>>466861Don't pay too much attention to Zed, Opie. He's just spouting what somebody who may or may not know anything told him. It is entirely possible that Zed has never had a thought that wasn't induced by another person.
>>466136To answer your original question, I prefer to use Arkansas stones. Soft Arkansas as a coarse stone, hard or black hard Arkansas as a finishing stone, depending on what I'll be using the knife for. Sometimes I use a strop. Instructions for construction and use of a strop can be found here:
>http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php/640503-Make-a-leather-stropI like Arkansas stones because I'm old-fashioned. Diamond stones may be better, especially for rough work, because Arkansas stones start about 800 grit and sometimes you need to cut some metal off a blade in a reasonable amount of time. What you use isn't as important as what you use having a wide contact area with the blade to limit plastic deformation of the steel as you hone the angles. Think 1/2" wide or better. Round is bad.
There are a jillion reasons a knife sharpened by hand is better than a knife sharpened with a kit or a clamp. Those sharpening kits that clamp to the back of your knife change the angle of the edge constantly from quillon to tip. A good hand job is better, but clamps will do.
>>466960Pic related, or go over to
bladeforums.com and look around a bit in the maintenance and tinkering section. Read the stickies there.
>>466875>Could get decent edge with any piece of metal, say keys in your pocketKeys are made of brass or similar soft metal. Unless your knife is shot to shit before you start, it'll dig into the back of your keys and try to cut them. You aren't suggesting trying to sharpen the blade by pulling it backwards across something, are you? That works pretty well as a steel to clear off little bits around the edge if you have some burr, but not so great when your blade needs real work.
