Some great info there, thanks. I have spent quite some time searching and reading info about sharpening scissors, and there just isn't a whole lot of good info out there. On the other hand, countless people keep saying that cutting sand papper or tin foil is great for making scissors sharper... Well, if they're dull enough to begin with, perhaps that makes them "better".
I have kind of fallen in love with old dressmakers shears, and I have bought a couple of abused and neglected ones for something like $3 each. Being old and neglected they ofcourse had some rust damage, on top of being dull. On the edge where you normally regrind scissors it's no problem, rust there gets removed with a "standard regrind" to the original angle. I used a ordinary coarse/fine stone (not really fine by knife sharpening standards) and tried to stay at the original 30 degree angle there.
The inside of the blade was my biggest problem, they are hollow ground and the pitting caused by the rust forced me to regrind that side too, to be able to get a good edge. Eventually I figured out that the curved edge of a schythe hone had close enough to the radius of the hollow grind to work, so I could use that to regrind the inside of the blades to more or less the original shape. It might not be perfect by the standards of someone used to professionally serviced shears, but they do cut fabric and just about anything else very well so I'm happy with the result.
I would greatly appreciate any pointers about sharpening scissors, both those that are in fairly good shape but dull, and the old neglected slightly rusty ones you can pick up for $3 at swap meets. (As you may have figured out I like fixing stuff myself, so while sending them off for a professional regrind might get the best results there's no fun in doing that.)
