Beautiful new knife guide

[grepper]

I wanted to show off my impressive woodworking skills, so lacking a table saw or jigsaw, I hacked this prototype out of an old piece of wood using a full size ax as a chisel, a small sledge hammer to bash on the ax to split the wood, and hand saw. 

I know!...  You are in awe of the fine craftsmanship!  You can tell I have a bright future in handmade fine furniture.

It's pretty obvious how you use it.  Just rest the knife against the guide and sharpen.

It works for any size knife, pen knife, machete etc

I didn't bother to even fasten it to the front of the machine, and just had my wife hold it in position whilst I sharpened a knife.  It worked.  Nice, even, 20 degree bevel.  No slipping down the wheel because it is sharpening into the wheel rotation.

For longer knives you would have to pop off the honing wheel, but that's quick and easy.
It does not interfere with use of the water tray.

Could it use a little refinement?   

You need to be able to adjust the closeness to the wheel.
Adjustable rest angle would be cool.
Needs to be higher on the wheel so the wheel goes slightly behind the bottom of the rest.  This would also probably eliminate the need for popping off the honing wheel.

Anyway, it's a different approach, and for a "slightly" rough prototype, it worked! 

[Rob]

Just needs a nice manufacturers plate that's all....job done :-)

[Colin]

A wedge underneath would adjust the rest angle and could alter the height.

I suggest this could be sold as an additional jig, perhaps the W180, as its a wedge and can alter the angle 180 degrees.

[Herman Trivilino]

Are you sure you didn't train a beaver to make that thing?   

It has a lot of potential.  Nice work.  Maybe there's some way to clamp the base of the jig to the base of the Tormek, that way you wouldn't your wife every time you feel the need to sharpen up!

You could make different jigs for different angles.

[grepper]

She's a beauty, ain't she?   Actually Herman, it was "constructed" using stone knives and bear skins.

I just wondered if that approach would work, and even with my hack job it did.  I'm sure it can be made adjustable in all directions, or even a simple tilt would work as Colin interestingly suggested.

Your tool rest design is so simple and quick to make I don't know if I'll bother playing with this thing, but I was curious to see how that blade orientation would work as far as holding the knife stable during sharpening and providing a perfectly even bevel.

Oh, the wife says thanks for your idea of actually clamping it to the machine. 

[Herman Trivilino]

Your jig has the advantage of being "stand-alone".

[mike40]

Awesome workmanship on this grepper. I love learning from the masters. Where do you source your bear skins? I already bought the knife jig, so I guess I don't need this and besides I don't think I could get my

wife to come into the shop to hold it for me anyway. In fact, right now I can't even get into the shop myself with all the gardening work. Your jig does look like an interesting prototype and if it works well, nothing

better. I love shop made solutions. I suggest you put an extension or a step on the back so you can clamp it to your work surface.

[grepper]

Here is version 3 of the knife rest thing I've been working on.  You can see that it's stuck atop version 2. 

The rest itself is attached with a post on a ball and socket, so loosening the top knob frees the ball to adjust to any angle, 180 degrees front to back.  It also allows the ball to rotate in the socket so alignment with the wheel is easy.

The rail that the head assembly is on is double C channel top and bottom.  Loosening the large nut at the bottom of the head allows the head to glide along the rail so that it's easy to adjust its closeness to the wheel.

Loosening the nut under the rail allows the rail to swing from side to side so that horizontal alignment with the wheel is quick and simple.  Additionally, even with the head locked in position on top, this allows the entire rail/head assembly to slide in and out as a unit.  So not only does that make another quick and easy way to adjust the head proximity to the wheel, it also means that whatever post is holding the rail can be up to 6" away from the machine.  Especially nice for clearing the T7 dredge bucket.

I've just got a piece of cardboard stuck on it as a rest for demo purposes, but I will replace it with a ¼" chunk of plastic, probably from a cutting board.

Obviously this is not at the correct height, so I need to chop off the piece of wood that it is sitting on.  I haven't figured out what I want to do for its final stand, but I want to make it height adjustable.  I may use threaded rod or something like that.

Anyway, a slight improvement over the most beautiful version 1 knife rest. 

[Rob]

Blimey that's brilliant Mark

And if you get bored sharpening things you can plonk your camera on it and start snapping long exposure shots 

[grepper]

Yea, with enough room left over on the rail for a flash head, diffuser and an umbrella.  Funny how they would just slide right on.  You'd almost think it was made for that. 

[Rob]

Well its obvious isn't it!!

The camera companies have been secretly watching you and have perpetrated industrial espionage...I mean it's obvious :-)

[jeffs55]

Is all this because you do not have a knife holder or the edge setter or do you simply want to play? What are the advantages of your design over the factory option?

[grepper]

I have the knife holder and the long knife holder.  None of these works for a machete, pen knife, or lawn mower blade, or very thin blades like you run into with some fillet knives, etc. 

The jig Herman made also works for these.  Tormek also has the Small Knife jig for small knives.  This is just a different approach.

It also shows how versatile the T7 can be.  There is always a way to make it do what you want.

And yes, and maybe more importantly....  I got to play too.

[mike40]

Looks very high tech Mark. Should work fine.

I thought the long knife holder was for filleting knives so I'm wondering why you need something else.

[grepper]

Yes.  The long knife holder works well for long blades, but on very thin (distance from spine to edge) knives I still ran into problems with the jig hitting the wheel when attempting to sharpen at a very small angle, say 15 degrees.

The long knife holder really helps with long knives where the blade thickness, i.e., across the spine, is thin so that there is a lot of lateral flex in the blade.