O Galoots:
Some more thoughts about how to deal with scissors that have been trashed by
grinding on the inside ("flat") surfaces. This is from theory for me, not (as
far as I can remember) experience.

If you have good scissors that are soft enough to resharpen with a file, then
you might be able to make some improvement by bending the blades.

There are two types of curvature to the "flat" surface, resulting in a compound
three-dimensional curvature. First, the whole face is hollow-ground by the maker
with a big wheel, maybe two or three feet in diameter. To properly re-establish
this by grinding you would need a comparably big grinding wheel, or a special-
purpose belt grinder, and a lot of skill. Second, there is curvature along the
length of the blade; this is what results in your being able to see lots of
daylight between the blades when the scissors are closed and the blades touch at
tips and axle. Scissors Sam calls this second curvature the "spring."

Sam says that you can re-establish the spring of blades that don't have it it:
"In this case I take a pair of heavy pliers and very slightly spring the thinner
of the two blades inward at about two-thirds toward the tip of the blade, then
again at about half an inch from the tip. If you examine quality scissors
closely, you will find that one blade is always thinner than the other. This is
the shearing blade. Always spring the thinner blade....The very hard crystalized
scissors will never be sprung out of shape. Usually I get them with the points
broken off. They are very brittle and will break easily. Before I attempt to
spring scissors, I test them with a file. Scissors of softer metal that can be
sharpened with a file will not usually have broken points."

A thought of my own is that if the problem is a counter-bevel, that is to say a
loss of the hollow of the hollow grinding, then we might take thought to how
Japanese plane blades are treated when the hollow on the back of the blade has
been flattened away. The blade is put flat down on a wooden block, edge sticking
out a little way, and the bevel is given a series of lots of light taps to turn
the edge downward. The taps must be given well back from the edge, on the soft
iron of the back of the blade, not on the the hard brittle steel of the edge.
The metal doesn't have to be moved very far. The technique is somewhat skilled,
but it is well within the capabilities of the individual woodworker; when I took
Japanese sharpening classes, many years ago, the teacher (Jay vn Arsdale) re-
established the hollow of a number of students' blades in this way. I think a
similar approach might be taken to the blades of good shears. If (when) I try
it, I would probably hold the blade in a vise while I did it; and after tapping
over the edge I might just barely touch the flats of the blades near the edge to
fair in the shape---very carefully so as not to destroy the hollowness created
by tapping. After all, as Scott says, what do you have to lose?

I wouldn't want to experiment on treasured big bankers' or tailors' shears with
either of these techniques, because I think they would need a bit of practice.
And I don't, at the moment, have any scissors that have buggered-up flats to try
them on. But sooner or later I will end up with a pair that needs the
techniques, and I intend to try them then.

By the way, in the twists of trying to clear up my backlog of email, I only just
read Scot's long screed on sharpening scissors. I agree with every word of it,
even when it is different from what I wrote. Of course, I agree with myself as
well. And I agree with Claudio too. There is an awful lot of room for varying
methods in sharpening scissors, as long as you understand the geometry.
And never touch the insides of the blades with abrasives.
Tom Conroy.
Oh, and never cut sandpaper with scissors. But none of use would do that, would
we? Sam gets quite heated, by his lights, about a household-tips newspaper
column that advised housewives to sharpen their sewing scissors by cutting
sandpaper with them.  The damage is completely untreatable after a few
repetitions. This is about the only damage he seems to give up on. But we
wouldn't ever do that. Or touch the insides of the blades with abrasives. No
indeed.