My father had a whetstone like one of those in the picture. He used it so much that it developed a “dip” in the middle. His pocket knives ended up looking like mini scythes or even toothpicks he sharpened them so much. Strange obsession.
“My father had a whetstone like one of those in the picture. He used it so much that it developed a “dip” in the middle. His pocket knives ended up looking like mini scythes or even toothpicks he sharpened them so much. Strange obsession.”
Soft stone soft steel. This doesn’t happen if you have good steel and a very hard stone. The trick is to stay on top of it religiously, and change stones as often as needed. It is the difference between “Grind” and “polish”. Keep it polished and you do not need to grind it with more aggressive coarse “grinding” whetstones.
Wood carvers sharpening their chisels know this difference, Barbers using straight razors knew this difference. Keep the edge polished to a razor edge. Leather was used as the final edge “polish”. Make a cut or two and “polish”. Using the less as aggressive leather takes much much less off the edge each polishing.
I personally use a quartz stone that I cut myself for polishing the edge, it is almost as equal to diamond in hardness. I could wear through twenty knife blades before you will ever see a dip in it. Then finish polish with leather to remove the microscopic burrs. Stay on top of it with a few strokes on each and you are good to go.