A method for shaving and shave grinding tooth flanks of cylindrical workpiece gear wheels, especially, flank-line modified gear wheels, and for profiling tools needed for shave-grinding cylindrical workpiece gear wheels. During the machining of gear wheels, certain areas of the gear wheel need to be machined more so than other areas, meaning that some areas require more material to be removed than other areas. As a result, certain areas of the tool are not uniformly worn, but rather the area of the tool which removes the most material is worn more quickly than other areas of the tool. Similarly, if certain areas of the gear wheel are harder than other areas, the tool performing the actual machining will wear at a corresponding rate. The present invention avoids such non-uniform wear by providing greater areas of cutting surface on the tool performing the actual machining in the positions which are required to remove the most material, or which are required to machine the hardest surfaces of the workpiece.