How to

Sharpen Your Knife

Words of Purpose and Intent

By

ERNEST EMERSON
Copyright ©2020 Ernest Emerson

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a

retrieval system, or transcribed, in any form or by any means, electronic,
mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without prior permission
of the author.
About the author:
Ernest Emerson is the founder and owner of the company, Emerson
Knives, Inc. and is considered “The Father of Tactical Knives” having
designed the most iconic and well -known combat knives in history.
He is a Black Belt Hall of Fame member and United States Martial Arts
Hall of Fame Member and is a “Tier One” hand-to-hand combat and edged
weapons instructor who has taught his combat system to many of the world’s
most deadly warriors, including the U.S. Navy SEAL Teams, U.S. Marines,
U.S. Army Special Forces and various Government agencies.
Sir Ernest Emerson is a Knight of The Noble Order of the Black
Shamrock and also holds the coveted title of Master-at-Arms. He is a noted
lecturer, author and is an expert witness for the Los Angeles District
Attorney’s Office in deadly force cases. He has appeared on many T.V.
shows, radio programs, and has acted as a technical expert on numerous
award winning movies.
His background includes playing professional baseball, boxing, Jeet Kune
Do and Gracie Jiu Jitsu. He is the founder of The Emerson Combat System
and is the owner of the Black Shamrock Combat Academy in Los Angeles,
California.
He is the husband of a beautiful wife and the father to three wonderful
children. Mr. Emerson is a Rock n’ Roll junkie and enjoys the taste of fine
Scotch whiskey. He may be contacted at Ernest@emersonknives.com.
 Dedication
For my family, my loving wife, my three wonderful children and two
beautiful grandsons. I would give my life to keep you from harm.
Your support has made all of this easy.

Disclaimer
Please note that the author is NOT RESPONSIBLE in any manner
whatsoever for any injury that may result from practicing the techniques
and/or following the instructions given within.
Contents
Introduction
Blade Styles Explained
How to Sharpen Your Knife
Sharpening a Conventional – V Grind Edge (Not an Emerson Edge)
The Diamond Stick Method
Serrations
Sharpening the Chisel Edge
Stropping
Sharpening the Curved and Recurve Blade
Stropping the Curved Blades
Sharpening an Emerson Knife Using a Fixture
Conclusion
 Introduction
I’m going to go out on a limb here and I apologize to any and all
anthropologists if I get this wrong, but I’m willing to bet that I’m pretty
right. So here goes. I submit to you that the knife is man’s third oldest tool.
I think that the first tool was a rock, something that could just be picked
up, used and discarded when through. It could be used to crush some seeds,
grub a hole in the ground, or whack some other bi-pedal hominid on the
head. I don’t know if they could throw stones but I’m sure that came along
fairly soon also.
I’m pretty sure the second tool was a stick. Again, this was something that
could just be picked up and used for all kinds of tasks such as extending your
reach, poking into a termite hole or a honey bees nest, digging up some
turnips, whacking your enemy, or scratching the itch on your back.
And then someone came along and broke a rock and cut their finger on the
edge. And thus the knife was invented. Tool number three. I would surmise
that it probably came from some form of flint, obsidian, or volcanic glass.
I also believe as do many sociologists, anthropologists, and scientists that
the knife was not just one of man’s first tools but that it was probably
mankind’s greatest tool. In fact Forbes Magazine did both a study and a
survey and concluded that the knife was number one on the list of mankind’s
greatest tools. Without the knife at the starting point, all the other great
inventions would have been virtually impossible to create. So for the last
several million years man has relied on the knife and its cousins and
offspring, the chisel, the scythe, axe, and the sword who were all relatives
derived from that original sharp rock.
And the knife still continues to be an essential tool for all of us, from the
pocket knife we carry to the surgeon’s scalpel, to the blades on the
lawnmower that cut the grass in front yards. We all still depend on the knife
every day of our lives in some variation or another.
What is the most important attribute for any and all of the members of the
knife family tree? Simply that they are sharp. The ironic thing is that those
pieces of obsidian fashioned into cutting tools millennia ago were some of
the sharpest “knives” ever created. When a piece of it is flint knapped, the
resulting edge goes down to almost a molecular thinness due to the
crystalline structure of the material.
And all knife owners have been chasing after that extreme edge and its
sharpness ever since that time, so long ago when that “caveman” first broke a
piece off of that rock.
Blade Styles Explained
 How to Sharpen Your Knife
Without a doubt “How do I sharpen my knife?” is one of the questions I
am asked more often than any other. It is also one of the most misunderstood
subjects of discussion among knife makers, hunters, fisherman and general
knife users anytime you put more than one in a room together.
There have been dozens of articles, and even entire books written about
this subject and I am sure there will be many more to come, including this
one.
First let me give you my qualifications to write about this subject. I grew
up on a farm in Northern Wisconsin, hunting, fishing, and farming, so I used
knives in just about every capacity including in some ways I probably should
not have used my knives. Yes, I used them to jump the solenoid on my 67
Camaro a number of times in my youth. I still have a 67 Camaro and I live
on a ranch with horses and other livestock so I still abuse the hell out of my
knives on a daily basis.
I am also a 30 year plus, knife maker. A knife maker who owns a pretty
successful knife company. As a result, I can say pretty confidently that I’ve
sharpened as much or more than any other person on earth. For the first three
or four years I sharpened all the knives my company produced so I know I’ve
personally sharpened in excess of 100,000 knives.
Does this mean I know everything there is to know about sharpening
knives? No. Does this mean that I am the world’s greatest knife sharpener?
No. It does mean that I’ve got a little more experience than the average Joe.
Hell, a lot more experience.
So, here we go with my take on sharpening knives.
How sharp is sharp? This is the most hotly debated topic in the knife
sharpening category. Everyone had a Grandpa whose knife was always hair-
poppin, hair splitting, sharp. A lot of knife guys strive to keep their knives
shaving sharp. I shave with a disposable Bic, not my knife.
I’m not for or against razor sharpness. But, I’ve had knives that I could
shave with and I’ve had knives that I could never get razor sharp. There were
many probable reasons, the biggest of which is, the thinner a blade is, the
easier it is to get that blade to razor sharpness. Much easier than let’s say, a
camp hatchet. I know. I know. I’ve seen the guys who could shave with their
axe. I was raised 25 miles away from the place where the World’s
Lumberjack Championships have been held for over 50 years or so. I also
worked in the woods pulping and clearing roads and I’ve hand split hundreds
of cords of firewood in my life. No one could ever shave with any of those
“razor sharp axes” after splitting just two pieces of red oak.
Think how thin a straight razor is and you’ll see my point. A thicker blade
is always harder to bring to that level of sharpness. Then of course, there is
the blade steel itself, the heat treat hardness, the temper, and the type of knife
grind used which will all greatly affect your ability to put an edge on, and
keep an edge on your knife.
To me, a knife is sharp enough when it cuts cleanly and smoothly through
whatever I need to cut. It does not have to be “razor” sharp. It’s not a razor.
When I was a hunter and fisherman in Northern Wisconsin I had a hunting
knife and a fillet knife. They were always kept pretty sharp. They were also
never used for general utility use on the farm. I would have ruined them
forever in just one day of “farm” use. If I had wanted my everyday work
knife to stay razor sharp I would have spent all my time sharpening and not
getting the cows milked.
Where I am going with this is simply to say that I believe that in the real
working man’s world there are three types of edges; the razor edge, the
working or utility edge, and the dull edge.
The razor edge is a special purpose edge which is for a special purpose,
maybe shaving? Most of the time just for bragging. I’ve heard it called the
braggers edge. It’s not going to be a razor’s edge after I strip a few wires, cut
bailing twine (sometimes wire) and scrape paint off some electrical
connectors. I’ve dulled every knife I’ve ever used and I can dull them in
pretty short order depending on what I’m doing and what I’m cutting.
I believe that the best edge is what I call the utility edge. It lasts the
longest in the working environment and is the easiest edge for the average
Joe to put back on his knife and get back to work.
So I am going to show you how to put a working edge on your knife, plain
and simple. It will be sharp, very sharp, will last the longest and give you the
most cuts for the amount of time you have to spend sharpening it.
 The first thing I have to say are two things we have all heard before. A
sharp knife is safer than a dull knife. You don’t want to have to horse your
knife through something. If you have to apply too much pressure to cut, you
might slip and this can lead to a pretty bad injury. Maybe you should have
been using a hatchet or a set of wire cutters for a job you really have to
“muscle” through.
The other truism is; never let your knife (or your life) get too dull. It’s
going to take that much more effort to bring it back to sharp. Some guys
recommend touching up your edge after every time you use your knife so it
always stays sharp. Sounds good on paper but in reality, “Who in the Hell
does that?” But if you are one of those guys – good on you. It’s just not me.
I’m not going to get into all the machines, setups, guides, tools and
contraptions out there to help you sharpen your knife. I’ve got most of them
and they’re all getting dusty in boxes somewhere under my work bench. I’ll
talk about sharpening devices a little later on.
I’m going to teach you how to use two different methods, the flat stone
and the stick. If you learn how to use these two methods you will always be
able to sharpen your knife into a useable condition even if you have nothing
but your knife with you. I’ve sharpened my knives on bricks, rocks, car
windows, steel pipe, and old tire rims when I needed to. Could I shave with
them? Not unless I was a masochist, but nonetheless they got my knife back
into use.
 Here are some of my sharpening accessories and tools

What I’m going to describe here are the bench stone method and the
diamond stick method.
Now everyone has heard about stones such as Arkansas, carborundum,
water stones, ceramic stones, etc. and they all work well. However, for the
bench stone method I’m going to describe here, I’m going to tell you to go
get a set of diamond stones (plates). They are little plates of plastic or steel
with various degrees of diamond grit imbedded or plated into them.
 Diamond Stones - My Favorites

They are not expensive and I bought a set of coarse, medium, and fine
over at Harbor Freight for $3.00 each about 5 years ago and I’m still using
them. I’ll also tell you to go to the Sports shop and get a diamond stick.
These come in all diameters, lengths and grits. I would get a coarse and fine
grade. That’s what I use. The Ultimate Edge makes the ones I use at the
shop but a smaller one about the size of a writing pen is handy to carry in
your gear or truck glove box. I keep a small one in the glove box of all my
vehicles.
Let’s start with the bench stone method. Of course you can use
conventional sharpening stones for this method, but the diamonds cut so
cleanly and quickly that I’m going to describe this method using the diamond
stones. They are very aggressive (fast) at shaping the edge and are virtually
fool proof, which is a good thing in my case. You can use any stone you
want, the method is fundamentally the same, regardless of type.
I usually hold the stone, any stone, in my bench vise so I have a safe,
sturdy setup, and I can swivel the vise if I need to.
You can sharpen dry on the stone but it will clog up pretty fast. I
recommend using some oil or water to “float” the particles of steel that you
are scraping off. If your knife is really dull, start with the coarse grit. If it’s
not too dull just use the finer grit diamond stones. You do not always have
to start with coarse grits. If you always do, pretty soon you won’t have much
of a blade left.
Here is the Emerson quick and dirty bench stone sharpening method for a
knife with a double v - edge grind. Note: This is not the edge grind that is
found on Emerson Knives. Emerson Knives do not have a double v – edge
grind, they have a chisel edge grind (sharpened on one side only). I put this in
here because most people have at least a few of these type of edged knives
and they need to be sharp too. I know I’ve got a few.
 Sharpening a Conventional – V Grind Edge
(Not an Emerson Edge)
1. Shoot some WD-40 onto the stone. (pg. 24)
2. Cutting into the stone, incline the blade slightly; about the height of two
pennies at the back of the blade (for the average knife) and push the blade
away and across the stone (pg. 24-25). Don’t be shy about the pressure, most
people use too light a touch. Use enough pressure to feel the stone cutting
against the blade edge. That’s the best way to describe it. If you’re
sharpening a knife for the first time, take a black magic marker and coat the
previous (factory) edge angle in black. When you are cleaning off the
marker, you probably are at the right, good angle. Most sharpening
aficionados recommend a 20 degree angle on each side for a good sharp,
working edge.
Sharpening Using the "conventional" Arkansas stone method:
(Cont’d from previous page)
Sharpening Using the Diamond Stone Method
(Cont’d from previous page)
 (Cont’d from previous page)

3. I try to keep the licks even on both sides to hopefully keep my finished
edge in the center of the blade, so I’ll do 5 licks on one side, then 5 on the
other alternating until I’ve removed enough steel. How do I know when I’ve
done that? I will look down at the edge to see if there are any white spots on
the edge (see diagram on next page), which are actually dull or flat spots
where the two angles have not come together in a sharp peak. This is very
small to see, so you need good light and good eyes. I’ve resorted to using
magnifying glasses that I now have laying around all over the place. You
never know when you’ll need to pull out a splinter or read an Advil bottle for
the correct dose. The thing is once you see the white spots, the flats, you’ll
be able to see them every time. You just need to know what you are looking
for. Repeat this until the entire edge is basically the same and just disappears
as you are looking down at it.
4. Repeat the process with each grit including the use of the black magic
marker. Eventually you won’t need the marker because as you sharpen
enough times, you will eventually get the hang of holding the proper position
of blade to stone.
5. When you have worked your way to the finest grit, continue sharpening
until you feel a burr on the edge of the blade as you run your fingernail or a
pencil as shown, across and off the edge of the blade. Not along the edge
mind you as this will just get you cut, but off of the edge. See illustration.
When you have the burr you are finished with the stone sharpening but are
not done yet.
 "Feeling" the burr with a pencil

6. Stropping : At this point you must burnish or strop the edge. Remember
the old barber with his leather strap, working his straight razor back and forth
along it? What he was doing was called stropping and it removes any final
burrs, polishes, and aligns that final edge. I glued a piece of leather to the thin
side of a 2”x 4” and hold it in my vise. The barbers used rouge or a polishing
compound on their stropping leathers to smooth and polish more effectively.
You can too if you have some. If you don’t have a piece of leather laying
around a leather belt can work just as well.
Flat leather and cardboard stropping plates - Note wooden bases for holding in a vise.

Strop made from an old leather belt, glued onto a 2"x2" board.
 If you use cardboard, take the cardboard and lay it down on a stable, hard
surface or glue or tape it to a 2”x 4” just like I did with the piece of leather.
With pressure, strop the blade back and forth just like the old barbers did.
Whatever method you choose, do not go fast, but slow and controlled.
Remember you have a sharp knife in your hand. Just strop the blade until the
edge gets kind of shiny and you can no longer feel any burr on the blade.
Your knife should now be sharp enough to tackle any normal chore.
 Cardboard Stropping

Stropping on the cardboard plate

Leather Stropping
Leather Stropping (cont’d)
Belt Stropping
Belt Stropping (cont’d)
 Or you just don’t strop at all and let the burr break off while you’re
actually cutting something. Perhaps you don’t have anything to strop the
edge on. In a pinch, I’ve used my blue jeans on my thigh but you need to be
pretty careful if you are stropping on your leg.
7. Cut until your knife gets dull again.
 The Diamond Stick Method
Using a diamond stick you follow the same procedures and steps as you
did with a bench stone. You are just holding the stick in your hand. Using a
stick allows you two options.
Option A – You can hold the stick and push the knife along it and away, in
the same motion as if you were sharpening a pencil. Just do 5 licks on top of
the stick and 5 licks underneath the stick so you hit the other side of the knife.
Option B – You can hold the knife and push the stick along and off the
edge of the knife. Essentially you’ve just swapped the knife and diamond
stick. In option A you were moving the knife against the stick. In option B
you are moving the stick against the knife.
 Ultimate Edge Diamond Sticks

You can always combine option A and B if sharpening one side or the
other is easier using either option. You might use method A for the front
(top) side and option B for the back side if it’s easier. There’s no rule.
Use the magic marker to mark the edge for both of these stick methods,
until you get a natural feel for the correct angle. It only takes a few
sharpening sessions.
"Blacking" the edge & Finding the right Angle to take off the "Black"
 Sharpening along the entire edge with the diamond stick

Follow the procedure to the fine grit stick and you can feel the burr just
like with a bench stone and proceed to the stropping just as before.
 "Feeling" the burr (along the entire blade) with a pencil

You probably won’t be able to shave with these sharpening procedures, but
you might if you get good at it. It’s just a matter of how impatient you are or
how much time you have on your hands. Either way this should get you a
good working man’s edge and back into the thick of the cutting action.
 Serrations
I would like to offer my thoughts on serrated blades. Most folding knives
now offer straight plain edge or partially serrated blades. I’m big, Very big
on serrations on knives. Serrations cut and cut and cut. Even when your
knife is dull, the serrations will still cut. Hell, even when the serrations are
dull they will still cut.
I recommend them for one basic reason. They cut through nylon webbing
like there’s no tomorrow. What is made of nylon webbing? Seat Belts. You
are way more likely to be in an accident or run up onto an accident than any
other emergency situation. I’ve been the first on the scene of three car
wrecks and have cut people from seat belts twice in overturned vehicles. One
was on fire. Whether it’s you, a loved one or a complete stranger, those
serrations may mean the difference between life and death. All of my knives
are serrated.
To sharpen serrations you need to purchase a small diameter (1/8 inch -
.125 in.) diamond stick. Some sporting goods stores sell them as fishhook
sharpeners, to fit inside the serration teeth. Or you could go online and
lookup diamond needle files. They taper down to a point and will work for
both the wide serrations and the little teeth in between the wide ones. They
are cheap and will probably last longer than your knife.
 Diamond Files

Using a small round file for the small serrations

 Using a
larger oval file for the big serrations

You simply file down in the groove and off the edge of the blade just like
you are filing a groove in the blade. That’s what a serration actually is. After
you’ve got it back to an edge in the groove, just burnish or strop it a few
times on the backside and you’re ready to go.
 Sharpening the Chisel Edge
There are many ways to sharpen our knives and no one way is better than
any other. Actually because our knives are sharpened on one side only,
people tend to think they are harder to sharpen. It is actually easier, since you
are only dealing with one side. It’s just different, not any more difficult.
We are always asked about different sharpening systems and fixtures.
Well, there are so many that we cannot be familiar with them all. We just
don’t know how well they work on our knives. Then again, I’ve sharpened
knives on pieces of cement, bricks, rocks, steel pipe, car windows and just
about anything at hand.
The easiest method that I usually recommend involves purchasing a round
or oval shaped diamond stick (finest grit possible). You can get them at
hardware stores, gun stores, and cutlery stores. I recommend “The Ultimate
Edge.” We sell them on emersonknives.com if you’re interested.
Hold the knife in your left hand with the point facing away from you.
With your right hand run the diamond stick out along the blade’s edge away
from you. You have to find the right angle to incline the diamond stick so
you are affecting just the edge. Depending on how dull your blade is or how
hard you press this may take 5 to 25 strokes. Don’t use a baby or feather
touch. You need to put a little pressure in your strokes so that you are
actually removing some metal. To find that “right “angle, just take a magic
marker and blacken the edge with it.
Using a diamond stick to sharpen the "main" edge on a tanto blade
 Using the diamond stick in a second operation to sharpen the front edge of a tanto blade.

Then angle your diamond stick so that you are just removing the black
marker. If you can do that, you have now achieved the proper angle. Don’t
worry after a few tries, you’ll develop the muscle memory to do it without the
markers. After a few strokes with the diamond stick, take your fingernail and
scrape towards and off the edge on the backside of the blade. Run your
fingernail towards the edge at 90 degrees to the edge, not along the edge or
you might get cut. You should feel a noticeable click as you run your
fingernail off of the edge. This is the burr that you produced by sharpening
the front side. If there isn’t any, hit the front side a few more times until you
feel the click (burr) all the way along the edge.
Now you turn the knife over, take the diamond stick, incline it just
slightly, and lightly run it along and off of the backside of the edge. If you are
doing it just right you’ll feel it “catch” on the burr. Remember you are not
trying to sharpen the backside you are just breaking the burr loose.
Sometimes you will see the burr peel off like a tiny wire. That’s what you
want. It tells you that you’ve got a wire edge along the blade. You are now
almost done sharpening but need to move on to burnishing or stropping for
the best, sharpest edge, the final edge.
Or you can use the diamond stones mounted in your vise for a more
"conventional" sharpening procedure.
Sharpening the "main" edge of a tanto blade
The separate process of the front edge on a tanto blade
 Stropping
At this point you must burnish or strop the edge. Remember the old barber
with his leather strap, working his straight razor back and forth along it?
What he was doing was called stropping and it removes any final burrs,
polishes, and aligns that final edge. In lieu of a barbers leather strop I just
glued a piece of leather to the thin side of a 2”x 4” and hold it in my vise. The
barbers used rouge or a polishing compound on their stropping leathers to
smooth and polish more effectively. You can too if you have some.
If you don’t have a piece of leather laying around a leather belt can work
just as well. If you use cardboard, take the cardboard and lay it down on a
stable, hard surface or glue or tape it to a 2”x 4” just like I did with the piece
of leather.
Stropping the primary edge of a tanto on the cardboard plate
Stropping the front edge of a tanto on the cardboard plate
Stropping the flat, backside of primary edge on cardboard plate
Stropping the flat, backside of front edge on cardboard plate
 With pressure, strop the blade back and forth just like the old barbers did.
Whatever method you choose, do not go fast, but slow and controlled.
Remember you have a sharp knife in your hand. Just strop the blade until the
edge gets kind of shiny and you can no longer feel any burr on the blade.
Your knife should now be sharp enough to tackle any normal chore.
This may sound a little complex but once you’ve done it a couple of times
it can actually be done in about 5 minutes. If you come up with any different
ways to sharpen your knife please let us know. We are always willing to
listen and learn.
NOTE: On Tanto style blades like the CQC-7, Bulldog, CQC-15 or
Roadhouse, treat each edge (the main edge and the short, front edge)
separately. Don’t run the diamond stick out and up the front edge in one
motion or you will round off the crisp transition point between the long
(main) edge, and the front, short, upswept edge. Sharpen each of these
separately.
 Sharpening the Curved and Recurve Blade
As you can see from the diagram that shows blade styles, there are two
basic curves found on knives, a simple arc, either convex (arcing up) or
concave (arcing down) and then a combination of the two arcs resulting in the
“recurve” type of blade found for example, on the Emerson Commander or
CQC-15. The single convex curve is found for example, on the Emerson
Persian or CQC-8, and the single concave curve is found on the Emerson
SARK and Karambit knives.
The convex curved knives are sharpened in the same manner as a straight
bladed knife and can be sharpened easily using either the bench stone method
or the diamond stick method which I’ve already described.
However, the concave curve cannot be sharpened on the bench stone
because, well, you can’t fit a square peg into a round hole. Believe me on
this, I’ve tried it more times than I’m willing to admit. It just doesn’t work.
It’s the same principle with a concave shaped blade and a flat, square, stone.
So I’ll show you how to sharpen those blades, the Emerson way.
The only way to sharpen the “inside curve” on blades like the Karambit or
Commander is to use something that can fit inside of the curve. What I use is
The Ultimate Edge diamond stick.
What you do with the concave curved blade or the recurve blade is
essentially the same as you do with a straight edge blade. You blacken the
edge with a magic
 "Blacking"
the edge

marker, hold the knife in your left hand and run the diamond stick down,
along, and off the edge of the blade. If you are cleaning off the magic marker
you know you’ve got the right angle.
Using a diamond stick to sharpen a curved blade
 Using a diamond stick to sharpen a recurve blade

If you have a recurve blade you run the stick around the inside curve and
then around the outside curve in one continuous motion towards the tip or
point of the blade. Once you feel the burr with your fingernail on the
backside like in the previous description, you are ready for the next step and
that’s where this changes from the previous stropping method.
 Stropping the Curved Blades
For the curved and recurve blades you can’t strop the knife against a flat
surface, once again, the square peg - round hole principle is in play. You
simply cannot hold a curved blade flat against a flat, square, surface. So here
is the solution that I came up with and have used successfully over the years.

The cardboard and leather curved strops. There is a 2"x2" screwed onto the bottom of each piece so
it can be held in a vise.

Get a piece of 2 inch to 3 inch diameter PVC pipe about 18 inches long
and tape or glue a piece of cardboard (the grey kind from the back of a
yellow legal pad) about 12 inches long to the pipe, bending it around the
outside.
Leave about 6 inches free on one because this is the end you will be holding
in your vise.
Stropping a recurve blade on the leather curved stropping tube.
….cont’d from previous page
 Or, take a piece of leather and glue it to the PVC bending around the
pipe just like the cardboard. Then you can use this handy device to strop the
curved bladed knife just like I described previously using the leather or
cardboard attached to the 2”x 4”. You can coat it with some rouge or
polishing compound if you have any and begin stropping back and forth at a
moderate speed with a little pressure and after a few swipes, your curved or
recurve blade should be good to go.
Just a few swipes and it cuts like this.
 Sharpening an Emerson Knife Using a Fixture
I frequently get emails and phone calls about using a sharpening tool,
fixture, or gadget to sharpen an Emerson knife. The first question that is
always asked is this, “What is the angle on the edge of an Emerson Knife?”
Well I’m going to be real frank with you. I don’t know. I think it is
somewhere between 25 degrees and 35 degrees. All of our knives are
sharpened by hand and I don’t pay attention to the exact angle. Now, there
are physicists, engineers, and scientists out there that will argue till they’re
blue in the face about the ultimate degree of the edge angle.
I always ask them two simple questions, “What’s the edge angle on a razor
blade? They’re pretty sharp,” and then I follow with, “What’s the edge angle
on a paper cutter? They’re pretty sharp too.” But you see, the angle is way
different on both of those two items.
So, my philosophy has always been this. Either a knife is sharp or it isn’t,
and I don’t need to be a theoretical physicist to figure that out. I’ve
sharpened knives with a rock, a piece of pipe, sand paper wrapped around a
stick, a piece of brick, and a piece of broken glass. Do you think I knew what
angle I was using?
Now be aware that as Matthew Quigley said in the movie, “Quigley Down
Under”, in the famous duel scene with six guns, he remarked, “I said I never
had much use for one. Never said I didn’t know how to use it.”
When it comes to those sharpening gadgets, “I said I never had much use
for one. Never said I didn’t know how to use it.” I do know how to use those
sharpening tools and I’ve never had any problem using one. I just never had
much use for one.
But for those of you who do use them I will offer this advice. If you are
worried about the angle to set your fixture to, just blacken the edge of the
knife with some black magic marker and set your fixture to remove the black
marker all the way to the edge. You then have the correct angle. Will it be
the same on your other Emerson Knives? I don’t know.
Different models and blade shapes are sharpened slightly different from
each other, so there would never be a standard angle for Emerson Knives in
any case. All I know is that when they leave our shop they are sharp, real
sharp, and I know that if we can do it, you can too. Just don’t over
complicate the process.
 Conclusion
The final word on sharpening a knife? Well there is no final word.
Everyone including myself has a different opinion of just what sharp is and it
is largely a subjective opinion. There are a myriad of ways to sharpen a knife
and there are dozens of gadgets and devices to help you do so. Some are
good. Some not so good.
What I wanted to do is to show you the basic skills needed to bring a knife
back to a good utility, working edge that that you can use hard for a generous
amount of time before you have to sharpen it again. This way if any of those
gadgets are not available to you, you will still be able to sharpen your knife.
Remember at the beginning I told you I’ve even used a rock to sharpen a
knife? It wasn’t pretty but it did the job. It worked simply because I knew the
basics of knife sharpening. I hope you will now know these basics too.

-Ernest Emerson
 Other Books by Ernest Emerson
1. Surviving Inside the Kill Zone
2. Chain Reaction Training
3. The Seven Strategies of Hand to Hand Combat
4. The Seven Essential Skills Needed To Survive a Deadly Attack
5. Bad Guy With A Gun
6. Warrior Book – Barbarian Combat Conditioning Manual