Sharpener?

I use whetstones.  1000 grit, 6000 grit, 16,000 grit....though it takes forever to use whetstones properly, but once you grab a hold of the concept, your knives will be razor sharp and no need to take them in for sharpening!

I have been using Spyderco Tri angle Sharpmaker since 1985 for all my knives and scissors.  I use Whetstones for other tools and am comfortable sharpening knives on them also.

The Sharpmaker is my choice for knives though.  They have no learning curve and with regular use will keep knives very sharp with just a few minutes a day or week, home cook/ pro cook.  They are available from Walmart for $56.00.  There are some Youtube videos demonstrating them also.  I never use a steel I just give the knife a couple strokes on the Sharpmaker.

Good luck there are many correct answers to this question.

i use machine

masterchef 130

we have a couple of differnt guys come in and do our knives about once a month.....bothe had some good and not so good results, A triple stone is what I have been use to in the past but some type of machine would be nice and alot cheaper in the long run...just wondering if anyone else has had some experience with other machines and with technology movig so rapidly I would think they would have come along way since the Ron Popile shapener

I just use an old fashion wet stone with a 1500 and a 2000 side. i got a 6000 grit one too.  I also have a guy come in and put the edge back on my guys knives once every quarter.  But for the most part we all try to maintan our knives with the wet stones or a butchers steel.  i like the F dick steels the best and find that they work great for the Sabatier and Kikuichi knives that i have. Once you get the knack for the wet stones you can get your knives pretty f n sharp.   Never had any luck with those ceramic things.

Z

I use an Edgepro Apex 3. I read about it on cheftalk, and decided to give it a try. It's not cheap, around $225, but it comes with 5 stones, 120, 220, 320, 600, 1000, and it's easy to mantain a consistent angle, which is one of the most important things when sharpening. The grits on the stones are not standard, but you can look them up on the net and see how they compare to others.

The only complaint that I have is everybody wants me to sharpen their knives for them now, or they want to borrow it.  I just have to tell most folks that I don't have the time, or that it's too expensive to loan out. I really like it a lot, and would highly recommend it to anyone looking to sharpen their knives accurately and reliably.

After many years of strictly using stones, I finally broke down when I saw a commercial grade Chef's Choice 2000 for a ridiculously low price on Ebay.

It takes me to about 80-85% of where I want to be in less than a minute with very minimal stock loss, after that I take it the rest of the way with a few stokes on my 8000 grit King waterstone.

Gives my knives a great edge that (could just be my perception) seems to last a little longer as well.

don't want to bump an old topic , but in a pinch I find that the bottom of a ceramic bowl or coffee cup work amazing! , around the bottom where it isnt glossed the hard ceramic is exposed , with the right angle of attack, you can put a decent edge of your blade. Any one else ever done this in a pinch at work to get a good edge ?, and the honing of a steel jus wont cut it ? this clearly isnt the best option lol clearly but with practice it comes in pretty handy in the middle of a rush and you pick up a dull knife supplied by the company.
 

I tuned my pocket knives on the bottom of corningware coffee cups for years.  

Bottom of a coffee cup?  Sounds weird and awesome.  Anyone have a method or demo link they could provide?  I'm in a kitchen where we can't get a guy in to sharpen our blades, but I carry a little sharpener (forget the name, but Ruth Reichel recommended it) in my toolbox and seems to do the trick temporarily. 

Posted by Deborah452 

It's a very old trick, the equivalent of using an extremely coarse steel.  It doesn't actually sharpen so much as turn your knife into a POS saw. 

BDL

whetstones are great. but they are time consuming to do correctly. 

What i've opted to do is take a lesser quaility knife and use a ceramic diamon steel. The type of knife you buy is important. I use a I.O.Shen, shun are the same i think. But basically they have two pieces of soft steel wedged around a piece of harder steel. It makes sharpening a breeze. So yeah, i guess i went for a knife thats easy to sharper, rather than buying the proper sharpening equipment.

So i use that knife for my bulk work, i treat it really badly and my ceramic steel sharpens it up well enough for kitchen use.

I also have a damascus blade for any fine work i do. For that i use whetstones. If you take the time to get the edge with whetstones, the edge seems to last forever. I usually spend around 1 hour working on it and won't have to work on it for months.