I found myself doing some drywall work this weekend. It had been a while because I really hate the dust. As I looked at my tools, I wondered whether one ought to sharpen a drywall knife. Would it make it feather any better?
In my experience, a sharp knife is just easier to tear the paper if one makes an errant pass.
Add a little water to the mud and it will smooth a little nicer. Also mix throughly every time you open the bucket. The mud works a lot nicer without any hard chunks.
In my experience, just using the knife, i.e., spreading and smoothing the slightly gritty joint/spackling compound over the slightly rough surface of drywall keeps a good edge on my drywall tools. Kind of like stropping a razor on a leather belt.
Some people like myself should always use very dull edged drywall tools. Otherwise the temptation for inapproprate use of a sharp edge is too great on observation of the finished product.
Egon
<font color="blue"> people like myself should always use very dull edged drywall tools. </font color>
I wont go into details about how I discovered the sharpening effect of just using a drywall knife. Suffice it to say it involved an outburst then a bandage. [img]/forums/images/icons/crazy.gif[/img]