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Sewing Scissors

 

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Sectional view of the cutting blade

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Scissor parts

Scissors are sharpened according to the angles shown below.


Unless the scissors need to have a really honed edge, honing is not recommended for scissors. Stop after the sharpening step (but with a high grit level - 1,000 or so).


Some scissors have differing angles for the Thumb Blade (shown in red on the picture below) vs. the Fingers Blade (shown in blue on the picture below). In those cases, separate angles are shown in the table below.

Beautiful things come together one stitch at a time.

Anonymous

The picture to the right shows a sectional view of the cutting blade.

General Guidelines

Type

βThumb βFingers

Notes

General Scissors 120°  
Clayton 7” 110°  
DaVinci - 21/2” blade 120° 135°  
Delica - 31/2” blade desk scissors 130°  
Embroidery scissors 115 - 120°  
Fabric shears, ≥ 7” 125 - 130°  
Fiskars dressmaker 120°  
Gingher 'Knife Edge' dressmaker 115° 135°  
Gingher snips resharpened 125°  
Gingher thread snips 105°  
Industrial shears, ≥ 7” 125 - 130°  
Italian pinking shears 105°  
Kleencut 110°  
Pinking shears 90 - 95°  
Tailor shears, ≥ 7” 125 - 130°  
Wiss dressmaker 115° 120°  
Wiss pinking shears, old style 105°  
Wiss thread nippers 100°  

Notes & Comments

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SVX-150 scissors jig

The Tormek SVX-150 Scissors jig is the best to use for these.


Grindstone Rotation

When sharpening scissors, use the vertical position with the grindstone rotating towards the blade. This keeps the SVX-150 properly aligned to the grindstone. (If you use the horizontal position, the grindstone will pull the scissors away from the jig.)

However, if you are sharpening left-handed scissors and they cannot be disassembled into the two pieces, you will need to sharpen from the horizontal position as the piece not being sharpened would interfere with the process otherwise (it would hit the Tormek machine).


Diamond Grinding Wheels

Use of diamond grinding wheels is not recommended. The sharpness of the angle for sharpening can damage the diamiond wheel. (And the SG grindstone works quite well.)


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