Knife blades get dull quickly ?

[cyclops2]

Seems my using cut fresh bait dulls the blade quickly. Fish scales ?  Anyone else have that problem ?  The Rapala knife is too hard of a metal. So I bought a cheap short kitchen ,,,Paring knife. Softer S S blade. 4 strokes fully resharpned.

[Functional]

Might need a different edge angle on the Rapala knife. Too fine of an edge and you will dull it fast, need a higher angle or different edge profile in general (apple seed). 

 

Harder metals will (should, with the right edge) dull less quick but take longer to sharpen. Softer metals will dull quick but can sharpen easier. 

[casts_by_fly]

1 hour ago, cyclops2 said:

Seems my using cut fresh bait dulls the blade quickly. Fish scales ?  Anyone else have that problem ?  The Rapala knife is too hard of a metal. So I bought a cheap short kitchen ,,,Paring knife. Softer S S blade. 4 strokes fully resharpned.

4 stroke sharp and 4 cuts back to dull.  

 

The harder the metal, the harder it is to sharpen but also the harder it is to dull it and the better of an edge it will take.

 

if you're talking about the rapala fillet knife with the wooden handle, that's a soft metal in the blade.  I have one and have used it for 20 years.  Like you said, a couple strokes on a kitchen sharpener (I use a lansky pull through on cheap knives) and it will sharpen up.  BUT, you're not really sharpening the cutting edge itself.  With cheaper pull through type sharpeners all you are doing is taking the burrs off.  That's good, but you're also adding small serrations along the blade.  That makes it feel sharp quickly, but then those serrations roll over and it dulls quickly.  What you need is a proper sharpener that puts a clean edge across the full cutting edge.  I do that for my better knives.  When you have a single cutting edge with no burrs and no micro serrations then you have a clean cutting edge that will cut for a long time without dulling.  

[Will Ketchum]

I've used one of theses on my Rapala fillet knives. They keep the angle of the cutting edge constant as you roll. Never a problem.

 

[TnRiver46]

There’s nothing wrong with rapala knives

[throttleplate]

My wife does all the cleaning of the fish we take home, crappie, sunnies and walleye. She likes to use the old rapala knife and always says how dull it is and will sharpen it against the rock she is cleaning the fish on, she claims this helps it some.

I use the stock supplied sharpener to sharpen before every trip and also use another pull through sharpener designed just like the rapala but more aggressive stone as it leaves shards of metal behind. Wife is philipina and she doesnt want to use a cutting board even though we own one designed for fish with the clamp to hold the tail she always uses a flat rock by the river.

[Bankc]

5 minutes ago, TnRiver46 said:

There’s nothing wrong with rapala knives

They're not high end, but they're not too bad either.  I've definitely spent more on worse knives in my life.  If you tell your wife they're made in Finland, she might even let you keep one in the kitchen.  

[casts_by_fly]

i agree with this.  They aren't bad, and especially not for the price.  I mean mine has kept for 20 years of light use.  Just know that your'e going to have to sharpen is every other fish when you're filleting anything tougher than a bluegill.  That's a good rule generally but definitely so here.

[NavyToad]

@throttleplate I know the drill. Gave my wife a machete/bolo for X-mas one year. Saved wear and tear on our good knives. 

[throttleplate]

1 hour ago, NavyToad said:

@throttleplate I know the drill. Gave my wife a machete/bolo for X-mas one year. Saved wear and tear on our good knives. 

[txchaser]

Turn the knife edge up in a strong light and look for rolls/nicks/whatever. It should be pretty obvious at that angle. 

 

Generally a knife that's a little dull doesn't actually need a sharpener, it needs a strop. Sharpener works of course, but it's just overkill. 

 

A few quick strokes on a strop (with a little compound) solves dull. Sharpeners solve malformations, knicks, bad rolls of the edge, etc. Butcher steel does mostly the same thing; it's a little better at rolls which is more likely on a kitchen-style knife than real damage unless you are hitting animal bone.

 

The knife thing was a deep rabbit hole for a while. It's as bad as fishing rods. I can only cut one thing at a time. 

 

Old hickory knives are really cheap, and the steel is just right for heavy food prep. Super easy to get sharp, hard to keep that way, but a couple of strops and it's back at shaving sharp. Pretty soft steel.

There are a bunch of alloy steels out there that are the opposite. Brutal to get a good edge (best off getting diamond) but they'll stay sharp for a really long time. 

 

For the original question, yeah the scales are hard on that rapala. 

 

 

[MGF]

I'm late to the party but here goes...Some of the best info that I've seen on sharpening can be found here...https://www.youtube.com/@OUTDOORS55  

 

In short...a knife can seem sharp when it has a bur but the bur folds over easily and the knife is dull almost instantly. Proper bur reduction/elimination results in a blade that will hold it's edge.

 

How to do that? That's the $64 question. Successively finer abrasives to refine the scratch pattern and eliminate the bur is great but good stones are expansive. The other way is to apex the edge with whatever stone you have, minimize the bur with really light strokes and then strop to remove the "last" of the bur.

 

I use an eye loop to see what's going on with the blade edge. Once you see it some of this stuff will make more sense.

 

As for the Repala...I won't try to tell you that it's the best knife but I got my first one when I was a child and filleted fish with it for probably 20 years before thinking that  it might need to be sharpened. LOL

[TnRiver46]

Same here! I’ve been using them about 30 yrs and I fillet a lot of fish. And cut up a lot of bait. 

[Bird]

My wife cleans all the fish and loves her Rapala knife and clip board.

I use a file working it away from the blade and a whetstone working the blade forward..... that's how I was taught.

[cyclops2]

I like the Rapala knives. But i am constantly cutting up a small perch to catch several large ones for senior friends to enjoy. 

   I keep the Kitchen Paring 6" blade in the top long space of the tackle box. I take the small stone from the kitchen to the boat for a resharpening.  

I am constantly cutting the scales of the baitfish.    👍

[scaleface]

3 hours ago, MGF said:

a knife can seem sharp when it has a bur but the bur folds over easily and the knife is dull almost instantly. Proper bur reduction/elimination results in a blade that will hold it's edge.

This. I never could figure out why my hair popping blades dulled after limited use. Now I put a micro edge on them and it makes them stronger and sharper.

[throttleplate]

What Stropping Does

At this point switch from a superfine hone-grit paper (1500 plus grit) to a leather strap, belt, or section of a belt, called a strop. The fine sandpaper hones, and the leather strops. Strop with the same back and forth motion, strop the blade’s edge against the leather. This action bends the now unseen burr back and forth against the leather and the burr finally breaks free. The edge thickness is now just paper thin or less. So “paper thin” doesn’t sound like the edge would bear up during use, being this thin, right on the very pinnacle of the blade’s edge—but it does.

With removal of the burr the edge acquires maximum sharpness and can be re-honed repeatedly without subjecting the blade to recurring sharpening cycles with lower grit sandpaper. This maintains the thin-and-sharp element of your blade.

Choosing A Strop

Make your strop from a strip of leather belt (10-inches long) glued to a bit of yardstick or lath material. Glue a strip of 800-1500 grit wet-n-dry sandpaper to the other side for a hone.

The same exact motion is used on the leather side of the strop stick. When the smith is “into” the motion it is similar to a continuous figure-8 movement. Most of the time the leather is enough to restore the blade’s edge without using the sandpaper side of the stick.

How To Strop

Stropping is a low-angle slap and slide motion. The leather actually sharpens the microstructure of the blade’s edge. It 1) bends the burr back to a sharp edge or 2) bends it back and forth till it breaks, like bending a wire coat hanger back-and-forth, revealing a new raw edge. Visualize a barber in an old-west, cowboy movie slappin’-n-slidin’ his straight razor on a big leather strop. Slap-n-slide your Frontier blade on the 800 to 1500 grit black W/D sandpaper 10 to 15 times then on the leather the same number of swipes. When your edge dulls you can often just strop with the leather, forgoing the hone altogether, in the restoration of a keen cutting edge.

 

After stropping, if your knife edge isn’t near razor sharp, go back to your wet-n-dry-sharpening action with the higher numbered sandpaper grits (400, 600, 800) then strop again.

Testing The Edge

Feel the edge with your thumb, perpendicular to the edge. Never run your thumb or fingers vertically up or down the blade. It will cut. With time you’ll be able to tell in an instant various level of sharpness with just your thumb. With time you will feel the burr and know the angle of any blade with just a touch of your thumb.

Another sharpness indicator is the use of an old leather belt or scrap of leather. Almost any “sharp” knife can cut a sheet of paper but stiff leather is the true challenge. First, use a knife of known sharpness. Cut a bit from the leather. Note the force needed to peel off a few pieces of leather. Use the same piece of leather on subsequent blade edges you sharpen in the future. By comparison, the quality of those blades’ sharpness can be gauged.

[throttleplate]

This topic has now brought me to amazon to search and buy a strop, i am glad that @cyclops2started this topic as i never understood when watching old westerns the barber was running the straight razor blade up and down a length of something which turns out to be leather. My wife should be happy at the differance in the blade sharpness.

 

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07TWMRC15/ref=ox_sc_act_title_1?smid=A312E2U64V7XLE&psc=1

[TnRiver46]

Amazon is always the big winner……..

 

you mean to tell me you don’t have a belt at home ? I’ve worn one everyday for at least 20 yrs

[throttleplate]

1 hour ago, TnRiver46 said:

Amazon is always the big winner……..

 

you mean to tell me you don’t have a belt at home ? I’ve worn one everyday for at least 20 yrs

 

Not a real leather belt, only the fake pleather belts. I was at a  2nd hand thrift store today and looked at an old weight lifters belt that was marked at $10.00 and thought about buying it as the inside leather was medium smooth.

 

[throttleplate]

Went and found an old leather belt hanging in dads closet so i stroped my rapala knife today. Now i must notify @TnRiver46that i didnt purchase an amazon strop.

[TnRiver46]

HAhahha, my wife throws away at least one of my leather belts every year, they get abused at work 

[txchaser]

 

 

The close ups on this are pretty good so you can visualize. 

 

Also, japanese knife sharpening is a little like JDM tackle. Don't even go look. This whole space has its own monkey and it's a vicious little thing.

 

Did you know that Spyderco has 39 different steels in their beta program (Mule) that you can buy and test, but only in limited relases? 

[TnRiver46]

My wife has a Japanese knife set and they are scary. The whole “dull knife is more dangerous” thing is not true, sharp knives cut things very well 😂 

[cyclops2]

Why I and my Perch fillet person wear S S metal woven cloves.