Should I exchange this knife? (Pics, wavy blade)

First time poster, American living in Finland, and culinary student here. After much contemplation I decided to purchase a K Sab Au Carbone 10" chef's knife as my first real chef's knife. (Guess who's posts I've read a lot of...) While I'm quite happy with the feel of it, upon further inspection I have my concerns about the straightness of the blade. This will also be my first foray into freehand sharpening, fwiw.

I took some pictures on a piece of glass to hopefully illustrate the curve to the blade. I couldn't manage a picture looking at the tip and down the blade, but it's very obvious in that direction that there is one long arc along the spine and two waves along the edge. But I don't know. You tell me. Should I return the knife? How straight is "straight" when it comes to knives? I purchased it straight from the sabatier.us website, btw.

tl;dr: is this blade straight enough to freehand sharpen without trouble or do I exchange it?

Spine of the knife, tip to the left.

Close up of the spine.

Hard to tell(?), but the blade is touching the glass both to the left and right of the gap.

Belly of the blade flat along the glass, starts to curve up after 6 inches or so.

Knife held the other way, edge starts to curve up after a couple of inches.

Blade is touch just to the left and right of the picture.

Thanks BDL, concise enough for me.

Hopefully I didn't shoot myself in the foot by taking oil coating off and getting a hint of patina along the blade before even thinking of checking the blade. Rookie excitement, what can I say.

Quote:

Originally Posted by boar_d_laze 

Whose posts?

 

Exchange it.

 

Good luck with the cooking and with the knives.  Watch out though, carbon Sabs can become an addiction.

 

BDL

Sorry, missed the first part of your comment somehow. Mainly your posts and a few others with nary a sight of a negative comment towards the brand. Plus at 61 euro it's hard to argue with the value of the knife and the maintenance needs fall in line with my meticulous nature. 

I sent the knife back today. I wrote to them over the weekend and again on Wednesday and didn't hear anything back, so I just stuck it in the mail today hoping for the best. Of course, when I come home and write an email explaining that I've returned the knife I get a response in minutes. I don't suspect anything fishy, it was simply amusing. Hopefully everything works out; I'll update here later.

Jim, that's a great inscription, thanks for sharing.

BDL, I've been pretty bad at detecting even goopily thick written sarcasm this week. It's one of the perils of non-stop scouring the internet for culinary supplies I suppose.

Replacement knife arrived in the mail yesterday along with freebie tomato knife for my troubles. I sharpened it last night (separate King 1k and 6k stones) and it took a pretty good edge despite my less than stellar sharpening skills. 2.5 kg of yellow onions later and it's starting to have a pretty solid patina already. 

How have I not read anything about waterstones grinding through flesh when using one's thumbs as guides? It makes sense now, sure, but ouch!