# Review/Project Knife



## ModRQC (Oct 9, 2020)

Review/Project Knife

So I went down to Lee Valley tools a couple weeks ago. There’s only one of these in Québec, located near Montréal. I was aiming to shortcut shipping delays and get that Sigma #240. At the same time I was curious to see what was in store there.







We can clearly see a foreign box lurking there with the Sigma. The title of the thread is sure to be indicative. I also bought a knife – and let’s start with the worst:






When I had it in hand in the store, combined with that sticker, I almost decided against buying it. Took a moment to get over the bad first impressions and decide it could still be an interesting purchase in the end. There was some kind of insinuating thought there that perhaps this could be a cheap Victorinox-ballpark carbon steel knife. Curiosity got the best of me. Wouldn’t know what good it really was until I could mess around some with it.

Almost 80$ down all in, about 10-20$ more than average CAD priced Victorinox 8” online. Unknown pretended carbon steel knife made in China – like stamped in China. Had to trust Lee Valley on this, and as unboxing, I thought why not an informal review.

*Lee Valley Peasant – Carbon Large Chef 210mm *(Made in China)
360 / 215 / *215 *… *56* / 49 / 30 … *2.2 */ 1.9 / 1.5 / *0.8 *… *0 *… *223g *… ***

Long *(Total/Blade/Edge)… *High *(Heel/Half/Tip -35)…* Thick *(Heel/Half/Tip -35/Tip -10)…* 
Balance *(Chin = 0)… *Weight*_…* Cutting OOTB *_( *** Poor* ** *Avg **** *Good* ***** Great)

So here… Box would be a 1/1, it’s sober and perfect friction fit, knife has its VCI fold and a LOT of oil on the blade, and is neatly tucked enough that it won’t budge and could take all kinds of package dropping without suffering any serious blow since the blade is suspended. Anyway, I’m pretty sure you can throw this bare knife to a concrete wall for kicks and not harm it much. The handle will actually bounce.










Blade would be 0.5/2. Not only it’s obviously of no soulful making, but the spine is almost sharper than the edge, and “choil” pretty much the same, although in this case not a problem since there’s not any finger about to nest there. At least it doesn’t have a full finger guard, and is cut right (well, profile not withstanding).






Finish would be 0.5/2 – it looks the same than my Cuisinart Chef that I now use to cut ungodly stuff. Only Victorinox that I know of grinds a blade nicely in that kind of price range and even higher. However it makes for rather simple maintenance even as a carbon steel (if it was indeed one) hence the half point.

Profile sure is a zero score; grind and geometry, while nothing spectacular, were strangely akin with a Victorinox, with some attempt at convexity and somewhat thinner behind the edge too – nice for the price. However, in cutting, I could feel some inconsistencies behind the edge, especially a thickening somewhere mid-blade to tip, that all needed to be addressed with some liberal thinning.






Handle would probably be a 1/2 with a severe critique of its bulk, but still ok looking for its rustic intentions, resin impregnated and about indestructible, consistently shaped and pretty comfortable in the hammer grip the target customer would be inclined to use. Balance close to the heel enough. It could have been worse, much worse, seeing how they almost grew a whole synthetic tree out of that tang, leaves and all. A comfortable enough hammer-pinch grip was all I needed to test this knife some anyway.






Overall score would hence have been something like *4/10*. And if compared to a Victorinox purely on the usual terms of my reviews, then it sucks amazingly.







What kind of strange literature is this? I guess we never understood the traditional 60* angle of approach when sharpening correctly. It doesn’t have anything to do with the approach of the blade to the stone, it’s all about the other way around… Enlightening! Away with this though…






OOTB edge meeting “average” requirements, quite ill-sounding paper cutting, but still cutting readily enough for the average marking – I mark Poor those that don’t cut anything much.

I had cut an onion to test edge and general performance, and some garlic too, also trying to see, was this truly carbon steel or just cheap… unknown steel. Hard to say, this was no strong reactivity nor patina, but there was a tendency for sure, and it appeared very quickly. And the heel of this thing was liable to gouge a cutting board.


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## ModRQC (Oct 9, 2020)

First and foremost, I had to modify that tip (if nothing else because the knife resembled my Cuisinart just too much), and round the heel.









The latter obviously was a matter of 30 seconds, but the tip took about 40 minutes to get where I wanted, started on SP320 and finished on NP800. I took a leaf out of Victorinox’s book for the heel – minimal, simple, effective, almost not showing.









I had dulled the OOTB edge first on the side of the NP800. Once the tip rebuilt, I used the dry NP800 to give the knife a quick and dirty edge within two minutes. Deburring was excessively easy, edge was much keener than OOTB, and it behaved like I’d expect a carbon to. Very pleased with the easiness of sharpening– even stamped the carbon steel here (possibly SK5 but I have no reliable source) was more than good enough for what I had in mind: a joy to sharpen compared to a Victorinox, capable to take a keen edge so easily.






The night after the edge was dulled once again, and time for some thinning, focusing on bringing the whole mid to tip area on par with the rest of the blade – for all the faulty aspects of this knife this thickening was the worse. Minor low spot near the heel, I stopped when it started to scratch as I was starting to get close to dangerously thin by then– at 15mm over the edge it’s not a problem neither.









Gave it another quick edge and went to cut half an onion to garnish some frozen 4 meats pizza – late and lazy supper – and this time around got a full-blown start of a real patina. Still mild considering the ingredient. Almost unnoticeable discoloration of the onion near the root. Performance was pleasing enough – now a fine cutter for the price and not too bad with food release.






All there was left to do was to sand it enough that it didn’t look terrible, and give it a true edge. Probably etch it too since I had in my mind to “lend” this knife to my Paderno friend, get his “regular uncaring knife user” impressions, and see if he would come around to treat it right or would mess up the edge or something before long. I would at least make sure the blade would resist better to such occasions he would leave it laying around dirty or wet.


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## ModRQC (Oct 9, 2020)

Final result is pretty self-explanatory: I sanded, etched and sharpened the knife. It was so thin it was ridiculously easy to give it just but a very slight edge – but a very fine one too. Took 5 minutes on the NP800 to do the bulk, then a couple of minutes each the SP2K and SP5K finished the job. I really think I never encountered a knife so easy to deburr before. Any of Swedish Carbon, White #1-2, Blue #2, V-Toku is of the same ballpark more or less, although I guess it’s fair to assume that this one here is well below 60HRC which explains the even easier sharpening.






Very slight edge…






Tip perfectly reprofiled…






Spine chamfered and smoothed…






Rounded heel…






Profile comparison…






Final word: the conclusion from my review was that compared to a Victorinox, and with only the usual points I review, this knife isn’t a very interesting option regarding fit and finish, profile and grinding, or handle. It’s only real advantage is to be thinner behind the edge than the Victos usually come, but sadly the grind isn’t nowhere near as consistent and makes that thinness a moot point if one won’t thin it anyhow to correct the bevels.

However, to my eye and heart at least, once a few things are corrected I think it sure does a hell of a competition to the Victorinox Rosewood – and if my usual reviews had a score on sharpenability this knife here would blow out of the water pretty much any knife that came into my hands so far. In my mind, it being carbon and behaving like a nice carbon does just makes it shine.

It is now in the hands of my Paderno friend. Reports so far have been enthusiastic. Some surprise with reactivity on his behalf – I really didn’t prepare him much but to say maintenance was crucial. He did let it aside, dirty with meat juices, for a good while before cleaning. No biggie, some more darkish patina, still cuts fine. I explained why and what was to be expected, and he didn’t feel the need to ask me anything since. I still have to see how it really maintains a working edge, and he’ll be a good test of that.

For someone akin with western profile and bulk there is nothing wrong with this knife – when he looked upon it first, he immediately thought this was good ****. Of course, I had worked on it, but he very probably would have reacted the same had I just cleaned and sharpened it. At least THIS one of his rather poor set I’ll be very happy to sharpen when the time comes. Return of the prodigial son or whatever…

So is it a good knife in the end? Not for any one of us I suspect, and not for your average “customer Joe won’t spend much over the cheapest prices and will treat it wrong anyhow”.

Does it beat a Victorinox? Probably it can’t for quality and consistency reasons – and with any customer in mind, steel. Paderno friend is my friend and will listen to me, and I will monitor progression closely for a while. Normal circumstances we wouldn’t want to be so involved with a simple customer. Victorinox can get pretty keen and sharp for soft SS, is low maintenance which is likely to be the MOST important aspect with this kind of customer, will take kindly to some abuse, ill cutting techniques, and misuse of a cheap honing rod.

A good uncaring friend’s knife? Yes, absolutely! Won’t be no drama if he decides to cut bone with it… will make my input a 5 minutes sharpening once in a while, hassle free, if he treats it right. And I’m quite sure, after the first surprise, that he’s treating it just fine by now. Seems in love with it – so be it, I won’t claim it back.






Be well folks!


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