Lost my Sharpening Mojo

It's been too long since I've really beaten a knife to submission I guess. It was bound to happen and now it has...

I've lost the ability to take a knife from dull to hair-popping sharp.

It's a dark day for me.

I have a knife that I simply cannot get sharp. I worked backward from a strop loaded with green compound all the way to 220-grit paper on a Hoodoo Hone and back and it still just isn't sharp.

The knife feels sharp but it neither slices paper nor shaves hair nor curls up fuzz sticks.

I've done enough sharpening of knives, axes, machetes, and other tools to know that I can get a hair-whittling edge on most anything with enough effort but this knife has me stumped.

Maybe I haven't spent enough time with the coarser grits to really establish the convex. Maybe the Rockwell on this blade is extremely high and my SiC paper just won't cut it (no pun intended.) Maybe I've really gotten too rusty to do a good convex.

I'm about ready to pull out the old belt sander and work the edge that way.

Off to "work" I go...

Thanks for reading,


B