Here’s a few mods, tips, & tricks I did to my WEPS

[Chris Jarve]

Here is a video I uploaded to MODiFiEDZ YouTube channel about some modifications I did to clean, lube & protect the sharpener as well as consistently get mirror polished edges & even hair whittling sharp edges everytime. There’s some more Wicked Edge sharpening videos on my channel if you’d like to check them out.

[wickededge]

Here is a video I uploaded to my YouTube channel about some modifications I did to clean, lube & protect the sharpener as well as get mirror polished edges & even hair whittling sharp edges everytime. There are some more Wicked Edge sharpening videos on my channel if you’d like to check them out.

I hope you guys can find something interesting.

Awesome stuff. Might start doing a pre-lube during QC.

-Clay

[Mark76]

Some great ideas! I will definitely try the washers, they should prevent the stones becoming “sucked” (that is the way it feels when sharpening) to the joints. And the lubrication also sounds like a good idea. And I must also try a magnet…

Funny to see that some people are busy increasing the friction of the rods (in order to remove some play), whereas you try to decrease it. This afternoon I tried the trick with the Subway rods, but this created far too much friction to me.

Thanks!

Molecule Polishing: my blog about sharpening with the Wicked Edge

[Leo James Mitchell]

Yes Mark, some interesting ideas. The magnet is a must for me, what an excellent idea that is. Mark, I am just about to send you a PM…give me a few minutes.

Leo

[Marion]

great job on the video.

on the play in the joint between the rods and the black elbow, I pulled the assemblies off the sharpener and gave them a tweek in my arbor press to tighten them up. now almost no play from side to side.

I have the same ultra sonic cleaner. I never considered US-ing my stones. Yours is also much cleaner than mine… both the stones and US.

Had to look twice at your stone you used in the video. My 800/1000 stones are yellow and baby blue.

[Josh]

I’ll try to post more about this tonight maybe… but here are the mods I’ve done to mine (pictures seen here).

So, in short, I have:

• Had a metal fabrication shop make me an exact replica vise out of hardened A2 tool steel
• Had the same metal fabrication shop make me my “straight razor” attachments out of the same… this allows me to get in front of the vise on straight razors to get about 10-12 degrees/side
• Purchased more of the exact same vise screws in different sizes so now I can sharpen a blade that is a half inch thick probably lol
• Re-inforced the rod arm joints with washers (although I am going to try to incorporate Clay’s 6/32″ screw idea to get them precisely tightened to where there is no play but they are still loose enough to move
• Purchased allen screws that are the same thread pattern as the knob you use to tighten the rod arm joints to the degree bar… this way I can ensure that they are truly tight and will not loosen during sharpening
• Incorporated the plastic straw idea from straws at subway over the rod arms to reduce play (not pictured yet)
• Additionally I have mounted this to a suction cup base, similar to the panavise (also not pictured yet)

Clay, I am interested in you looking into maybe making one of the straight razor like attachments out of aluminum, with the small square arm (the one the rod arm base fits over) much longer (i.e., maybe even 3″… what you could do with this is not only use it for straight razors and longer knives, but you could also turn it vertical to be able to get a very steep angle (i.e. in the case of a planer blade which has a steep chisel grind) which you can’t do with the stock WE… just some thoughts =)

[wickededge]

I’ll try to post more about this tonight maybe… but here are the mods I’ve done to mine (pictures seen here).

So, in short, I have:

• Had a metal fabrication shop make me an exact replica vise out of hardened A2 tool steel
• Had the same metal fabrication shop make me my “straight razor” attachments out of the same… this allows me to get in front of the vise on straight razors to get about 10-12 degrees/side
• Purchased more of the exact same vise screws in different sizes so now I can sharpen a blade that is a half inch thick probably lol
• Re-inforced the rod arm joints with washers (although I am going to try to incorporate Clay’s 6/32″ screw idea to get them precisely tightened to where there is no play but they are still loose enough to move
• Purchased allen screws that are the same thread pattern as the knob you use to tighten the rod arm joints to the degree bar… this way I can ensure that they are truly tight and will not loosen during sharpening
• Incorporated the plastic straw idea from straws at subway over the rod arms to reduce play (not pictured yet)
• Additionally I have mounted this to a suction cup base, similar to the panavise (also not pictured yet)

Clay, I am interested in you looking into maybe making one of the straight razor like attachments out of aluminum, with the small square arm (the one the rod arm base fits over) much longer (i.e., maybe even 3″… what you could do with this is not only use it for straight razors and longer knives, but you could also turn it vertical to be able to get a very steep angle (i.e. in the case of a planer blade which has a steep chisel grind) which you can’t do with the stock WE… just some thoughts =)

Josh,
Those mods are awesome! I’ve something I’m working on for the razors which is similar, wonder if you’d like to have a look?

-Clay

[Josh]

I’ll try to post more about this tonight maybe… but here are the mods I’ve done to mine (pictures seen here).

So, in short, I have:

• Had a metal fabrication shop make me an exact replica vise out of hardened A2 tool steel
• Had the same metal fabrication shop make me my “straight razor” attachments out of the same… this allows me to get in front of the vise on straight razors to get about 10-12 degrees/side
• Purchased more of the exact same vise screws in different sizes so now I can sharpen a blade that is a half inch thick probably lol
• Re-inforced the rod arm joints with washers (although I am going to try to incorporate Clay’s 6/32″ screw idea to get them precisely tightened to where there is no play but they are still loose enough to move
• Purchased allen screws that are the same thread pattern as the knob you use to tighten the rod arm joints to the degree bar… this way I can ensure that they are truly tight and will not loosen during sharpening
• Incorporated the plastic straw idea from straws at subway over the rod arms to reduce play (not pictured yet)
• Additionally I have mounted this to a suction cup base, similar to the panavise (also not pictured yet)

Clay, I am interested in you looking into maybe making one of the straight razor like attachments out of aluminum, with the small square arm (the one the rod arm base fits over) much longer (i.e., maybe even 3″… what you could do with this is not only use it for straight razors and longer knives, but you could also turn it vertical to be able to get a very steep angle (i.e. in the case of a planer blade which has a steep chisel grind) which you can’t do with the stock WE… just some thoughts =)

Josh,
Those mods are awesome! I’ve something I’m working on for the razors which is similar, wonder if you’d like to have a look?[/quote]

sure would! send pics my way 🙂

[Mark76]

Although I’ll wait for Clay’s low angle attachment, I love the straight razor attachment, Josh. Does it work better than “normal” sharpening? I ask this because a straight razor has its own guided angle sharpening system. (And because I just got the first straight razor in my life :).)

And now I’m going to develop a pencil sharpening modification… before I start work on the rocket motor attachment 😆 .

Molecule Polishing: my blog about sharpening with the Wicked Edge

[Josh]

Although I’ll wait for Clay’s low angle attachment, I love the straight razor attachment, Josh. Does it work better than “normal” sharpening? I ask this because a straight razor has its own guided angle sharpening system. (And because I just got the first straight razor in my life :).)

And now I’m going to develop a pencil sharpening modification… 😆 .

oh, I definitely would wait for Clays low angle attachment as well =) I just needed something now to be able to sharpen razors with. It is only a small mod, but immensely helpful. I don’t know if you have rotated your rod arm base forward yet and tried to do your razor with it, but I immediately had problems with it binding… which isn’t good when you need to do 1000+ passes per side lol. So this fixes all that. It works just as well, if not better than simply laying a razor flat and using the razor’s spine… what I do is basically have the stone/strop just a hair off of the spine. It is consistent and seemingly much faster, although I have ran into the issue with it taking practically forever to get our the previous scratches from each consecutive grit….

[Josh]

here ya go…a few more pics that i didn’t have uploaded before =) Clay, this is what i’m talking about being able to get a steeper angle…

sorry they’re not the best quality in the world…. oh, and the only reason the straight razor is in there is for photo purposes only…. lol, i was just getting ready to hit it w/ the 10k choseras but wanted to demonstrate what i was talking about first =) i would never put that steep of an angle on a razor! lol

[wickededge]

These are great, thank you for sharing!

-Clay

[Josh]

np… you see what I’m saying about extending the square arm on the mod to be about 3″ long? you could then slide the rod arm base up and down on it, which would then allow for even scissors =) unfortunately (hind sight is 20/20 lol) I didn’t make them long enough so I still can’t do scissors =(

[Josh]

Hey, just so everyone knows if your interested…. I reinforced the joints on my rod arm bases. It didn’t work as planned at first, so I adapted and now its great. I used a “nut and bolt” style instead of threading the actual aluminum base itself. For the larger part of the base (i.e. the blue part), you will need to drill it out with a 1/8″ drill bit (and bore it out a little to widen it) and use a 6/32″ screw to go through. For the top part (i.e. the black part of the base) I used a slightly smaller screw, which was 4/40″ (if I remember correctly).

Using these items I am now able to (with the help of loctite) tighten the nut just perfectly to where it will still allow free movement but not so loose as to allow any play. This in combination with the Subway straw idea and there is hardly any noticeable play!

[Bruce Guignard]

Great video. Thanks for the suggestions. I feel like the farmer’s anxious rooster – just looking for something to ****, ah.. sharpen.

[Author]

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