The Proper Way To Sharpen a Serrated Edge KnifeLook on almost any knife blog and you are going to find an article on how to sharpen knives. They are so common that some may feel that they are there simply because they are expected to be. That is not the case. The reason that there are so many articles written about how to sharpen a knife is that it may be the single most important skill that a knife owner needs to possess.Why Sharpness is VitalA dull knife is more dangerous than a sharp one. A Knife with a keen edge allows you to work efficiently with a minimum of force and maximum control. A dull knife forces you to use more muscle and greatly raises the risk of a blade slipping and ending up somewhere that it shouldn't be.If you have ever pulled on a stuck door and had it suddenly come free you can understand this principle. The more force you have to apply the less control you have.The big difference is that, when a door comes free, more than likely, nothing more than your pride is going to get hurt. When a knife blade slips it often involves blood flowing and occasionally trips to the Emergency Room.That is why knowing how to sharpen a knife is so vital to its safe use.Serrated Blades are Not Plain EdgedThe one fault that can be found with, most of these, knife sharpening articles, is that they rarely address sharpening knives with serrated blades and the ones that do; get it wrong. They, on the whole, want to treat a serrated blade much the same as a plain edged blade. They are not the same thing.You can sharpen a serrated knife the same way you do a flat edged knife, but in essence what you are doing is flattening the teeth and slowly but surely turning the knife into a plain edged knife. Serrated knives are built with a totally different geometry, cut in an entirely different way and require their own sharpening techniques.How to Sharpen a Serrated Blade ProperlyThe First and foremost thing to remember when your serrated knife is starting to lose its edge is to never come near it with flat sharpening stones. As mentioned above, while you can put a type of edge on a serrated knife this way you are actually damaging the very thing that makes your serrated blade a serrated blade.To correctly sharpen a serrated knife, depending on the type of serrations, you will need a round sharpening stone and a triangular sharpening stone.Be forewarned that it takes patients and attention to detail to correctly sharpen, a serrated knife. Unlike a plain edged blade, where you want to sharpen the entire length of the blade at once, when sharpening a serrated blade you work on one serration at a time.Bread Knives and Carving KnivesIf you are sharpening a knife with loose gullets or serrations like you find on a bread knife or serrated carving knife the process is simple. Using a round stone work the curve of each serration or gullet as if it is a separate miniature blade.Work your round stone at a slight angle to the blade around the curve of the gullet. For the sake of safety, start with your hand close to the blade and draw your fingers down and away from the blade.Your goal is to raise a burr same as on a plain edged blade, but again, you have to work each gullet separately. This is very time consuming and is best done in short sessions so that you do not lose concentration.SpyderEdge KnivesThe process for blades that have a patterned series of serrations like those originated by Spyderco and copied by most of the major knife companies is much the same as it is for the simpler and more traditional serration patterns. The exception being that along with the major gullets you also have the smaller V shaped serrations to contend with. To sharpen these smaller serrations, you will now need your Tri-angular files.Carefully draw the stone across each side of these narrow V's, again moving your fingers away from the blade not towards it. Gently stroke each side of the serration until you have raised your burr.All BladesOnce you have accomplished the above, the finishing of all blades is the same as for a plain edged knife. Simply polish the burr away with a strop. What you will be left with is a serrated blade that will shave as fine as any plain edged knife you may own.
