It took lots of repetition honing, stropping, going through setup, realizing the chip breaker was right on the edge of the blade, repeat, new error. The first picture is progress: small and crunchy, long and crinkley, long and papery.
Sharpening using Atoma 400/600/1200 diamond plates + a strop I had around. I found Wood By Wright’s setup video helpful and have been enjoying Rex Kreuger’s videos on sharpening and other things.
I worked so hard for these shavings, surely there’s something fun to do with them.
Unfortunately I don’t have anywhere to burn them, but maybe I’ll save some for camping trips.
You can make your own firelighters with wood shavings/sawdust and paraffin wax (for candle making). Melt the wax, mix in the sawdust and pour into a muffin pan to cool. Use paper muffin liners and they’ll start really easily. The sawdust will burn hot enough to light small logs without intermediate sized sticks, and the wax is waterproof so they’ll last basically forever.
Obviously don’t use material from any treated or painted lumber, only clean wood.
They make great compost too if you have any plants or a compost pile.