# Home Chef/Advice on Knife Sharpening/Honing



## ToolPunk (12 mo ago)

I do a lot of cooking and cutting. I make food from all over the world everyday for my family so my knives get a lot of use. Up until recently I was using the most out of department store knives using a steel honing rod. I really wanted a knife I could appreciate a lot more that gave back too.

I decided the best for me was the Fujiwara FKS Santoku. My questions are; As a home Chef, does this knife need to be sharpened anymore than when it arrived? Should/Can I use my honing rod on it? Or, do I need to start learning how to sharpen with stones to maintain this knife?


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## brianshaw (Dec 18, 2010)

Sometimes knives are "sharp enough" out of the box. Slice a tomato and find out. 

Hard(er) steel knives tend to NOT do well with a steel hone. For a hone, use a ceramic hone, if any hone is used. Be gentle… that knife-hone slapping seen on TV is nonsensical and can chip a hard steel blade.

Sharpen with stones. Traditionalist will insist on water stones but Arkansas stone sharpen Japanese steel too. There are hundreds of threads on sharpening and many internet sources to get you going. At some point you will need to learn how to sharpen your knife with stones.

Enjoy your knife!


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## benuser (Nov 18, 2010)

Don't be surprised when finding out that the factory edge won't last. They are usually poor and weak. A first stone sharpening requires to get rid of it. From there on maintenance is much simpler.


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## ToolPunk (12 mo ago)

@brianshaw
Funny thing, slicing a tomato is what brought me here... After using the knife for a couple weeks+ I noticed it took some effort to pierce the flesh of the tomato before slicing smoothly. Slicing was still nice but if it was still sharp it shouldn't be fighting the tomato skin. I picked up a decent ceramic hone and it definitely brought me back to when the knife arrived. Being the person I am though, I like to be able to take care of my things myself so I also grabbed a decent sharpening stone set.

@benuser
This is what I was noticing so in addition to the ceramic hone, I bought a sharpening stone set.

So far I have practiced sharpening a department store knife and WOW that thing melts through tomatoes, its like slicing air... I will definitely enjoy sharpening the Fujiwara and experiencing it to the fullest now! Thanks guys for the nudge to get it done right!


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## brianshaw (Dec 18, 2010)

LOL... the dreaded tomato. 

You should easily be able to get that knife sharp enough to slice through tomato by just waving it above! Well, not really but the tomato will be cleanly cut by the mere rubbing of the knife across the skin.

Once you get it sharpened, just a bit of really light honing with the ceramic hone will keep your knife in good shape and extend the amount of time between stone sharpenings.


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## benuser (Nov 18, 2010)

A ceramic rod may work, provided you deburr. Normal strokes are edge leading — unless you want to quickly abrade a lot of steel, but that is not where ceramic rods are for. Let a few last strokes be very light and longitudinal, along the edge, under the same sharpening angle. You will see the burr remnants on the rod. Without deburring the edge won't last: the burr will wrap over the edge, making it perfectly dull, or breaking off, leaving a moonscape-like damaged edge behind.


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## Daxocyt (11 mo ago)

I'm an amateur cooker, so I want to ask someone more experienced for advice. Knife sharpening is always a problem for me, so I bought a Krauff sharpener. Are such devices used by professionals or I spent money on a useless thing?


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## benuser (Nov 18, 2010)

I don't know the product. Sharpening a kitchen knife is not so much about restoring an edge at the end of a piece of steel, but more restoring a complete geometry. A good working chef's knife has a spine of 2-3mm, an edge of 1 or two microns, a thickness of 0.2mm above the edge, 0.5mm at 5mm from there, and 1mm at 10mm. If you only restore the edge a rapid thickening behind the edge will occur, making it harder to get through dense food and making the board contact more violent. This is why within certain limits a thinner blade will longer hold its edge.


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