Sharpening Technique

[joebuck]

We have kicked this around a good bit but i would like to discuss " edge angle" and it's dynamics as it relates to durablility,sharpness and function.

Heres my beliefs...For the most part we are talking whitetails with what 18" to 24" of water based fibrous tissue, cartilage and possibly bone we have to shoot through broadside or slight angle.. The broadhead as a tool only has to cut that lenght, period then it's in the dirt.IMO ,it only has to be durable for 18". I like a Low angle edge from a proper tempered steel. I have never experienced any rollover after my blades passed through the animal. Now these are Double Bevel heads i'm talking about. Then when i started using Single Bevel, i assumed, "well certainly i will see rollover now since a single bevel has HALF the bevel support of a double bevel".....Didn't happen.. still now rollover....Reason being..i only assume the quality tempered metal edge is still harder and SHARPER not to be dull by an occasional rib bone. Again Metal properties in a BH are of huge importance

I shot Snuffers and WW forever. LOVE'em...Also i love the Truangle system with leather strop....BUT.....i added a tweak to this system. I took my Truangle block and lowered the angles of the wood base with my tablesaw and reattached the files to produce lowered angled edge 20-24... ...........SHAZAMMMMM!!   made huge difference in penetration for me especially on hogs. As i type this ,i'm looking at a full body mount of "Rooty" a 340# boar i shot coast to coast through the shield with a 160 snuffer ground level..shot was 20 feet but that Head will cut... and it was Razor Sharp ( not Scary) nor serrated sharp ( stropped polished it) due to the fact i lowered it's shoulder edges.

Given the right temper, quality of metal, one can go LOWER on bevel edges and still have an extremely durable edge especially on a 440 Stainless head.  

It's extremely hard or impossible to flip a burr to get it Razor Scary sharp on a 34 degree bevel from a lower quality metal head because of the crumble effect. For this reason i took my 3 blade heads from a 45 degree flat to a 24- 20

[b.glass]

I haven't read all the posts but just want to say...What are we wanting to cut? Not so much hair or muscle, but vital organs that are soft and mushy and can move out of the way of a less sharp broadhead. I feel like that means a shaving sharp head is best.

[Bullfrog]

Joey, I still have the article you wrote about sharpening in "longbows and recurves". MAN, that is a blast from the past huh.   BILL

[joebuck]

BUllfrog!!!!!!!!   that was 15 years ago!.........time flys.......

[Bullfrog]

Whew, man you ain't kidding. I have probably spent a grand since then just on sharpening stuff!!    BILL

[JimB]

I'm no expert on this as I used broadheads for 40 plus years that were sharpened with a file or drag sharpener.They killed and I knew all the rationale for using that type of edge.The real reason I used them was,I didn't know how to get a polished,true razor sharp edge.That's a fact.

After all these years,and with the help of KME and a little diligence on my part,I have been using honed,polished edge,razor sharp broadheads-2 seasons now.

I have only taken two antelope with them so don't maybe have enough data to call this a "study".But the difference has been dramatic,so far.

For those who haven't hunted antelope,they run at twice the speed of deer,are very high strung and with the best hits,can easily cover 75-100 yds or more and usually do.

Last year's antelope went down in 40 yds.I had never had that happen before.that means he was on his feet for an estimated 1.5 seconds before being completely incapacitated.

This year's antelope was quartering away and though it looked good,the arrow went under the lungs and only hit liver.The antelope moved off 35 yds,laid it's head down and never raised it back up.She went to sleep.She reacted as if she didn't know she was hit.The group of antelope with her were on high alert before the shot and they didn't even get spooked from her reaction.

Again,I had never seen an antelope react like this.They usually run much farther after a clean miss.I had never seen any animal expire so quickly from a liver hit.Blood clotting is a very important factor as we don't always make perfect double lung hits.

Go back and read Batman's last post.I think he hit a very important point.When i cut myself on a wire edged shop knife,sharpened on a drag sharpener,it hurts like crazy but I can cut myself on a scalpel and don't realise it till I see blood.

The game we hunt are by nature,nervous and high strung.I believe that a finely honed razor edge combined with a pass through,may reduce the length of a blood trail by half or more.

In the case of these two antelope,distance traveled was way less than half what I normally see.I only ever liver shot one other antelope.It was with a file sharpened broadhead,also a quartering away hit.It traveled 250 yds and it took 30-45 minutes to expire,vs 35 yds on the most recent.

Still need to use these a lot more but I'm sure I won't go back.I did a post recently on exactly how I shapened these heads called "Sharpening Grizzlies and Other Stuff" It works on double bevels as well.I was sharpening challenge as well but not anymore.

[Sharpster]

Thanks Jim,

I was hoping you would share your experience with us. Here's another set of photos I recieved from a guy who shot this buck in Iowa last week. The broadhead is a honed and stropped Grizzly 190 (and I know how sharp it was because I sharpened it for him). The shot took out the top of both lungs but didn't hit the spine or the artery below it. The broadhead didn't penetrate the off side so there is no exit wound and all this blood came from the entrance wound which as you can see was still "plugged" with the arrow. The deer only went 15 yrds.







Ron

[Zradix]

JeeEEeezz

Put some red on the ground

[Bullfrog 1]

Sharp, they were lucky enough to get that main artery. If not that deer would never have been found. I know it happened to me before.   BILL

[Sharpster]

Bill As I posted on the other thread, I don't believe the main artery under the spine could have been hit in this case because the deer took 15 minutes to expire. In my experience (and I've hit that artery a few times over the years) whenever that artery is severed the animal never lives more than a few seconds. That spinal artery is probably the most leathal hit that can be made but it's also far too small a target to intentionally aim for. The other reason I don't think the artery was hit is that whenever the artery is cut, the majority of the bleeding is  internal whereas this deer was obviously pumping it out through the entrance wound. Also, note the bright red frothy blood on the body. That looks an aweful lot like lung blood to me? A wierd one for sure, but we all know wierd things happen from time to time.

Ron

[joebuck]