Well I received mine last week and took it out for a test drive today. Whilst it was send from within the UK it came in a brown box with Chinese writing a plenty!
Firstly, I think the build quality is superb and the angles have colour coded graduations almost identical to the Edge Pro Apex system. All the parts are solid and work smoothly and the bag is quite robust and good quality so for a Chinese knock off it's got 10/10 so far.
I took two knives to run the test; one being a Mora Companion and the other a Condor Bushlore. I decided to alter the grind on the Mora slightly and set to work.
The stones are supplied with a small bottle of oil which I used. I'm not a fan of oil as it's messy and I'll stick to water next time and use the oil to put a thin layer on the carbon blades before packing them away.
The stones are in 4 grits; 180,400,800 & 1500 so to begin I used all 4 in order.
I found that the stones take off metal real quick and real easy, but I didn't like the end result at all. After working on both knives I couldn't get a paper-cutting edge on either knife even after spending extra time on the 1500 grit. I know 1500 isn't that fine a grit (certainly not compared to Japanese water stones), but I expected a better edge prior to stropping anyway.
After this disappointment I dug out my DMT diamond stones and decided to try these using this system. I have the DMT Aligner Deluxe Kit which comes with a snap on holder for the 4 inch stones and I found this worked very well using this knock-off guide. Anyone who has used THIS DMT system will know that the knife clamp supplied with it is a load of plastic poo (unlike the Lansky holder) and doesn't last 5 minutes, so I was glad to find I could combine both systems.
A few strokes with my diamond stones and the edges were having paper sheets as I expected.
So in my view, the stones supplied are pretty course and rubbish but overall I'm happy with the system for £30. It works with my DMT stones and I'll cut some blank holders soon to tape down various grades of micromesh to enhance it further.
Anyone else tried this system?
