "engineered" to be that precise. Whether or not a somewhat convex micro bevel matters is a different issue.

[lowell holmes]

Mike Dunbar shows freehand sharpening technique where you sharpen with movement cross body in stead of fore and aft.

I learned the technique from a Norton dvd I bought when I bought the Norton water stones.

If you use that technique withcross body movement, you can lock your wrists in place and move with back and forth hip movement.


With your wrists locked it is easy to lift the back of the chisel for the microbevel strokes. The human anatomy may not be that precise, but it is close.

[Erik Christensen]

tried it a number of times - was never happy with the result so i went back to using a guide - only adds 30 seconds to the process and to me was worth the repeatable accuracy

[Shaun Mahood]

I'm grinding convex bevels on all my cutting tools, these days.

Jim, how are you grinding the convex bevels? I've done it in the past when grinding on a coarse stone but have moved to a 6" grinder and am hollow grinding. Have no idea how I could accurately grind a convex bevel on there, but so far am less successful getting my blades consistently sharp with the hollow grind (weird to me, it should be easier but haven't got the hang of it yet).

[Jim Matthews]

I've done it in the past when grinding on a coarse stone but have moved to a 6" grinder and am hollow grinding. Have no idea how I could accurately grind a convex bevel on there, but so far am less successful getting my blades consistently sharp with the hollow grind (weird to me, it should be easier but haven't got the hang of it yet).

I recommend sticking with what works for you, fastest.
If it's repeatable and doesn't eat up shop time - stay the course.

I grind, polish and hone by hand.
If I've got a piece of steel that's badly chipped, I use a file to get things back on the square.
(I'm not using particularly hard steel, or a modern sintered formulation - my tools are nothing special.)

I think my reluctance to use powered grinders is that I never stop in time - I'm forever fixing problems of my own making.
With hand grinding, I can see my progress and feel when the burr is lifted sufficiently to go onto the next step.

I'm probably a good deal slower than you, with a powered wheel.

The difference is that I can get an edge that's just "gone off" back to really sharp in about 90 seconds, at my bench.

Nothing wrong with microbevels if they work for you. I'm just too lazy to want to spend any more time sharpening than I must.

[Roy Lindberry]

Simple question with probably a more complex answer: how hard is to to maintain a micro bevel when you free-hand hone (I use waterstones)?

Rob Cosman shows a technique of holding the blade and locking the wrists, that worked pretty well for me. You can see him explain and demonstrate it in this video. However, I have found it faster and easier to use convex bevels, so I no longer use a micro bevel.