The Best Knife Sharpener

[BRush]

A quality knife comes with the blade edge angled and shaped the way the maker intended, which should be the reason you bought it. It should be regularly honed and stropped so that its original edge is never worn to the extent it loses its original shape. Honing realigns and removes some of the bent edge and stropping polishes the edge without removing metal. This only takes a minute or two and requires no special skill. With quality steel this is not a big deal and doing it properly maintains your knife.

A quality knife should never be neglected to the extent its edge must be reshaped by the use of a stone or, horrors, a grinding wheel.

Having said this, many, including myself, often find our knife's edge needs some reshaping or we want to increase the cutting ability of a cheap knife that comes with a poorly designed or formed edge. After deciding the degree of bevel you desire, a stone should be used, either free hand or with one of the fixtures mentioned. Apply stones in decreasing grits until extra fine and then the hone and strop. A fine stone can remove as much metal as a course stone. A course stone is faster, but leaves a courser edge which requires more time to polish. I find it faster overall to start with a finer stone and it allows more control as to how much metal is removed. Always take care to remove only as much metal as necessary to make your desired degree of edge. Use oil with the stones and use the highest grit only to establish the blade angle and each lessor grit only to remove burs. Then hone and strop, with or without abrasives, to remove the edge overhang and mirror polish the edge. That edge is easily distorted from use and needs to be regularly restored, every other use maybe.

 

[Highhawk1948]

Spydeco Triangle sharpening kit

 

[jbuidon]

Ok, every one reading this forum, and this thread, has at one time or another had a dull knife to sharpen. And if your like me you have had days you couldn't put a proper edge on a knife if you worked on it all day!
So, in my 60+ years of carrying a knife I have always had an eye out for a better mousetrap when it comes to keeping a sharp knife in my pocket.
So far, I have not found the perfect sharpener. Now please let me clarify something. The perfect sharpener should be able to:
A. put a nice edge on any size blade
B. Do it without having to find out where 12 or 15 degrees is
C. Do it in less than 30 minutes, which is my maximum attention span when trying to sharpen a knife.

I have not covered every corner of the knife world, but I certainly have bought more than my share of sharpeners that promised to be the "Last one I will ever buy".
Anybody got any good answers, I sure am willing to listen.

You have nice qualification for a nice sharpener, however you should also consider the blade type of your knife. Every blade type has a dedicated sharpener. For example, you would have difficulty sharpening a stainless blade if you will only use sharpening stones. Because of their hardness, stainless blade are perfect to sharpen in an electric sharpener.

You can read this blog for more info.

 

[c3006]

If you are serious this is hands down the best I have ever used,the only problem with it is you will gain more friends if they find out you have it. I know its expensive but I hate a dull knife.
RealSharp, Electric Knife Sharpener | Forsyth, MO

 

[SweetMK]

I got my Work Sharp Ken Onion today, the wife is happy,,,,

15 minutes, the main half dozen kitchen knives were sharper than they have been in two decades!!

WOOT!

 

[snubbyfan]

I finally got myself a hunk of jewelers rouge and made a strop out of a leather scrap. I didn't think I really needed it but it makes a sharp edge very sharp.