Best knife sharpener for under $60?

If you could agree to $59.95 plus $10 S&H i would suggest a set of Paper Wheels.
After a short learning curve (offer to sharpen the cheap kitchen knives of your friends & neighbours for free) you will be able to make most knives hairwhittling sharp, and after some more practice they will start to look real good as well.
 
Learn to freehand. I know that this does not answer to OPs question, but once you learn how to do it you can basicaly sharpen with any steel abrading material you find, which renders any sharpening rig useless. May sound harsh but it is true. I personaly am gadget lover, but no matter how much I like my lansky, freehanding is way quicker for me.
 
I actually ended up getting a work sharp ken onion to try out. Managed to pick it up for $125 shipped, twice my price but I figured it would be nice for sharpening my kitchen set too :D
 
amg137 said:
For my money, I'd get a sharpmaker, though I currently use a work sharp Ken Onion edition which has completely changed my outlook on sharpening. I haven't used my sharpmaker once since I picked it up. It's significantly more expensive than a sharpmaker at around $140-150, but you can do a complete reprofiling and sharpen a knife up to a mirror polish in a matter of 15 minutes or so, and you have dozens of angle settings as opposed to just two.

This reprofiling thing is something I wish I had been told before I bought a sharpmaker - it's really just not possible without the "sold separately" diamond stones, and even then it can take an hour or more.
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I got the larger Lansky set, then the Sharpmaker. I bought both as an after thought because I needed to sharpen my knives, and I didn't see running them out for sharpening all the time as being very practical. It turned out fairly well for me as I found that some of my cutting tools had to be reprofiled to at least the 20 degrees or whatever the Sharpmaker is. So, I find the Lansky set up to be a little sloppier and easier to make profile angle mistakes with, and the Sharpmaker to be nearly fool proof. I sometimes use the Lansky set to do some grunt work on a blade edge and when it is much finer I can then switch over to the Sharpmaker for future sharpenings. If I had to choose one, it would be the Sharpmaker. But remember that the Sharpmaker works on finer or steeper edges. If the edge has heavy shoulders meaning that the edge is thicker and more chisel like, the Sharpmaker will take forever. The Lansky takes a lot of metal off really fast and can get a blade very sharp. The Sharpmaker is basically a no brainer set and forget set up. Most of my knives sharpen easily with the Sharpmaker because in general, most factory knives fall within or close to the Sharpmakers angles. I am no authority, just a schmoe that has used both sets for several years. I get my cutting tools to smooth paper slicing sharpness.
 
With my limited experience, the Sharpmaker. I've used water stones and DMT products, but the Sharpmaker was easier for me. I have the Ken Onion W.S. on my list, though. Let us know what you think of yours when you get it.
 
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