Work Sharp Knife Sharpener review

Some of you may know from previous discussions that I am big on knives. I have small lock back pocket knives, multi-tools, quality kitchen knife sets, but mostly fixed blades that range from cheap to very expensive.

I have been using knives since I can remember. I have also been on a constant quest to find a foolproof and effective way to get and keep a good edge on my blades. I have never been able to put as good an edge on my knives as I would like doing it free hand. I've used various draw through carbide and ceramic sharpeners for marginal effect. I've used countertop power grinders, and at one time had a paper disc setup on a bench grinder; one side impregnated with diamond dust, the other with white rouge. Up till now, that was probably my best sharpening system, allowing me to regularly achieve what I refer to as scary sharp edges on just about every blade I tried, from pocket knives to beat to hello machetes.

The problem with the wheel system was the lack of a suitable guide. I cobbled together some do-hickeys that got me a good 20 degree angle on the wheels, some of the time. It required some practice, but I got good enough that scary sharp was almost always a certainty. I had never tried a belt sharpening system up till now, and I have to say, this little unit is 4 stars out of 4.

It came with two guides, one for 20 degrees, one for 25 degrees. These two angles are pretty effective for most all of the sharpening you would need. There's also a jig setting for sharpening scissors. However, should you need to sharpen something that either won't fit in the jig or requires a different angle, the jigs come off and you can rotate the belt head to suit your needs for just about anything, from axes, to shovels, to lawn mower blades. You can even do gut hooks.

As a good test, I grabbed up one of my old Busse Swamp Rat knives; the Desert Battle Rat model. This is a heavy fixed blade, and I had put a horrible edge on it that I needed to rework. In less than 15 minutes, I had completely reshaped the edge and had achieved the scary sharp level using the 25 degree jig. I left the edge rough as this is a utility blade. The unit comes with 3 belts, an 80 grit, a 220 grit, and a 6000 grit. With the 6000 grit, you can polish an edge to scalpel sharpness.

A bonus to using a belt sharpener is the give in the belt tension allows for a convex edge. In my opinion, this is superior to a flat or concave edge.

Needless to say, I am sharpening up all my knives that need it. I have also offered to sharpen up friends' knives.

I got mine for $70 from these folks:

http://www.sharpeningsupplies.com/Work-Sharp-Knife-Sharpener-P381C68.aspx

I have no affiliation with this company or with Work Sharp tools. This was the best deal I could find, so I am just passing on my good fortune for y'all. It would make a pretty good gift under the tree for less than $100.

Nice! It seems like the Ken Onion version is better still. It does everything the standard version does but with slightly larger belts and a more powerful motor. Plus it can be used without the guides with even bigger belts.

Great review, don't mean to 'steal your thunder' at all. I think the Work Sharp has a lot of potential. A buddy of mine that's a vendor for Tanaka Toshi (stones from Japan) sells special formulations of compounds he's created, and he has created a series of special linen belts that will be available just specifically for the Work Sharp. The linen belts will allow the use of a much wider range of grit compounds than you can currently get. I think it will amp up the WS to a whole new level.

BTW, I'm very envious re the Busses! I have a Bony Active Duty and a Game Warden but I'd love to get my hands on a FFBM or the like! If I had the cash I'd pick up one of the new Anniversary Straight Handle Battle Mistress CGs! Almost $500, though...a bit rich for my blood.

Harbor freight 1 inch belt grinder

Been using one of these for sharpening, shaping, and related blade grinding applications: $39.95, uses cheap standard belts.

For standard boring stuff I use 1 orange and 1 yellow Diamond stones freehand.
Since I cannot break my mother or in-laws of using glass cutting boards, its not worth the time to get their scary sharp.


I bought a kit in the 80s - a razor edge system with 2 stones and a blade guide that attaches to the back of the blade.

I bought mine at cabela's- but they sell direct at http://www.razoredgesystems.com/

This kit always gets things sharp, and extremely consistent.

I am looking at switching over to this at home http://www.sharpeningwheels.com/index.html.

several knife forums swear by it- knives so sharp that you can WHITTLE hair, not just shave it...

Yes, the wheels are what I had before. They were pretty effective, and yes, I could get knives sharp enough to whittle hair. Not entirely portable, but it got used a lot. It would make a ribbon on the edge if you weren't careful. I ruined a few small blades before I got the hang of it. It is really easy to overdo it.

The deal with the work sharp is the belt speed is not too high. 3400 rpm seems a bit hot and I might worry a bit about destroying the heat treatment on a blade. As with all things, I suppose it just takes some practice to be proficient.

I wish I could've mastered freehand with stones. It just never worked out like I wanted.

I moonlight as a sharpener, mostly kitchen knives. My "thing" is high end Japanese blades. Those kinds of knives I do on synthetic and/or natural Japanese water stones. I also have a couple of belt grinders with a wide variety of belts. My favorite is a modded Kalamazoo 1" x 42" machine. It runs at around 1800 rpm, just about perfect for sharpening, and it has a 1/3 horse Baldor motor. My next purchase will be some of the CBN emulsions my buddy Ken has developed for Bark River.

The only minor "knock" on the WS for me is that for the same money you could get a decent 1" x 30" belt machine. The latter is more versatile and has a much, much wider array of belts. A regular grinder can used to fix tips or do heavy repairs, something the WS isn't really set up to do. But if you just want to sharpen a regular household-type volume of knives I would think the WS would work well.

Yep this, mine has been used for everything from knives, shovels, axes, drill bits, screw and bolts, and other metal parts.

Again, not criticizing the Work Sharp; it does appear to be a good tool. But my (admittedly much more expensive) Kalamazoo can do a lot more stuff. It's superb for sharpening, and I can get a knife about 90% as sharp with it in 3 minutes as I can get a knife on stones in an hour. It makes me want to dump my stones down an elevator shaft sometimes!

It's also terrific for fixing broken tips, taking out major chips, reducing bolsters and doing major re-profiling. It's right on the border of being a machine a knifemaker would use (in fact, some do).

With 80 grit Blaze Ceramic belts even stuff like CPM254 and S30V melts like an icicle on a hot stove!

Interesting conversation. Especially since I'm in the process of setting up a belt grinder from Lee Valley for my metal working shop. Lots of really interesting abrasives available.

Yep, I've known about belt grinders and always figured that's where I would end up. Admittedly, the Work Sharp is not the biggest, most powerful belt grinder on the market. It is widely available and seems to have a pretty good marketing campaign and support program. I figured for the money this would be a good enough platform to recommend for the average knife guy. The unit is pretty foolproof, yet versatile enough to be used for more than just sharpening knives.

My point is this little unit is out of the box effective and does as good a job or, in most cases better, at sharpening as any of the myriad other sharpening systems I've tried.

For the more experienced, I would agree that you could do better investing in something more robust. I am sure that eventually I will probably upgrade as my proficiency improves. This was a good way to get introduced to using a belt sharpener for the first time. I can build on positive experiences.

Let me put this another way. I let my wife use it to sharpen a couple of my Hinkels, and she did a good job. This is the first time she's ever sharpened any knife. She's a Klutz (as voted on by her senior class in high school, I have it on record).

I'm looking forward to trying the belt grinder. It seems to be the most intuitive of the mechanical sharpening systems I've looked at. I can do most everything I need by hand, but it takes time.

The WorkSharp looks mighty handy. As you say, it covers the bases for most people. If one fell into my Christmas stocking, I would not object.

Better still, the WorkSharp looks quite portable. As in, throw it in the trunk when heading to the in-laws for Christmas and amaze them by turning their "sticks" back into knives.

Sure, a big belt grinder is somewhat more versatile, and has a wider variety of standard size belts available. But I'm not going to schlep it around with me, nor use it on someone's kitchen counter.

Dang, you sold me.

I have no problem with getting a superb edge with a stone but I have a WorkSharp and much prefer to use it. I would never use a conventional grinder on a tempered blade, it is just TOO easy to heat it up and ruin the temper. I have a wetwheel grinder for major work (had it for lots longer than the WorkSharp). The limited belt selection from WS limits its use but lots of belts are available. The WorkSharp will do major work, and do it well. Just remove the guide and use the open belt. Unlike the large bench size belt grinders, it does not have a built in guide, but it will work. Will it replace the larger systems - no, but it is convient for most of the work that most of us do, lots easier to move around (sometimes important) and takes up lots less space ("space is a tool"). For me it has placed a larger low speed belt grinder much further down on the want list.

If you want to optimize the WorkSharp buy some Micro-Surface belts (at an astounding .59 ea). They are available in a large variety of grits, I bought from 240 to 1200 (not the same numbers as the grit numbers used by WS). I will add the URL when I get home tonight. (http://micro-surface.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=273_197&products_id=91) Also read the BladeForums (http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php/795222-Aftermarket-belts-for-Work-Sharp-tested-today!).

Respectfully,

Jerry

Absolutely! I agree with you. I don't mean to sound like I'm running it down. It does seem to be a fantastic system. The portability of it is a great selling point, too.

Please see the URL's added above.

Respectfully,

Jerry