Important Articles/Research by Cliff Stamp (and a few others )

Cliff has been a great influence on my knife making career, and these are the articles/experiments & write ups that Cliff did which I compiled over the years. Hope you guys enjoy re-reading through them sometime (this is just a condensed list and by no means exhaustive), I need to myself. Obviously these will only be up as long as the old forum is, so would be good to find a way to archive.

Couldn't figure out how to get actual bullet points to work so I guess this will work:

• Micro-Bevel influence on edge retention slicing hemp - compares vg10 to s30v and shows that edge retention increases as edge angle decreases
• Coarse edge finishes seem to have have longer edge retention in cutting soft material
• Polished edge finishes have longer edge retention in chopping or cutting wood
• How to optimize your primary grind/edge angle
• Repeated steeling may lower edge retention - “edge was maintained using a steel and a loaded strop” also under the ‘sharpening’ section
• Coarse Edges vs Polished Edges - force required
• Stropping can round the edge (also info on coarse vs polished)
• Edge Stability
• Grindability is an important factor to consider when choosing a steel

And here are a few other random articles that may be desirable to read (they were to me!)

• Stropping Effects - Wicked Edge Forum (Cliff participated in comments somewhat)
• Damage can extend below the apex here (Science of Sharp Blog by Todd Simpson) and here (Wicked Edge Forum) i.e. an argument for de-stressing an edge
• Dry, powered sharpening may damage the apex
• For the maker - Grain direction in steel matters
• Toughness graph comparison and here (scroll down)
• Edge retention tested on 48 steels
• “sharpening in terms of grit finish and edge angle have a greater effect on performance than steel choice”
• “with higher toughness, the knives are better able to handle thin, low angle edges without chipping. And they can be heat treated to higher hardness to help prevent edge rolling and deformation, while still maintaining good toughness. This means that, indirectly, higher toughness can lead to better cutting performance because of the possibility of thinner edges.”

Josh,
Great stuff! Cliff was also a huge influence on me, as he was a lot of people, and I go over his work every now and then because although I still am not on Cliff's level of understanding, my understanding has improved, so I understand his work the more work I do myself.

Thanks for this. the bullets are appearing ok to me now.. i just resaved the settings and it seems to have applied them now

Yep bullets are working well now!

This is one of my favorite works, because this led to a few other important discoveries by Cliff:
[www.cliffstamp.com]

Yeah Jason that’s a good thread. Tons of information and work done there, no doubt.

Cliff's help with grinding on a Harbor Freight 1x30 sander:
[www.cliffstamp.com]

I have been thinking of this for the last few weeks. Not only did Cliff leave the work he did, but he provided sources and a model of how to behave when interacting with people in ways to further knowledge in knives and sharpening. He had a way of answering questions and talking to you that you felt engaged. I am also better for meeting Cliff online and following his work, I was able to meet all of you here.

I remember someone getting mad our recommendations of the 1x30" belt sander in that or a similar thread. They didn't realize it would require some effort and skill to use it properly and were a bit upset after they scuffed some of their knives up.

Older Spice,
Actually it was a discussion between Cliff and Chum about how to learn to do something. Cliff was saying to use your good knives to practice on since you will learn faster and set good habits.

Might of been on the old Knife Test forums where someone got upset at us. I don't think it was Chum.

So true, he had a way of asking questions to get you to really think about your conclusions. And when he explained something, he had fabulous analogies

Josh,
Exactly!

Older Spice,
Probably, I re-read the thread today and that is the only thing I saw that was close.

Hey everyone. It’s great we still have a place to go to talk about such things, even though I’ve moved on to more dangerous things. Are Cliffs reviews still available on the old site? The two best/most influential for me were the ones on Alvins Paring knife and Cliffs mild steel tension bar knife.

Quote
me2
Are Cliffs reviews still available on the old site? The two best/most influential for me were the ones on Alvins Paring knife and Cliffs mild steel tension bar knife.

[www.cliffstamp.com]


That link is to the main page on Cliff’s site, everything I’ve checked is still up and viewable.

For me I think one of his best innovations was the way he started to look at how PSI changes the way various sharpening equipment works. It was a really remarkable insight that immediately brought great clarity to a subject matter that was always very difficult to get any useful information from, and it also allowed people to optimize the equipment they already had.

Another one I really value was his experiments with edge retention that focused on edge angle and apex finish, demonstrating that those two things could often make a far larger difference in performance than the steel type or even the heat treatment.