Edhead,
The error was not his it was in my instruction, and I must respectfully disagree with you. Not a single skilled craftsman, in any trade, started with all the knowledge needed to successfully and skillfully ply his trade. He began as an apprentice, studied until he was skilled enough to become a journeyman, and eventually became a master. Along that road he makes many mistakes, some of which seem to be common sense to the journeyman or master. However, many things only become common sense with years of training and experience.
To explain it another way, when a helicopter pilot wishes for his helicopter to fly forward he moves the cyclic control forward. This causes the rotor blades to change pitch at a particular point in the rotation which causes the entire disc to tilt. To a layman or apprentice it is “common sense” to assume the pitch change occurs at the point in which the rotor tilts, e.g. If the front of the disc moves down, the pitch change occurs at the front, however this is incorrect. To me, an experienced and learned helicopter pilot, it is common sense that the pitch change occurs 90° before the response of the rotor. In other words, if you want the front of the disc to tilt down you have to cause a pitch change at the right hand side of the rotor disc. This applies to a counter clockwise rotating system. Common sense dictates that it will be opposite in a clockwise rotating system.
It’s common sense and easily intuited because I have training and experience. I don’t know you personally so I’m going to assume that you don’t have that training or experience, or other training that would help you make that determination.
My point is that a lack of knowledge in a subject shouldn’t stop you from studying and learning that skill. I wasn’t born a helicopter pilot, a blade smith, or a sharpener. I have learned these skills through study, training, and application. I’ve made plenty of mistakes along the way, but that doesn’t mean I shouldn’t have undertaken the learning of these skills. Nor did my mistakes mean that I should have given up and left it to other more skilled persons.
As it stands he has sharpened several more knives and is becoming more skilled every time. Each time he works on a knife the quality of his work improves, and he is able to work more independently.
As to the original question, how would you have fixed the knife?
p.s. my apologies for any spelling errors, grammatical errors, or typos. I’m on my iPhone, so it’s difficult to get it all right.
