robinf51•12d agoMost Upvoted

Update: tried whittling with a cheap knife instead of my good one

I grabbed a $5 knife from the hardware store on a whim last Saturday to carve a small bird, figuring it would be junk but I didn't want to dull my good blade on pine. The edge held up way better than I expected and actually got sharper after a few strokes on a ceramic mug. Has anyone else had a cheap tool surprise them like that?

3 comments

3 Comments

the_thea12d ago

Ha! My buddy bought a $3 chisel and it's still going strong five years later.

phoenix_grant3412d ago

Did he actually use that chisel for anything more than opening paint cans or scraping stickers off glass? Because there's a big difference between "still works as a paperweight" and "still holds an edge after chiseling oak or concrete." Cheap steel usually goes soft fast, so if he's actually using it to cut wood or stone, I'd be shocked if it didn't need sharpening every five minutes. Five years of real use on a three dollar chisel sounds like a fairy tale to me. Either he barely touched it or his idea of "going strong" is pretty loose.

jana_hart1812d ago

Ha, that's awesome! I once got a dollar store screwdriver that stripped after like two turns, so I guess you got lucky lol. My cheap luck usually runs out way faster than that.