$6 Smaller knife
Up to 10cm long.
Tired of blunt kitchen knives?
Let me get those knives back to as-new for you.
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Pricing
Pretty simple. Small knives and big knives. There is no need to over complicate things.
Have something else, sure lets have a chat.
$8 Bigger knife
10cm to 30cm long.
Other Sharps
$6 Secateurs
$8 Axe
$8 Garden shears
$8 Kitchen scissors
Repairs
Typically same cost as the sharpening. So for a small would be $6 to repair and then $6 to sharpen
My Service
Pretty simple. I sharpen straight edge sharps. This is the normal assortment of Chef, Utility, Santoku, Cleaver, Paring, Filleting, Brisket... and lots of other names encompassing sharp stuff used in the kitchen to prepare food.
Kitchen scissors, secateurs, garden shears, long swords, axes, etc are all good too. Fundamentally its just an edge with a unique bevel angle and unique sharpening style making them fiddly to dissemble / maneuver.
✅ Standard Kitchen Knives, Scissors, and Secateurs.
Chef, Utility, Santoku, Cleavers, Paring, Filleting, Brisket, Leatherman, Pocket. Anything with a straight edge out to about 40cm.
My happy place to whisk whisk away with the stones.
✅ Slightly Damaged Knife
Small damage I'm happy to repair. Stuff like
- 1mm-2mm nicks in the face
- dished out blades where I can file it back to a true face
- broken tips which you simply want filed to a safe/blunt tip
✅ Group Bookings
For group bookings (eg unit complex) I'm happy to pack up the workshop and come to you for a day (Friday, Saturday, or Sunday). I would need access to power, some shelter, and your assistance communicating with tenants.
❌ Badly Damaged Knife
Major damage (say more than 2mm deep) or bent blade, sorry this will require shop attention from the bigger operators. I am happy to recommend folks that can assist you.
❌ Specialised Sharps
I'm unable to take on bread knives, professional working scissors, swords, high-tensile combat knives, hook knives, swords and other oddities. Basically stuff that needs specialised gear or isn't legal to carry around (eg a Hattori Hanzō katana). Roughly these items are
- doesn't have a smooth cutting face
- super hard needing specialist gear
- tight bends
- sharpening from unusual angles
- I'm not comfortable sharpening
Gallery of sharps
Some of the knives which have come over the bench
Opening Hours and Drop-Off/Collection
This is a by-appointment service. I do not have a walk-up storefront. Give me a call or drop me a message and I'm sure we can work out something.
This is a side hustle to my day job, which means I'm unable to do a
day-service during most weekdays. With a mix of work-from home (myself or partner), working in
the city, and cycling to/from the city... there's plenty of ways we can coordinate our movements.
Some people drop / collect from my place.
Some I've cycled to them at 7am / 5pm to their place.
Some we've met in the city during our lunch breaks.
Some I meet before / after their shift in the kitchen.
Its not an
insurmountable problem for us to solve with a quick chat. Quite often households will plan around not having their knives for a night, eg will go out, eat left-overs, or use the dodgy old 5th best serrated knife.
Weekdays
An overnight service so will sharpen roughly 5pm to 8pm.
I do have a fortnightly Friday RDO, which providing I've nothing planned means I can do a day-service.
Weekends
Providing I've not got something booked / planned, am generally happy to commit to a daytime service.
Ball park 9am to
How Do I Sharpen Knives
This is a by-hand process using a guided system where I'll typically spend 10-15 minutes per knife. Ultimately its not Its not rocket science, its patience and being methodical to suit each knife shape, the steel type, and its current condition.
Honed Edge started its life using the Hapstone guided system and over time have upgraded to a pair of Tormek wheels to reduce the time per knife. For the majority of knives I continue to use the guides, primarily because I like ensuring a consistent edge angle across the face, and not an approximate/variable edge profile.
I did have visions of starting a market-stall, however changing community attitudes and laws that apply to knives in public spaces have largely killed that idea. You'll probably have noticed the "knife vans" that used to frequent markets disappeared. Its technically not illegal to run a stall or carry a knife for a valid business reason.... but its definitely frowned up and becomes challenging for everyone's duty of care.
If knife isn't good enough to hang on my wall, then the job isn't done.
Traveling in With Knives
This is the Police bit to protect us both. You can with a valid business reason travel with a knife. BUT, and the big BUT, it needs to be done responsibly and in a way to not alarm the public or gain you undue attention. Please see the Police web-link below for the actual wording. I trade as a business and my ABN 55 335 016 077.
When traveling with your knives, please wrap them in a tea-towel. This protects the knives from damaging each other, injury to you (or others), and demonstrates to the Police that you are being responsible (should it occur). Having the tea-towel also means I can re-wrap and protect them for the homeward journey. You can then enjoy that as-new edge without them being unduly blunted in transit.
Playing with your knife on the train, tied to your leg like a cowboy .... I expect you'll be talking to Police quicker than you'll be talking to me. And to honest, I won't be comfortable taking the knives off you to then be arrested myself
Jack's Law.
You should be aware of Jacks Law which gives Police additional search powers on public transport and public density areas for knives.
You need a valid business reason to have a knife in public. I run as a registered business (ABN 55 335 016 077) which should qualify as your business reason. See the commentary above about being responsible which along with being upfront, polite, and honest with the Officer should ease any tension. Remember a knife is considered a 'weapon' and it is entirely reasonable for the Officer to behave as such, until you give them reason to relax. Give them lip, and things will justifiably go south very quickly.
Knife Care
Some suggestions to prolong the cutting edge on your knives.
Hand wash only, the dishwasher is abrasive and will dull the edge
Avoid cutting on hard surfaces like glass, granite, and ceramic. Cutting boards (wood and plastic) are ideal.
Store your knives in a block (edge up) or on a magnetic wall strip. Bouncing around in the top drawer will dull the edge, and for freshly sharpened knives likely to be a cut-risk for careless hands
Rinse and wipe after cutting acidic or salty foods (tomatoes, citrus, cured meats)
Use the right knife for the job. Paring and carving knives have a fine edge (less durable) for slicing. Cleavers and utility knives have a broad edge (more durable) for chopping and hard produce (raw pumpkin).
About Me
Long winded, apologies in advance.
What I've learned after using cheaper blades for most of my life... is they're actually ok. Yes you must give them a bit of love every month as they won't hold an edge like better steel, but like all tools if you maintain the tool then it will keep working. In a way, this is ok (for me) because I get enjoyment from sharpening the knives. 🙂 Would I replace them if they broke, hells yes in a heart beat. Some of the knives that come through my hands for sharpening are outright beautiful, feel amazing in the hand, and cut so so nice.
Years ago, a good 20yrs ago, I was given a double sided sharpening stone for Christmas and my old father in-law chiseled out a nice wooden box for it. I used it, and if we're honest, I was pretty crap at it. I'd try to image "halving" the blade angle 90 to 45 to 22.5 and then working the blade just old-timers would tell me to. The result was sort-of ok but nothing to boast about.
A bunch of years later I got more curious and while on a US work trip picked up a little Lanksy kit and made myself a wooden jig to suit different knives in the house.The result was actually pretty good and I had a consistent and decent edge. I was mostly content that I was most-of the way towards emulating TV chefs (in cutting, not cooking).
Roll forward to 2022, back end of the Spicy Cough. My two jigs worked well, but the limitations where playing on my mind as I learned more about the craft. Read, watched, and learned a bunch more on my options and chose a non-mechanical setup (longer term I can envisage mechanical gear, a van, a stall at weekend markets...), and bought a Hapstone rig. I liked that it had a flip-flop mech, I liked that it had a long reach so bigger blades could be done in a single pass, and I liked I had a way of knowing the angle to ensure every knife could (not should) be different. I bit the bullet, love it, and my knives stepped up an order of magnitude in their sharpness.
Being candid. There is something really pleasing about getting a tool of the wall, knowing its at the peak of its game, and slicing up tucker so easily. There's no second guessing about the sharp vs dodgey knives, its purely which knife is best shaped to the task.
Ok so this is all fine and dandy. I enjoy having a sharp set of knives on the wall, I enjoy keeping them sharp, and have a neat rig to do so.... but I get to play with the rig about once a month (for the cheap knives), and I absolutely will not stoop to blunting my knives purely sate my weirdness. Badda boom badda bing and a synapse storm later, Honed Edge is a thing. For what I think is a reasonable cost for hand stone sharpening, I get to do something I enjoy more often, I can buy the odd coffee or lunch at work guilt free, and you bring a whole heap of zip back to your kitchen tools.
Roll forward a couple more years and I've moved to a mechanical setup with a couple Tormek machines. The goal remains the same, enjoy the craft, bring some zing back to your kitchen, and feed my guilt free coffee (and the odd muffin) addiction back into other small businesses.
You might see me at the odd Repair Cafe too, donating my time and prattling away with the lovely folks who come through.
Thanks for your patience reading my little story :) Jeff
photo: showing my "sharp" dance moves while volunteering at a community event.
