Hi swiss army knights!
I just wanted to share something that might be known from all of you but that I just discovered today!
I like my blades sharp. I have several, all different steels (Buck 420HC, Case Truesharp, Opinel Stainless, Japanese blue steel and Victorinox), and I’m working on it on a 1000/6000 japanese whetstone. With time collecting knives, I have become obsessed with sharpness. And my “sharp enough” threshold evolved from “able to grab nail” to “able to cut paper” to “able to slice tomato effortless” to finally “able to shave my very thin arm hair”.
SAKs always have been one of my favorite EDC knife but I always have been disappointed with Victorinox steel. It is good, it get sharp easily and hold edge pretty good but I was never able to shave arm hair with. I have tried many things, from sharpening angle to sharpening methods (frontward, backward, different pressures etc...) but no. Never I could pop out those pesty arm hairs
I had heard about stropping before but I never wanted to invest a penny in a stropping kit of any sort. After all, shaving sharpness was just an obsession and not a need of any sort.
Then today came the day to touch up the blade of my SAK a little. It was at that very moment on belt clip. And on the moment to remove it from the clip I saw my belt and came what never came to my mind before: That's a fine piece of leather that could perhaps make a perfect leather stropping kit
Then I went to the usual. 1000 stone, then 6000 for the shiny polished look. And then I jammed the buckle of my belt with my knee on the bench and firmly caught the other part with my left hand to keep tension. And I started to rub my edge on the back of that belt in this awkward position. I was feeling ridiculous but full of hope.
Then came the final test... And I now have a bare patch on my both arms (I liked it so much I had to shave the other too
)
So yes, we basically all have a stropping kit bound to our pants
And I'm glad I have now a SAK as sharp as any of my other knives