Smith's Pocket Pal Knife Sharpener

I bought this spruce, little instrument in June 2011. At two years old, and used almost every time I use my kitchen knives, it is safe to say that this is a very durable piece of equipment and worthy of a five-star rating from me without any equivocations. I liked the first one so much that I bought another one. I keep one around my neck on a lanyard when I go on outdoor outings; hunting, camping, rambling, trekking etc. And I keep the other on my kitchen worktop, handy for sharpening my Santokus and other culinary blades in my kitchen collection. Both are still in perfect working condition and have retained their nifty appearance as well. The diamond rods on both sharpeners still snap into place in the opened position and in the closed position as faultlessly as they did when they were new. They keep all of my knives very sharp. I highly recommend this neat, effective, little tool.

This thing seems a bit cheap feeling at first glance, however using it, it feels well made, and does an excellent job of removing a dull edge and bringing a knife back to life. Very handy little thing to have and takes up virtually no space at all.

I have to say that when it comes to sharpening knives I just don't have the knack for it. I even have a professional butchers steel for sharpening kitchen knives. I look pretty good swishing the blade up and down the steel, but the knife always remains as blunt as a butter knife. So if you are using my review as a guide as to buy this sharpener or not, bear in mind my lack of skills for sharpening a knife.I have tried a few stones and sharpeners in my time and they give mixed results. This one is no different, for someone who hasn't got a clue, it does a reasonable job of removing nicks in the blade and honing it back to something that can make a reasonable cut. I gather that by the size of this it is mostly for pocket knives more than keeping a professional set of cookware knives in working order. I have used it on a few occasions for a kitchen knife and it has kept it sharp enough to prepare veggies and slice up the Sunday roast - yes I am that 1 knife does all person. I have used it mainly for keeping a range of pocket knives in a reasonable condition.I can't say I have been able to get the blades back to their factory shipped, sharp enough to shave with condition, but that could be my fault. That being said this is easy to use and can recover a blade as long as it is not too badly blunted.The instructions are simple enough. a few draws through on carbide to rough sharpen and then finish of with the ceramic. The spike is for serrated blades which I found was OK for cleaning up a few blemishes, but again due to my lack of skills I was unable to get a particularly razor sharp finish, but it was good enough for what I needed.This isn't one of the best quality build sharpeners I have seen, but it isn't bad given the current price tag of under 10GBP.

Handy wee tool that I keep in my backpack to sharpen my Leatherman Wave, its lightweight and works perfectly for a quick sharpen on the go, it has an attachment to sharpen a serrated blade, one of the main reasons I bought the tool. I wouldn't buy this if you need to sharpen a few blades and sharpen regularly but Ok for a quick sharpen once or twice on your travels

I got this in the post very quickly and after viewing on You tube how best to use it gave it a try, This is a very good Knife Sharpener very easy to use and giving Knifes sharpened by it a very Sharp edge, which is Great for use in the Kitchen preparing different varieties of food. It also has a Diamond Sharpener that really helps finishing off the Sharpening process to get a very sharp lasting edge, This is well worth the money I paid for it.

I bought this hoping to recapture the edge on my Swiss Army Knife. It is sharp but I don't think anything will ever restore the knife back to the Inox edge it had when I bought it. Also it would be handy if one could purchase replacement ceramics.

bought as replacement for my previous knife sharpener. This is a great tool. Nice and small, fits in any kit.Sharpens any and all blades and is perfect for my hook blade for box opening.Great little device that I would highly recommend.

Very compact (good thing), and does the job to a reasonable standard, however, this sharpener will NOT get your fine edge blade to as sharp a finish as some other products available. I have 2 victorinox Swiss Army knives of exactly the same model (don't ask why!), one I sharpened with the Pocket Pal, the other I sharpened with the AnySharp (available on Amazon), and even with Pocket Pal's ceramic part which AnySharp doesn't have, the knife sharpened with the latter performed better after testing the two. However the Pocket Pal does include a rod for sharpening serrated edges and could be easily taken anywhere where as the AnySharp is a little bulkier.