I love OtterBoxes.Derrick and Wendy Bohn, proprietors of KnivesShipFree, love these bulletproof little cases, too, and they keep inventing new ways to carry and use them -- the KSF Leather Holt, the KSF Fire Kit and now the KSF Complete Sharpening Kit.
The sharpening kit is an OtterBox 2000 stuffed with an assortment of edge-maintenance supplies: a two-sided leather hone, 20 strips of sandpaper (four each of five different grits) and two half-sticks of stropping compound (one black, one green). With the hone, compound and a couple of strips of each grit onboard, there's still room left for a small crock stick and a Sharpie.
The KSF kit is both tidy and capable, and using it is easy. If basic stropping is all that's required, simply load the leather hone with compound, set it into the rectangular recess on the top of the closed OtterBox and strop away -- black first, followed by green. For more aggressive sharpening, lay a strip of the desired grit of sandpaper over the leather hone, tuck the ends inside the OtterBox and close the lid to hold it in place.The stropping method, by the way, isn't just for convex grinds. This morning I used the KSF kit to restore my trusty Victorinox Farmer to working sharpness. (I'd rolled the edge last week while cutting some cable, and yeah, it was the wrong tool for that job.) Just 20 minutes' attention with the finer grits and both compounds brought the knife back to the way I like it (as well as nudging the beveled edge toward convex).
It's tempting, I think, to see a compact kit like this only as a take-along thing, but the KSF Complete Sharpening Kit has more than enough muscle to handle 90% of the sharpening I do at home. It's a winner, a keeper and a bona fide bargain.
Earlier postsImpressions: KSF Fire Kit
Impressions: KSF Leather Holt
Sharps: 'From the Edge'
Links
KnivesShipFree
KSF Sharpening Videos
