Couldn't resist tinkering a little bit right away so I took a set of balsa strops loaded with 15um CBN from Ken Schwartz and spent a little time on the blade. Here it is at 800x:



Just what I was looking for in terms of edge tooth. I'm excited to use this knife around the office, will probably invent some cutting tasks so I can see how it performs.

A couple quick tests after the 15um CBN and Balsa strops:

Shaving - effective but not as easy as after the 14um Diamond and Leather Strops
Copy Paper - easily slashes through, cuts curves and push cuts well

Off to attack some boxes

Just completed 80 cuts, 24" long without the blade getting hot. It's no longer shaving nor going through the copy paper easily, but still, 80 cuts through double wall cardboard is pretty impressive, especially for such a thick blade. So far, I'm liking the 15um edge.

Thanks! Keep us posted! loving the new pictures from your microscope!

A couple of observations so far:

1. I focused on rake angle during the whole process and found that it made a significant impact on performance. The first rake angle I tried was too extreme and required me to hold the knife at a funny angle while slashing through the cardboard. I modified the angle to 30 degrees from perpendicular (easily verified via microscope) and found a tremendous improvement.
2. The cardboard was touch on the blade and the 15um CBN and Balsa strops weren't able to restore the edge to shaving sharp. I had to go back to the Micro-Fines to get it done and even then it took a while to get rid of the little flat spot on the edge of the edge which made me wish I hadn't lapped the brown stones. I think I'll want to test a set where I do lap the white stones but leave the brown ones alone so they can be more aggressive.

razoredgeknives wrote:


+1 !