The “snake oil salesmen” that are in for a quick buck. But it does make you appreciate people and companies that actually take pride in their work, and CARE about it.
I don't know what to think about normal people (not people like us) and the knives they use. Most folks are happy with a set of $49 Ginsu knives in their kitchens that they'll use for ten years without sharpening, and think that spending $50 on a pocket knife is a lot. For them, maybe it makes sense to pay some joker $5 to remove some of the dullness from their knives.
They'll never pay what it costs to put a GOOD edge on their blades, and maybe that makes sense. Why pay to put a good edge on a blade, when you can buy a whole new set for much less?
We knife enthusiasts exist in our own bubble. Most people use ten dollar knives and consider a $5 hack job sharpening to be worth it. I sharpen knives for friends and family and their expectations are low, almost as low as the quality of their knives.
I don’t fault whomever sharpened that, they probably have many satisfied customers. That’s all most folks want on their Chicago Cutlery. Maybe he should have told the knife owner that he wasn’t the right guy for the job but in the end taking your Manix to the guy at the flea market was a bad call.
Would you take your Audi A8 to the cheapest mechanic in town? Would you take you vintage S&W revolver to the cheapest gunsmith you can find? Those mobile sharpening services do what most people want which is putting quick edges on cheap knives.
-Darby
sal wrote:Knife afi's are pretty far out, steel junky's more so, but "edge junky's" are just nuts. :p
SpyderEdgeForever wrote:
Also, do you think a kangaroo would eat a bowl of spagetti with sauce if someone offered it to them?
We knife enthusiasts exist in our own bubble. Most people use ten dollar knives and consider a $5 hack job sharpening to be worth it. I sharpen knives for friends and family and their expectations are low, almost as low as the quality of their knives.
I don’t fault whomever sharpened that, they probably have many satisfied customers. That’s all most folks want on their Chicago Cutlery. Maybe he should have told the knife owner that he wasn’t the right guy for the job but in the end taking your Manix to the guy at the flea market was a bad call.
Would you take your Audi A8 to the cheapest mechanic in town? Would you take you vintage S&W revolver to the cheapest gunsmith you can find? Those mobile sharpening services do what most people want which is putting quick edges on cheap knives.
The only person I sharpen knives for is my mom. I need to get her a couple really good knives and make her toss the rest. Even after divesting/downsizing, we still have too many kitchen knives; I’d be better off with duplicates of the ones I use the most, and none of the others. A bread knife, medium/large santoku, a 4” paring knife, and a chef’s knife will get it all done.
I wouldn't recommend throwing it away. There is still hard steel, well treated, attached to a handle. It just needs someone with the right equipment and technique to remove the over-heat, thin the edge, and actually sharpen it. It would then be useable as a knife, useable to practice sharpening on....and a constant reminder of the lesson.
I bet there are knife makers around that could do the job, although I would not expect them to do it for free. Hourly shop rates are always higher for makers fixing other peoples' mistakes than they are when the maker is doing their own thing.
As a teen I took a pair of scissors I used for fly tying to the local sewing shop to sharpen, they used a high speed grinder and took off too much metal. Fortunately they were not expensive, but I would expect that the mobile sharpener would have the same reaction, that the job they did was perfectly satisfactory for the rest of their customers.
1 - Yesterday night, while in the kitchen, my wife told me her favorite knife was our son's knife, a knife he uses from when he was 3 years old (he'll be five in a couple of months). That is a rounded tip, serrated and blunt Victorinox paring knife.
2 - My mum has a set of never sharpened (very blunt) knives. I recall there are bent tips and portions of the edge on several of them. On the opportunity to have free new knives, she told me she doesn't want to change them, as they are very good.
That said, what happened to that Manix is a crime.