Hello!

[mike]

Hello everyone on the forum!

I’ve been reading an awful lot about using the wicked edge (WE) as a sharpening device and I’m extremely interested in investing in one. I work at a grocery store as a meat cutter so I rely on having a sharp knife for work everyday. At the work place they have a basic manual sharpening stone set-up – but with other employees and also people who dont care about it the stones look pretty bad. Some of them have dips in them!

Typically if one of my standard 6” knives starts to get dull i try to scrape it on the stones and that usually gets me by for a couple days. So far in my bag I have 5 x 6” knives that I rotate between sharpening. I’d have to say that when I sharpen all 5 knives they usually last about 2 weeks before they need re-sharpening. This brings me to the justification of buying the WE.

With a little math I started to break down the expenses. It looks like i’d be spending $299 at the very least for the basic sharpener. divide that by the cost of a new knife ($18 plus shipping) that’s 16 knives. I’m sure $299 is the bare minimum since I’d eventually end up spending money on tools, compounds, and other stones.

At this point in my career, I feel as though buying a new knife every time the old one gets dull seems silly. I want to know whether or not in the long-term getting a WE would eventually start to pay for itself. I also have a 12” cimetar butcher knife blade I’d want to sharpen as well.

Thoughts? any input would be appreciated

[Mark76]

Hey Wizard, welcome to the forum!

The WEPS is a great device for sharpening your knives, but whether it’s value for money depends on your (free-hand) skills, the time you want to spend on sharpening and the desired quality of the results. If you simply want the cheapest way to sharpen your knives and you have the skills and time, plain stones may be the best option.

When I started sharpening I was a lousy free-hand sharpener and that was a reason for me to get the WEPS. And I can still get much better and faster results with the WEPS than free-hand.

Sharpening a knife from scratch is probably faster on the WEPS than free-hand. But it is in resharpening (touching up the bevels) that it really pays off. You simply clamp a knife, you set the angle to the one you used before and with a couple of strokes of a fine stone the knife is super sharp again.

And a reason for many people to get the WEPS is the quality of the results. If offers a precision you simply cannot achieve free-hand. If you’re interested in super polished edges, take a look here: https://knife.wickededgeusa.com/forum/4-knife-photos/9-super-polished-edges . But the same applies to toothy edges or any other type of edge you want to get. It’ll be a breeze in no time.

Success with your choices! Please let us know what you’ve decided, If you have any more question, don’t hesitate to ask!

Molecule Polishing: my blog about sharpening with the Wicked Edge

[mike]

I already know what I’ve decided. If wicked edge had some kind of payment plan system I’d pick up the pro pack within my next heart beat. I’ve already been to that forum post showing off super polished edges and I think for the kind of work that I do it would make cutting a lot more easier. Having a sharp knife at work lends to having less fatigue at the end of the day and it just overall makes me happier when I have to put less effort into cutting.

I’m decent at free-hand sharpening, but the real reason I was attracted to the WEPS is the ability to easily clamp the knife in and resharpen it really fast.

[Author]

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