Field Sharpening Outdoor Tools

Hey guys, Joe here. Thanks for tuning in. It's fall. It's a great time to be in the woods. I've been getting out more and more lately. I've been getting out the whole summer, but this fall is supposed to be a good one for trips for me. But with that I've been using my tools a lot. So I figured it's a good time to do a video about field sharpening for your tools. What I use to sharpen my tools in the woods is a Fallkniven DC4. I've had this same one for probably five years. It's going strong. So I keep it this small little pouch that buddy Kyle made for me I've got my sharpening stone here my strop, here my strop is just a piece of leather with polishing compound on it so as far as tools to cover all the bases I've got a convex style bushcraft knife this is a Turley Gasconade made by my buddy, it's Turley next up is a Mora bushcraft black Scandinavian grind so those are two the two popular outdoor bushcraft grinds already covered and then you've got a convex axe this is a Gransfors Bruks outdoor axe which see I can show you someone who will remain nameless dinged it up a little bit on this last trip we won't name names see right here on the toe it's gone but that's no big deal I was also using this axe to strike a fire steel about five minutes ago to to start the fire that's in front of me if you haven't seen that video there's the there's the link right there go check it out but yeah this is about sharpening so she's a little bit rusty that's no big deal either I think we'll start with the Turley Gasconade convex knife edge so my DC4 comes in two pieces it normally didn't normally they were originally they're stuck together glued together but this is a common problem with them no big deal they come off so you got your diamond side and you've got your ceramic side i'm just going to use a ceramic side because the diamond side is a little bit more for um main focus a little bit more for uh rough stuff like nicks and stuff like that so twirly gas grenades up first i take the stone i have my my fingers on the very ends if you can put them below the stone it helps just so that you don't get cut basically all i'm doing is i'm taking it i'm finding the right angle which you can by feel and hear and it takes a little while don't get me wrong it's not something that's going to come to you right away and i'm just going like that and i'm lifting as i get to the as i get to the tip you can make slicing motions as long as you're lifting when you get to the tip all right so lifting my the handle up the bottom of the handle up and it's lifting it's pulling the the nose down the tip down and the rest of the blade up and i'm just trying to touch the edge here i'm not trying to reprofile it i'm not trying to do nothing fancy i'm just touching the edge and you can hear it you can hear the sound so it feels sharp but we always want to do a couple passes on the strop the reason being the the DC4 will leave a rougher edge so when i'm when i'm on the DC4 i'm cutting towards it cutting towards it like i'm like almost like i'm trying to shave pieces of the stone off and then when i'm when i'm stropping i'm going the opposite way i'm bringing it back away from it and i'm doing the same thing i'm lifting at the end you can do it on a piece of wood but your leg works fine i haven't touched up this blade in a long time so let's see how she goes i don't got any hair on my arms anyway but let's do my leg the tip's sharp middle sharp and the bottom sharp i have bald patch on my leg now so away goes the trolley gaskinade the convex and we'll do the we'll do the axe right now too the axe is different though the axe you do i do circular motions so i keep the axe on my leg especially if it's a smaller axe like this if it's bigger it might be a little bit harder i'm just finding the edge following the edge i don't want to go too far this way because i'm going to flatten it out i don't want to go too far this way because it's not going to do anything i'm finding the edge again keeping your fingers away from it of the edge of the axe and off the off the stone on the underside of the stone doing circular marks again you can kind of hear it flip her around and i'm not counting i'm not timing i'm not doing any of that stuff just feel it when it's done and after you do this if it's a factory edge and you chip out a little bit or you get a little nicks and stuff after you do this your edge is going to be so much stronger it's almost sometimes i know on those fallen knives you almost need to break it and almost need to to chip it out a little bit or roll the edge just so you can so you can put a stronger edge on it but not always the case that side's done go back to this side and just smooth it out for a less amount of time then go back to this side and smooth it out and you're probably done again i'm going to strop and it's easier to do this with a smaller axe but the principle is the same for a bigger axe so i've noticed that it's tearing up that a little bit so it means it's got a burr on this side just work the burr down a little bit the burr is just the metal folding over because you went too hard on the one side or too for too long all right let's see if this thing shaves there you go super sharp now that's sharper than when i got it okay for the scandi scandi is easy because they have a bevel you have to you can follow so that's it right there you just follow the bevel at least that's what you're taught right what i like to do is follow the bevel just find the bevel and just lift it up a hair And that's what you're creating a micro bevel and a lot of purists don't like that, but I don't care I like a micro bevel on my Scandi knives It gives them a little bit more strength makes them sharp and if you do it enough over time It'll kind of convex it not really but more so and scouts off. So you're doing the same thing Basically, you're following you're just sharpening all the whole length of the blade You can do a slice and lift it up at the end if you want but again there's the bevel just tilt a little tiny bit more i'm just making sure i get the whole length of the blade here don't be scared you know i mean you're not going to mess something up so bad it can't be repaired don't take a brand new knife out and do this with it make sure you use it a bunch first but okay that's probably done oh she feels stupid sharp so then we will hit it on the strop again just a couple swipes away again away always away on the strop away from the the blade don't try to cut it be careful working on your leg oh my it wiped the hair off i'm gonna have zero hair on my legs so that's it guys that's my field sharpening video super simple super straightforward it took me a long time to learn how to sharpen knives and axes because i was scared of ruining the edge ruining the edge um just don't be scared you know what i mean just do what you got to do sharpen your axe sharpen your knife that way it'll work out for you. So the Fallkniven DC4 is the tool I was using. Again, this is what you would expect to get when you get it. Just this inside this. The strop does not come with it. The case does not come with it, but you can make your own very easily. The strop is just a piece of leather with a sharpening, sorry, polishing compound on it. And this is just an old pair of BDU pants sewn up into a little case so very handy it always stays with me inside of my possibles pouch in my backpack you've got stuff like a flashlight all things like that in there so toilet paper stuff you don't want to be caught without I hope this was informative I hope you guys enjoyed the video I hope you learned something let me know in the comments how you guys sharpen your stuff if you do I had a lot of comments on how I sharpen mine so this is the answer thank you very much for watching I'll see you soon on the next one goodbye