Sharpmaker Improvement, Sal

[Thomas J Ekman]

Hello Sal, I have an idea on how to improve the SharpMaker, which does a very good job in sharpening.
I bought a foldable sharpening steel from Razor Edge Systems last week. It is a smooth steel and has two stainless steel rods, pretty much the same size as the brass safety rods on the SharpMaker. They can be adjusted to any angle you choose.

Why not combine these two ideas, and replace the brass rods by stainless steel ones. They would fit in the slots on the ceramic hones, so that they would provide the same angle you used when sharpening the knife.

Just a thought that came to my mind when I received the sharpening steel.

 

[JamesA]

I'm not Sal, but:

Steel rods would be pretty darn useless as guards, so they couldn't replace the brass. The brass (I keep thinking that it's copper, but it might very well be brass) is soft; it'll stop the knife blade, instead of sliding it off, and it won't trash the edge like chopping away at those /hard/ steel rods would.

However, a suggestion: I've got the same steel, and it's very easy to unscrew the rods and stick them in the sharpmaker. I /think/ I saw Sal mention this trick once... whether it was him or not, it works ridiculously well. Makes steeling even easier than the folding steel does, and that's no easy task.

And while I'm here; for those in the know, shouldn't you be using a /larger/ angle when you steel the knife? I would think that sticking the rods in the sharpmaker base, so they're tilted outwards and resting in the groove that the edge of a triangle would go into, would give you a slightly larger angle...

 

[Sal Glesser]

Hi Thomas. Thanx for the suggestion. We've been using and suggesting putting the Razor Edgesteel rods into the groove and steeling on the Sharpmaker in that manner, as James suggested.

James is also correct in that the brass was specially selected as guards to stop the knife without hurting the blade. Also if the guards were in the grooves, there would be no guards in use to protect you.

sal