Hey yogi,
If you're not going to round the spine over yourself, you should contact Harold at MAC USA. Don't minimize the chip by stressing your own supposed fussiness. It's small, but in a really lousy spot -- right where your index finger will drape over it.
However, please take a look at the chip again and ask yourself if it will survive rounding the spine. You really should ease the spine and the back of the blade (some people call the back the "choil") as well. It will make your knife far more comfortable. Do it by clamping the knife in a vise (between sheets of cardboard to protect the blade), with the spine up, then using a strip of medium-coarse sandpaper like a shoeshine cloth over the first couple of inches of spine, until the spine is rounded over. Then use a medium-fine grit paper to buff out the scratches. Turn the knife so it's held vertically, and repeat on the back of the blade.
If you're going to grind the chip out anyway, it's not a reason to return the knife. Otherwise, it just might be.
The "raised" marking on the blade is ink, and will wear off with cleaning.
Japanese knives aren't German knives, and with a very few exceptions they do not come OOTB with well finished edges. A few makers whose output is intended entirely (or almost entirely) for the west -- like Global and Shun -- ship a well finished edge. A few artisan makers also sharpen, probably to prove some sort of artisanal point. Most don't. Good or bad, that's how it is.
It's ludicrous the way some dealers pretend that OOTB Japanese edges are intentional. Most knives which come with any edge at all (if that's what you want to call it) got a couple of swipes on a belt sander or grinder -- just enough to raise a burr; then one of two swipes on the other -- just enough to push it over. If they went one pass on the second side the edge will look as though it were profiled 70/30, two will look 50/50. But really, the knife wasn't meaningfully sharpened nor any symmetry imposed.
It's been awhile since handling a new MAC. I still haven't seen the last one I bought -- a 9.5" Pro like yours -- it was a gift for someone else. But I seem to remember that MACs used to come actually sharpened. Call Harold at MAC USA to find out for sure. In any case, MAC's "sharp out of the box," is nowhere near as sharp as the knife can or should be. These puppies aren't Wusthofs, they're capable of a lot more sharpness than a factory should waste time on.
Your knife might well have been one of those "Friday Afternoon" mistakes which happen in every factory. A nearly finished product gets pushed to the back of the bench with the idea of taking care of it, the problem forgotten over the weekend, it's boxed and shipped on Monday morning. If you do exchange the knife I'm interested in hearing if the replacement's OOTB edge shows more finish and/or sharpness.
Whatever happened in the factory, a knife like yours should not only have a really first class edge put on, but a fairly high degree of polish too. It won't really begin to come into its own until around the 5000# (JIS) level, and will just get better all the way up to 10K or so. Ordinary sharpness for that knife should be "fall through" a cucumber, onion, or tomato. That's not "incredibly sharp, right off the stones," mind you -- it's every day sharp.
MACs function quite well with a flat 15* edge angle, and 50/50 symmetry. You can improve performance a little by thinning the knife to 10* along its entire length, then sharpening to 15* on both sides. A lot of people, me included, call this a 15*/10* double bevel. But so what. A mild asymmetry of around 60/40 will make the knife work a little better without compormising durability or your ability to use a hone.
Once you've resolved the chip issue, for heaven's sake don't be afraid to sharpen your MAC! Putting it off won't make it any easier and in the meantime you're missing quite a bit of what the knife has to offer. Furthermore, it's an easy knife to sharpen and good to learn on.
If you find benchstones too intimidating (you shouldn't), then get an EP or even a Chef's Choice Electric. You need to be able to sharpen your own knife or find someone (who knows how to sharpen Japanese made knives without messing them up) to do it for you.
Same on steeling. There's absolutely nothing to be afraid of. When it needs steeling, steel it. Some rods are more appropriate than others for a knife with as thin and hard an edge as a MAC; but anything no coarser than "fine" or "extra fine" will be just fine for the time being.
Your pal,
BDL
Last edited: Aug 31, 2010
