Kitchen Garden Forum

I agree with PaulW - you use the whet stone(s) first to grind the blade to a sharp edge, then you hone it with the steel. You can't 'sharpen' with a steel, you can only keep it sharp if it's already sharpish. Otherwise you need the stone/grinder to get it sharp first. (Hope that made sense.)

This isn't very helpful but at our local village street market, the person organising it arranges for a knife sharpener man to visit on occasions, especially in the summer months. He does very brisk business with all kinds of sharpening tools. Seems home efforts don't always work very successfully.

I can't speak highly enough of my experience with both work sharp machines. In the beginning the original work sharp was offered to me through the limited 50% program from the NRA. I still have the machine 10yrs later and have NEVER been disappointed. I was offered the Ken Onion machine with and extra sharpening attachment back in May for a good discount, I jumped on it. Both of these machines will get blades of the hardest steels scalpel sharp in minutes.

I use a double side stone too, I'm not the best at sharpening, but it does the job.

I gave half a dozen chef knives to our usual fishmonger and they returned them super sharp. They were rewarded with haggis pasties and egg mayo and bacon sarnies on St Andrew's Day.

I have a silly little steel here. My big steel and whetstone are still in Kyiv.