Talk:Honing steel

Ceramic rods

I would like to see a comparison to the ceramic-rod steels that are sometimes uses for the same purposes. 75.84.191.42 19:53, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

Reviving this topic... the lead now defines a honing steel as "a rod of steel or ceramic..." How do ceramic rods fit in this article? Can they properly be called "steels?" Other abrasives, such as various diamond-surfaced shapes, also come up in this context. If honing works by plastic deformation or fatiguing off over-thin particles of the edge, what place do abrasives have here? Is there a certain grit size where it is more appropriate to call it "lapping" or "honing" instead of "grinding" or "sharpening?" __ Just plain Bill (talk) 18:36, 24 March 2011 (UTC)

"Sharpening"

Every mention of steels I see tries to make a distinction between "sharpening" and steeling. As far as I can tell, it is a question of semantics. If you think sharpening just means "making the edge cut better", then clearly a steel sharpens. If you think sharpening means "removing material from the blade so the surfaces come to a point rather than a radius", then a regular steel can't do much, although a diamond steel probably could. Given that this is a semantic argument, I don't see why the page makes such a big deal about it. The distinction should be made clear as it is important in describing what a steel does, but saying that a steel doesn't "actually sharpen" seems meaningless to me. Comments? —Ben FrantzDale (talk) 04:34, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

Over time, a sharp knife's edge develops a ragged, flexible filament which starts to curl over on itself. It can be very difficult to use a blade whose edge has deteriorated in this way to chop through an object, even if it isn't necessarily ribbon-shaped. A hone is used to align the thin plane of flexible steel that makes up the edge of the knife in the same direction - one pulls a knife by the flat and drags the sharp edge over the surface backwards. This breaks off only the longest ribbon-like parts of the edge, and pulls the rest into a reasonable straight orientation suitable for cutting. Honing happens on a very fine abrasive surface. You can hone a knife all day long with a miniscule amount of wear. Sharpening, on the other hand, involves removing material from the surface of the knife - from an entire plane a few degrees off from the horizontal. Sharpening can take away the entire strip of ribbon-like material and leave a dull edge (and then a sharp edge, with a finer stone), at the expense of removing a hell of a lot of metal. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.66.9.211 (talk) 02:29, 25 July 2009 (UTC)

Thanks 211 for your comments – that is also my understanding, and, further, one often hones daily but sharpens only annually. I’ve added as much to the page.

—Nils von Barth (nbarth) (talk) 04:28, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

Description

The description of how to perform steeling is vague; "place the near edge on the steel and and slide the blade diagonally", etc - is the blade "slicing" INTO the steel (like using a normal sharpening stone), or is it being dragged away from the cutting edge, like stropping? I've read that part ten times and I cannot tell from the information that is provided here. It ought to be a lot clearer. I'd sure it's very important which way the blade is held.

64.222.115.4 (talk) 06:29, 13 March 2019 (UTC)

My understanding is that both directions can be used depending on the effect you're trying to achieve and the materials. Stroping is often done with leather, slid away from the blade so it doesn't cut in, and results in a (near-microscopic) straightening of the cutting edge rather than removing material. A stroping effect can be done on a honing steel which removes nearly no metal and can be done frequently (as often as after a single cut if desired), sliding away from the sharp edge and not cutting into the honing steel. In contrast, honing a blade is a process of removing a small amount of material from a mostly-sharp blade to make (near-microscopic) grooves and peaks along the cutting edge, often with a cross-hatch pattern and micro-serrations. This direction would feel like cutting into the honing steel, but the angle should prevent it from actually digging in, and everything I've read describes how critical the angle can be, and the angle is different for various styles of knives, and especially different for single-bevel knives versus double-bevel knives. Different honing steels cause differing effects; those made with softer metals are better for stroping an already-sharp blade that needs to straighten the cutting edge, where honing steels encrusted with diamond or made from ceramic are harder than the metal blade and can create more grooves and micro-serrations on the cutting edge. Thus a honing steel allows both options, slide into the cutting edge to remove metal and reshape the cutting edge, slide away from the cutting edge to re-align the cutting edge. I agree with you, that's my own limited understanding that could be wrong, it is confusing and would be good for more reference materials in the article to clear it up. Bwagstaff (talk) 21:50, 12 October 2020 (UTC)

I agree, the term "near edge" is not defined in this article nor in any other blade-related article I can find on Wikipedia, suggesting that this needs clarification or revision. Lumberjane Lilly (talk) 19:11, 25 August 2021 (UTC)