[masraum]

Originally Posted by berettafan

My wife gave me a really nice kitchen knife Christmas before last and it kinda opened my eyes to just how dull our 25 year old Henckels had become. I do have a steel and also one of those V type draw through sharpeners. But this new knife was just another level of sharp and much better even though it wasn't as expensive as the Henckels.

So I ordered the Spyderco sharpmaker thing and tried it. Kinda tough for larger knives. After watching a few videos i've decided to try a full size stone and went with the Shapton Pro series. 'splash and go' style that don't require soaking.

Should be here in about a week. Anxious to see just how good i can get my old knives! I've ordered the 320 and 1000 to start. It sounds like the 1000 is a good all around grit.

I've wanted some of the Shapton Pro series for a while. I started with a King wetstone. It's something like 300-350 on one side and 1000 on the other. It does a good job. I can get our Shun's shaving sharp. I bought a DMT 2 sided diamond stone for some of my tools (chisels & hand planes) and have used that on knives and it also does a good job, probably easier to use than the King stones.

The Shaptons are supposed to be excellent. Let us know when they come in and how well they work.

You may also want to get something to use to strop the blade with after you sharpen it.

I've got these
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B08LLBN36V/
a piece of leather, but you need something under it unless you just want to use the edge/corner of a table/workbench.
or this guy
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07TWMRC15/
Comes with leather on 2 sides already mounted to a piece of wood. This is about half as wide as the one above.

I think either works OK. The one is convenient because it comes mounted to wood, but is narrow. The other is nice that it's larger, but it would be nice if it was mounted to wood (which you could certainly do).

Stropping with the compound is a lot like using a 5000 grit stone to polish the edge after the 1000. In my opinion, stropping is worth the price of admission.