Incoming....Edge Pro next week...

Hopefully, this won't lead to a family feud over who gets to use the Edge Pro tonight.:D

You and your father have made a very wise decision to buy the Edge Pro. Once you get the hang of it, you will find it to be more versatile than the Sharpmaker. It also happens to work better than anything else on the market (I know, I've over the years purchased everyone of of them).
 
Have fun with it, There is a much greater learning curve vs the Sharpmaker so start with a few knives in your kitchen before moving on to better stuff.
 
Remember to pick up a roll of blue masking tape for the blades. Don't want to scratch the finish with the waste from the water stones. Great item for near perfect bevels.
 
Be sure to keep the Edge Pro stones FLAT! :) I made this mistake and ran into problems and couldn't figure out why my knives weren't getting sharp anymore. A dished stone (worn in the middle) will throw off your angle and will mess you up as you switch stones.

Ben Dale includes some stuff to flatten them, but I recommend getting a piece of plate glass and lapping grit from leevalley.com.

Check your stones often, as if they get badly dished it will take a lot more time to flatten them.
 
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To hear Ben Dale talk the diamond stones just aren't worth their salt. He said to me that they were not even intended for use on metal blades which is kind of hard to believe considering they are sold all over the world as blade sharpeners. He has this bias against diamonds for sure when you speak to him about them but just the same, I ordered two of the EZE Lap diamond stones in the 1x6" lengths to glue to the extra mounting pads I had from Ben for my Apex system. I heard about this trick to mount the EZELap product to the EdgePro system from Cliff Stamp a while back and have always had pretty good luck with the EZE Lap products in the past. I thought all I had to do was ask Ben to send diamonds with my order but instead of getting the products I got an ear full of his reasons to not use the diamonds. :yawn: It was the first negative comments about diamonds I'd really heard in all my years of working with knives. Kind of surprised me.

Personally I feel the diamonds are easier to use, get just as good or better results and contrary to Dale's argument they leave less mess and basically seem to me to last lots longer than the water stones do. I've never had a problem with the edges a diamond produces and so what if the diamonds fall off the pads or scratch the blades deeper at the contact point. They don't scratch the blades everywhere else like those water stones do. Personally I've never used stones that lose so much debris all over the place as the waterstones do. The course one leaves sprinkles of itself all over the sharpener and the table you work on and in fact that debris can even scratch your table up so don't do your sharpening on a good table top or you will end up in the dog house fast when the wife sees what you did. Ben and I got into a debate about these issues on the phone last time we spoke.

I just don't agree with his take on the use of diamonds. I don't doubt for a minute what you might see under a scope. My take on that is, 'so what'. Does the knife cut or not? From my stand point they sure do after a few swipes with a diamond and they do it well after using a fine diamond for touching up an edge that has been used a while. We've used diamond stones in the deer camp in my family for years and feel they are an important item to not forget.

Besides all this if you want to really reprofile an edge fast to the correct bevel angle you'll never want to use anything other than a diamond on the EdgePro. Its knocks it out in record time and its perfect when done. I recommend you get you an extra mounting pad with no stone and mount your own diamond stone to it.

STR
 
I will second that. I have been using EzeLap diamond hones with the EP and have not run into any problems. Quite the contrary.
And lately I have been sticking my polishing tapes directly over the diamond hone when a more polished edge is required.

A very worth while addition to an excellent sharpening system.
 
And I'll third it. I do my hogging with P80 and P120 Gator Grit stuck to tape blanks, then I go to the diamonds. If I want a real pretty back bevel I'll then either use the F, EF, and UF waterstones followed by polish tape, or I'll use progressively finer grades of Wet/Dry SC sandpaper (like the Scary Sharp system -- and I've got 10 tape blanks that a buddy at work milled for me). The small primary bevel then gets done with a few passes from one of the diamond hones. Works well for me...

Mark
 
I'll fourth using diamonds! I use an EZE-Lap 41C taped to a stone blank for large reprofiling (thicker than the 42 series so it doesn't match up), but otherwise use an EZE-Lap 42C (250 grit) taped to a stone blank and the two pre-mounted EZE-Lap diamonds EdgePro sells (600 grit and 1200 grit - can't find a 1200 grit 42SF anywhere else and 41SC is too thick) followed by two tape blanks (one has 5 micron SiC and the other has 0.3 micron AO - this may change when I get ahold of HandAmerican's new polishing tapes, of course). Aside from the teeniest height adjust when switching from the 1200 grit diamond to the tape blank, it's the easiest way to make large, pretty bevels.

The thing about quality diamonds (such as from EZE-Lap and DMT) is that they start out feeling coarser than they really are. After a few dozen uses, they feel duller to the touch than when new, but they still cut fast and consistant.

Tim8557,

I find the Sharpmaker to be more versatile than the EdgePro, but then I have the Apex and I use the Sharpmaker to sharpen serrated and very curved-bladed knives, potato peelers, nail clippers, and scissors.
 
STR said:
It was the first negative comments about diamonds I'd really heard in all my years of working with knives.
Click to expand...

Wayne Goddard generally isn't enthusiastic about diamonds, mainly from a performance/cost perspective, just feels they are not necessary. Many of the traditional Japanese guys would probably regard the use of diamonds in a less than favorable light to be mild, you find this pretty quickly in wood working on the finer tools. A lot of the ABS guys prefer the india stones, which is just Norton's trademark term for aluminum oxide.

A lot of the bias against diamonds comes from some diamond abrasives being really clumpy initially with an uneven grit, or the poly ones which break down rapidly, or people using to pressing really hard which doesn't work well with diamonds. Shapton recently came out with a set of diamond plates up to 0.5 micron on optically flat glass plates. I doubt anyone would complain about the level of finish you could get from that. Not cheap though ~$300 for the u-fine one.

-Cliff
 
Cliff Stamp said:
Shapton recently came out with a set of diamond plates up to 0.5 micron on optically flat glass plates. I doubt anyone would complain about the level of finish you could get from that. Not cheap though ~$300 for the u-fine one.-Cliff
Click to expand...

That's not correct, Shapton came out with a new set of stones, plus a glass diamond lapping plate. But the stones are ceramic similar to their Pro series. Only the lapping plate is diamond.

http://www.shaptonstones.com/stones/glass.php
 
J33 - Have a ball. did you get the Apex or the Pro model?

Just remember, you have to soak the stones for 24 hours before you can use them (or 20 minutes whichever comes first).

Also remember, unlike with the Sharpmaker, you can scratch the blade more easily on an Edge Pro. The gritty goo from the stones can be deposited on the sharpener when you flip the blade over and scratch it up. Best thing to do is everytime you are ready to turn the knife over to put it in the toilet and flush. That way all the grits go where they should go. Or you could use that blue painters tape which comes off easily.

What grit sized stones did you get? Did you get some tapes too? I'm looking forward to your review. Do you mainly sharpen folders or fixed, plain or serrrated?

Do you guys use a strop/hone when you sharpen? It really helps.
 
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