Sharpening Service Fail?

mrdeus said:
My worst sharpening job when first learning looked much better than that. Did he just go "Good enough!" on his first attempt and stop learning?
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That made me LOL, no he didn't stop learning, he never started!

Even my 6 year old knows you don't take a blade to a grinder, "daddy can sharpen knives on his stones"
 
First, no idea what the knives originally looked like (as in how much metal was originally left on the blade, they seem to be ground pretty far up). But that sharpening is awful aesthetically. The person probably wanted to thin down the blade (as knives do get thicker the higher up the edge goes and need to be thinned down) - togishis do that a lot (and it is reflected in the price too). But uneven bevels are not the job of a professional.
 
Frankly, whoever sharpened those is a complete idiot.

I could literally sharpen a knife on the sidewalk and get a better edge.

All of those knives are now trash; I would send him a bill.
 
I think its your duty to out the service and name them so no one else gets their stuffed ruined!
 
Bazzle said:
This is what makes it hard for sharpening services. I've seen some really bad attempt's at sharpening, but this is the the worst. It is alarming to know that people continue to do this sort of work and making it difficult to explain to every third person you're "not one of those guys".
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I hate to say it but you have a point. This is the reason why I have never in my life used a sharpening service and for the most part don't ever plan to.

That "most part" is my exception clause for Richard J and a few other members on this forum who I would trust my knife to. No Other Exceptions. I'm too scared to get a knife back like that.
 
Oh Lawdy, those are poorly done! I did better on my first attempt sharpening with a stone! Are the edges on those 1° inclusive? I don't even know how these knives are so acute with such a rough finish. It would take a long time doing this on a cinderblock or sidewalk, and no bench grinder I know of has a 3' wheel. I would definitely insist your knives are replaced, and if they aren't take this idget to small claims court. I don't think the sharpener said anything along the lines of "barely competent" or "there will still be some steel left", so you didn't get the service you contracted.

On the only plus side, the first knife is pretty evenly butchered.
 
jdspaw said:
As the general manager of a mom and pop hardware store, I wanted to see what the greater knife community thought of the local sharpening service here in a corner of South Western Connecticut. As background, we had a very cantankerous old bastard doing our sharpening for years. He was mean and uninterested in customer's time frames, but he was excellent at sharpening. Chainsaw chains would come back like new and knife blades would be mirror polished. He fell out with the owner of the store though, and we had to find another service.
Below are a few shots of some knives we got back today:
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In my opinion, these knives were butchered by the service. Maybe these edges are what restaurants want, but I'm fairly sure my customer doesn't want his decent kitchen knives ground unevenly and rough. I know my own knives would never be sharpened like this.
For those of you who operate sharpening services, would edges like this be an industry norm? For those of you who are customers, would you accept these knives back and pay for them?
Thanks for your thoughts.
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Looks like they do a lot of commercial sharpening, normal for that type and what is normally seen.
 
Fortunately, the knives do not appear to be expensive. So your store is not out a lot of money. How much does the service charge for their sharpening?
I have seen this quality of work on a set of cheap steak knives.
I've talked with some workers that worked the canneries up in Alaska. I recall one said someone would come along with a bucket and pick up the dull knives and bring the ones that had been sharpened with an electric sharpener back.
 
Bo T said:
Fortunately, the knives do not appear to be expensive. So your store is not out a lot of money. How much does the service charge for their sharpening?
I have seen this quality of work on a set of cheap steak knives.
I've talked with some workers that worked the canneries up in Alaska. I recall one said someone would come along with a bucket and pick up the dull knives and bring the ones that had been sharpened with an electric sharpener back.
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That's for the most part standard from what I have seen over the years.
 
Have you considered microbeveling them and seeing if they will actually work? Or has the steel been burned?
 
I would guess all but the very top one could be fixed, probably not well enough to give back to the customer and charge, but you could probably make some good users out of them.
 
Ankerson said:
Looks like they do a lot of commercial sharpening, normal for that type and what is normally seen.
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This was kind of what I was expecting (or hoping) someone to say.
The service charged the store $5 a blade for this. No one thought to check the work before we paid the delivery guy. I just happened to see the the box and thought to check out how they did.
I can see why some of you want me to call them out, but a few people advised me not to. As a tiny business, I know well the power of just a little negative press. Besides, if you're curious enough, you could figure out who they are based on info provided here.
Thanks for all the feedback BF. You guys are very passionate about knives, and I have a great deal of respect for a community that cares as much as you all do.
In the future I'm planning on taking up the sharpening myself. I already do my own knives free hand, and I've been looking into chain grinders to do chainsaw chains.
 
jdspaw said:
In the future I'm planning on taking up the sharpening myself. I already do my own knives free hand, and I've been looking into chain grinders to do chainsaw chains.
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For <$100 you can get setup with either a set of paper wheels or a 1x30 belt sander (including belts) and a leather strop and sharpen knives in shop in under 5min per blade. :thumbup: if your paying $5 per blade you must be charging more, in under 20 blades it'd have paid for its self.

Chainsaws are simple. A DMT diamond file is $15 (or you can get a cheaper set for less)
 
jdspaw said:
This was kind of what I was expecting (or hoping) someone to say.
The service charged the store $5 a blade for this. No one thought to check the work before we paid the delivery guy. I just happened to see the the box and thought to check out how they did.
I can see why some of you want me to call them out, but a few people advised me not to. As a tiny business, I know well the power of just a little negative press. Besides, if you're curious enough, you could figure out who they are based on info provided here.
Thanks for all the feedback BF. You guys are very passionate about knives, and I have a great deal of respect for a community that cares as much as you all do.
In the future I'm planning on taking up the sharpening myself. I already do my own knives free hand, and I've been looking into chain grinders to do chainsaw chains.
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If they are sharpening commercial grade knives then what you ended up with is normal.

And that's exactly what it looks like to me.

The commercial grade stuff, they just use them, send them off and after they wear down they toss them and order new ones and start over again.

Nothing really negative about it as it's the standard that I have seen for the past 30 years or so.
 
I think I could do better than this freehanding while simultaneously pedaling a tandem bicycle. At night. Drunk.
 
That's absolutely horrendous. I believe I, a grown man, would start crying in the store, and then become immediately infuriated (obviously at the right party, not just the person standing in front of me). I'd demand for you to get money to reimburse me from the sharpener. Personally, I wouldn't ask you, the owner of the M&P shop, since I'd probably be informal friends with you, and I like to think of myself as an understanding and reasonable person. With that being said, I CANNOT understand what has happened to those poor kitchen knives, and IT IS NOT REASONABLE. I believe I could've sharpened it more effectively, without butchering (no pun intended, ;) ) the knife with my Leatherman file...
Good luck!
 
Ankerson said:
If they are sharpening commercial grade knives then what you ended up with is normal.

And that's exactly what it looks like to me.

The commercial grade stuff, they just use them, send them off and after they wear down they toss them and order new ones and start over again.

Nothing really negative about it as it's the standard that I have seen for the past 30 years or so.
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That makes sense. In a commercial setting I guess knives truly are just tools, and disposable/consumable ones at that. These edges are still shocking, though, by knife knut standards. Just shows how much we really baby and fuss over our own knives. :D
 
G. Scott H. said:
That makes sense. In a commercial setting I guess knives truly are just tools, and disposable/consumable ones at that. These edges are still shocking, though, by knife knut standards. Just shows how much we really baby and fuss over our own knives. :D
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Yes, they are two different worlds for sure.

It's just when reality sets in of how things really are it's shocking to some.
 
My Parents own a sewing and vacuum company and we have four stores in this state and we do lots of scissor sharpening and see some crazy stuff come back from hole in the wall sewing stores. It looks very similar to what you got there and yes, we do use a grinding wheel but you need to sharpen at a steeper angle on scissors. Anyway, I wouldn't be surprised to see that from a second rate knife sharpening service.
 
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