I've been stroping my carving knives every 10-15 minutes, but they still dull really fast. It almost feels like the stropping isn't helping at all! My chisels seem to hold up better, so I'm wondering why my carving knives are giving me such trouble. Can anyone help me figure out what I'm doing wrong? Thanks! Also, I found that some of my knives aren't very good quality, even after grinding the edges down. I'm thinking about being more careful with where I buy my knives in the future.
1 Answer
Stropping is great, but it won't help if your knives aren't already sharp. Make sure the cutting edge is well-apexed—there shouldn't be any visible chips or roughness, and the edge shouldn't reflect light. If they feel dull after a few passes on the stone, the problem could be with the initial sharpening rather than the stropping itself.
Yeah, I've felt the same! I thought I was doing something wrong, but now I get that some knives might just not be good enough even after trying to sharpen them.