Sharpenig technique back then

[Shuya]

Hi folks,

whenever I see old  and well used knives that the generation of my father or grandfather had carried, the blade is sharpened in a different way than what I see now.
These old blades often have sort of a thinned grind, like they were ground to zero with a convex edge.

My blades and what I see a lot is that knives with a defined sharpening bevel and the factroy grind (flat or holow or whatever). Thats what I learned, hold an angle and keep it as much as possible when touching the stone?

So my question is:
Did the blades had a different factory grind back then?
Or, what I rather assume, where they sharpened differently from what I do and learned? According to readings the knives where sharpened only when complete dull and were maintained and kept sharp by stropping them a lot. Is this the way to achieve this bladeshape?

I am asking because those old knifes cut like crazy and especially when whittling you really notive the difference between an old, thinned blade and a new factory edge or a blade that is sharpened to maintain this factory edge.

I dont want to force this shape, but would like to start sharpening my knifes so they develop this type of edge over time for better performance.

Regards
Michael

[Tasky]

Well... here's a theory:

I am a bit of a woodworker. We use various bladed tools, most notably planes and chisels.
Ideally you sharpen to task, but the first thing you learn is to sharpen your chisels and plane blades to an angle of 30º. This is for most general use.
The way you do it is to place your bevel side down on the stone and move it back and forth. This gives a mostly flat grind, but the change in angle at either end of the stroke and the way human arms move results in a slightly convex bevel. Similarly when you strop a chisel or plane blade, you drag it along the leather and there's a slight pivot or rocking which further develops the convex aspect.
It's a quick, effective method that takes moments and gets you back to work fast. It's only modern methods that mess around for hours with secondary, tertiary and micro bevels on their "scary sharp" tool edges.

I imagine most people like your dad/grandad (and many of that generation were into woodworking, either as a career or DIY, etc) would similarly hand-sharpen their other stuff, resulting in pocket knives with convex bevels.