There really isn’t any reason to buy both a #2K and #3K stone. The jump in grit is too small to make any major difference. You should be perfectly fine going from 800 to #3k. It could also be worth trying to stop at 3k and finish on leather.
Stainless rarely benefit from high polished edges as they have a tendency to loose bite. And for most kitchen knives. An edge with good bite is king.
Thanks for your advice.
I already own far too many whetstoness as it is.
When I get into something I usually go all in.
I already own the Zwilling leather strop block and use it quite often. It has held up really well.
Your welcome.
I have the same habit of going all in on buying cool stuff.
But look at it this way. The amount of money you save on the #2k stone will be pretty close to the price of a descent carbon core stainless clad knife. The best of both worlds😉
Leather is great for maintaining an edge, but also for removing burs between different stones or after sharpening. What’s important is that the leather is mounted on a block. If the leather is just a belt like you probably use for your razor’s. It will bend down when you strop the knife. And sooner or later your edge will become convex.
And that’s precisely why I bought the Zwilling Leather Strop Block. It can very precisely remove a burr or what’s left of the burr.
You say this like it’s a bad thing. The sharpest knife edges I’ve ever handled and seen have all been hand-rolled convex ones. Sharp as in the first sign is your own blood. More than once this happened to me when I CAREFULLY handled blades from Bob Kramer’s case.
The only issue with properly-executed convex edges is that they take a level of skill to put on and maintain that is beyond the skills required for the best constant-angle stoned edges. IME, you either have the touch for this, or you don’t (I don’t). And after years of use, the primary bevels need to get the full-face treatment. But so do all knives…
Let me volunteer a shocking sacrilege: A worn EIGHTY grit zirconium belt produces a quite fine edge on every steel I’ve ever put on a platen. I have no idea what the effective overall grit size is, but it’s a lot closer to 600 than it is to 6000.
That makes great sense. My 500 grit stone makes for a terrific edge for working in the kitchen. Plus it doesn’t take a lot of work! I often use the 1000 as well and wonder why I took the extra time.
I’m not saying convex edges are bad per definition.
Well executed they can work great. If they are made to be convex. A flat grind edge that become convex by accident/fault isn’t optimal in my opinion.
The best grind for my taste is a hollow grind with a small microbevel and some hight allowing a bit of weight and a nice tapper on the spine.
Yeah. Some people prefer convex and some prefer concave/hallow grind. The inexpensive Kiwi knives have pronounced hallow grind, while Global knives are famous for having convex.
Are Global knives still popular/famous? I used to remember people often talk about Shun and Global knives often at the same breath as the two better known Japanese brands in US, but I don’t hear about Global knives as much now. Maybe I just don’t pay attention.
Global knives were the first exotic knife brand I heard of back in the 90’s.
My big brother had 3 Global knives and back then they were ‘the sh*t’
I still own 5-6 Global knives, but rarely use them EXCEPT my most used favourite knife in my entire knife collection - the Global Tournier vegetable knife, the version of it with the extra fat thick handle.
I love that little knife to death. It’s by far my favourite knife in my 45-50 kitchen knife collection.
I mostly practice and sustain my whetstone sharpening skills on my other Global knives these days.
Globals were the All-Clads of the industrial knife world. Thin, light, iconic, immediately recognizable, SS, they became popular and a display that their owners were cognoscenti.
They’re not bad knives, but even by 1990s aspirational standards, they weren’t all that…
Hard to sharpen that tournee knife on a stone, I reckon.
A big advantage of a convex edge–done intentionally or not-- is edge SUPPORT. They chip far less and rarely roll. They deburr effortlessly.
I’ve always scratched my head why makers haven’t utilized convex geometries for knives with (too) hard laminated cores. It would be an ideal combination, IMO. I think the answer lies in the fact that flat machine platens ( and hollow-grind wheels) can be automated and take little skill, whereas grinding on a slack belt is difficult to get right and hand-rolling off a stone is the rarest of talents.
Hollow grinds are popular the world around because they allow more thinness BEHIND the edge (the edge itself being put on flat). This results in a lack of support, but it also means the blade can go longer–more use and more sharpenings–before it needs to be thinned.
I agree in every point you just made.
But for me the sturdyness of a convex edge is less important then how it cuts.
Points for hand sharpening globals on stones. I can’t think of many steels that are worse to sharpen on stones then the chromova 18 steel they use. 
Yeah. The design is definitely very recognizable from other brands. Maybe Global is still very popular. I don’t know. I just don’t seem to hear about them very often. (But ChatGPT told me that Global is still the second best known Japanese brand in USA.)
For me next to impossible to sharpen on a whetstone.
I’ve tried it once, but gave up.
I now only use my Ioxio ceramic honing rods and my Dickoron steels to keep it sharp.
It doesn’t have to be razor sharp, just sharp enough to rinse, peel and cut small round veggies like shallots, Brussels sprouts, mushrooms, berries, broccoli, garlic, ginger, chillies, olives etc.
I love that Global Tournier knife. So much so that I bought a backup of it.
It is interesting to read the digression on Global knives. They are nice enough but always felt kind of strange in my hand. That is saying a lot as I am pretty much A OK with most any other type of handle from Fibrox to a wooden Wa to a Wusthof classic. I am sure I could quickly acclimate, but as I am all knifed up, there is no need.
Yeah. I don’t like them either. Don’t find them comfortable or really aesthetically appealing. I have friends who LOVE them.
Since you favor hollow-grinds and like ultrafine-grit polished edges, I should send you my box of microtome blades (about 30 of them) I was given by my BIL, a histologist, when he retired. I also got the handles and the big’ol Lipschitz 2-sided strop to keep them honed.
Want them?
