Do I need a pocket sharpening stone.

[dwardo]

I keep a DC4 in my kit more for damage limitation.

If i nick or ding a blade, especially an axe it helps remove the tiny micro bur and enables me to carry on using it over the week/weekend without it rolling more. Saves me more work when i get home.

I guess it depends on how much work your tools get and for the weight and pack size of a dc4 type stone.

 

[Robson Valley]

I hold crooked knives stationary and move the abrasive (fine sandpaper wrapped on a pipe mandrel.)
I really have to concentrate to keep a consistent bevel angle without moving my elbow. Hard to learn.

Most wilderness campsites here are pretty stoney, you'll find something good enough to use.

 

[Janne]

In East Sussex there is plenty of sediment stone in the rivers and streams. Sandstone, even better, mud stone. Mud stone ( correct name?) has a great surface and is flat.

Looks like a brownish Japanese waterstone.

 

[moley1508]

I tend to take a book most trips and a folded sheet of 400 wet n dry in it. Works very well for me

 

[C_Claycomb]

I like the DMT Duofolds. I have an old DC4 which I like a lot, and the new CC4 looks good. Do I need to sharpen in the field, not often, and certainly not usually on weekend type trips, or for basic camping trips where I will be tented in some boring field eating out of tins and packets.

It is a different situation if I am away for more than 4 days, I might be wanting to do wood craft, and there will be fires and a need to light them. If I am doing wood carving, that can take an edge faster than you expect and chips and rolled edges happen, and are a right pain to live with if you are out for more than a couple of days. I dropped an S30V Ritter Grip on a rock and dinked the tip over, two days into a five day trip. I have had edges bump metal and turn when I am doing food prep and in those cases I am dang glad I have a sharpener with me. Could I manage without, sure, but would it annoy and take away some of the enjoyment of the trip, for me, yes.

 

[vestlenning]

Do I need a pocket sharpening stone

If your knife or axe get dull when out and about, yes, otherwise no.

 

[sunndog]

Unless you are planning large animal butchery or extended carving sessions then nah not for a weekend away

As said your belt or the welt of a leather sheath does it for me

 

[Zingmo]

Do I sharpen my knife in the field? Hardly ever.
Do I end up sharpening every other muppet's blunt, chipped and rusty tools? Every flippin' time!

Z

 

[Pattree]

Once every so often, maybe every 10 minutes, swish!, swish!, plonk back into horn.

Yep! I’m an ancestor. That is exactly what we did when I was in the Forestry Commission cutting bracken from around small tree plantations with a sickle but without the horn. As the old guys used to tell me - “you’re paid as much for sharpening as you are for badging (cutting). Later we were on piecework and cut until the blade bounced off the bracken.

It’s a philosophy I carry with me to this day.

You can keep your shiny super hard steels. I’m not critical of your choice but I’ll use a simple tool, usually an Opinel. I carry a circular 75mm dia two sided axe carborundum. It’s in a pouch rather than a horn but I can spit. I sharpen both the cutting edge and occasionally the back. For instructions in use see @Janne above.

pee ess
I have one of those double tapered stones Janne and I still use it today to sharpen my sickle and my hedging hook.
pee pee ess
I really must learn to look at dates on “similar” posts.