The sharpener has one one round fine ceramic rod that is set at a 22 degree angle which can be flipped from side to side to enable honing both sides of the edge. The base is made of simple plastic with a hand guard. The hone can be folded inside the base for storage and in its packed down state the system is about 1x1x6" .
The surface of the ceramic honing rod is quite even, there are no bumps or holes to catch and marr an edge and the rod is perfectly straight. It produces a very fine finish, with micro teeth smaller than a 4000 grit Japanese waterstone. The polish is easily the equal of the better production knives like Spyderco. The rod does however load up quite quickly, and like all ceramic hones cleans easily with an abrasive cleaner and a scrub pad.
Having to flip the hone from side to side is annoying, however this only has to be done on every stroke on the final stages. The hone is also fairly short which means larger blades have to be sharpened in sections. The rod is also very thick (1/4") so fine serrations cannot be sharpened. The biggest drawback is that there is only one grit, a coarse edge for higher slicing performance [ref] cannot be obtained. It also cuts very slow being so fine a hone and thus is only suitable for applying a micro bevel. It would literally take hours to hone the primary edge bevel on a blunt knife.
It is very cheap, you can find them at flea markets for about $5 CAN . It is very compact, light and thus portable. It easily fits in a large coat pocket and does not produce any heavy drag. The rod is the exact same diameter as common butchers steels, and the large fine DMT rod (600 grit) so both can be swapped in to make a much more versatile product
You can comment on this review by dropping me an email : cliffstamp[REMOVE]@cutleryscience.com or by posting in the following thread on Bladeforums :