Guess I’m a retard.. regarding knife sharpener

If you use the right belt, right guide, and right process as shown in the book, you should be okay.
I know I just started wailing away when I got mine, and found it works so much better when you read the directions.

If you’re not getting a burr then you haven’t reached the apex yet. Either doing something wrong or need to keep working each side.

I don’t believe in keeping exact knife angles if I’m gonna be sharpening my own knives. I can consistently keep my knives at whatever angle I work at and keep them sharp this way. If I’m working someone else’s knife I try to keep the angle.

The Green belt will cut anything. Only use that for tools or knives that don't have an edge at all.

The Red belt should be the one you use. Run the knife through 5 times on each side.

After you use the Red then you attach the Purple. Run that through 5 times or so on each side. That should smooth out the edge.

Learn how to do it the old fashioned way.

I should’ve payed more attention when my cousin would show me the old school way.

1. Buy some more belts. There are several places online you can get an assortment of 1/2 x 12 belts. The gap between the red and purple is too big IMO.

2. Get the knife in place before you hit the button. The extra time it spends on the belt as you get it situated can remove some serious metal.

3. I stopped using the guide and freehand mine, running the belt the same way on both sides.

Plenty of knife makers use belt sanders for a convex edge, and the Worksharp minus the guides is just a miniature version of that. Practice on some cheaper knives first and use ceramic crock sticks to hone the blade in between uses or at least occasionally. If you use the Worksharp every time you want to touch up a blade pretty soon they'll all look like fillet knives. Ask me how I know.

Anyone have a problem with it rounding the tip off the end of the blade?
I love mine and use it about twice a year on all my knives but I have noticed it starting to round the tip off some of my skinning knives and it rounded off my bubba blade also

I have rounded the point off several knives How do I avoid this

Yeah I’m going to start sending mine back. I need to get another good one so I can alternate when I send them back.
My buddy is good with the work sharp, I just asked him how he keeps from rounding the tip off and he said when the tip gets to the band, he shuts it off. He said it takes practice to get the timing right.