French Chef's knife edge: zero grind or convex?

[nine9jack9]

In building French Chef knife, what is advisable for final edge, grinding to zero, microbevel, convex. Stock is 1/8 thick O1 at 60 RC. Would like to hear arguments for various sides. Have looked at different makes to determine what to do. First one of these I'm building and am leaning towards convexing a flat ground edge to give it some strength when cutting through things like chicken bones or fish bones and yet still do a credible job on vegetables.

 

[John Wilson]

1/8 is fairly thick, but European designs tend to be thicker than Japanese blades.

I personally start with 2in wide .110 stock. I want a finished spine to be about 2mm (.078) thick at the heel for a blade length of 6in to 8in and taper to .5mm at the tip.

I flat grind the blade to an edge of .5mm prior to hand sanding and then sharpen to a convex edge.

If you plan to be able to go through chicken bones I would suggest leaving the blade's unsharpened edge thicker towards the heel. In my opinion, a bone chopper is a poor slicer. But leaving meat at the heel is a decent compromise, so long as the user knows they'll likely have less slicing performance if they use the heel when rocking or push cutting.

The dimensions I use make for a great slicer and veggie chopper but would make for a poor cleaver.

Does the user intend to joint the chicken or chop the bones?






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