Knives & Knife sharpening

[Mong.]

Cheers for the advice mate, that was more or less my plan. Unfortunately, I have nothing else to season unless I pick up a bigger one from the commercial kitchenware store I want to duck in to next weekend. Because it's going to be 30+ degrees for the next week, it's going to be a little while until I can get it going. For the most part, it'll get the same level of care I give my carbon steel wok. I rescued that from a cupboard and it's cleaned up nicely, I use grapeseed oil on it now. Dark, shiny, and almost uniformly non-stick. The family have been barked at about that enough times to know how I expect it to be treated, so I'll reinforce that they should do the same with the skillet.

I think this was a resource you or someone else linked too before. I'm going to roughly follow it as a guide, but I'm not convinced that using flaxseed oil (which appears to be steep in price) or repeating the process six times is entirely necessary. I think I'm going to start with three times with either grapeseed or peanut oil, and then see how it looks. I have a big bag of streaky bacon in the freezer to kick off actual cooking with this, enough for three or four batches. I think that should set it up pretty well.

 

[Pjotr]

............You don't seem the type to mess around with forcing a patina, is it naturally starting to come up yet?.........

As I'm in the process of essentially re-doing the grind on this usuba, I'm finding that it is reactive and smells a bit when in use. Makes sense with all that freshly exposed steel coming in to contact with whatever I'm cutting. I'm sure once I've finished, the knife will develop a natural patina. All my other carbon steel ones have.

 

[Mong.]

My beater nakiri is starting to develop one too now, but it's ugly as sin. There are a few nice looking blue patches, but the rest is stained a little yellowy off grey color. My fault for chopping onions and tomatoes, I think.

I was all set to pull the trigger on a Sakai petty because it sounds like you're having a good time with yours, but JCK have released a house range called Gecko. Their petty is $80ish, but it's VG10 damascus steel. There's another range of theirs in a Swedish steel too. My shiny thing syndrome is going crazy...

 

[Pjotr]

..............My shiny thing syndrome is going crazy...

As long as you're not buying stuff just because it's shiny. If it's got a job to do it's justifiable. On the other hand a bit of enabling is always justifiable.

 

[eggbert]

The gecko range has been about for a while, and from memory are being sold under several different brand names.
I know jck don't actually make any of their own knives but the fact they were one of several companies selling the same product put me off when I was looking a couple of years back.

That said, they do look pretty if my memory serves me right and they have the hammered texture above Damascus?

 

[eggbert]

Replying to my own post.

It looks like the gekko is an oem knife rehandled and rebranded by several different companies, and several people have said the same over on the knifeforums. I didn't look to see if the same steel was used below, but examples include
46 Layers Nickel NSW VG-10 Hammered Damascus Petty Fruit Knife 6" (150mm)

Togiharu Hammered Texture Damascus Petty | KORIN

RYUSEN Tsuchime Damascus Series,Japanese Knife,Japanese Kitchen Knife,Japanese Cutlery,Japanese Chef's Knives.Com

Damascus Hammered

I do like the idea of a fish knife though.

japanese knife

 

[Mong.]

Cheers for the links mate, I did a quick search and they have been around a while. Must have missed them when I looked at the JCK site previously. They seem most commonly branded as either Gekko or Togiharu, or no brand name at all. I don't know if there's any actual cutting benefit of the layered damascus steel, or if it's purely a visual thing. Something to research later, I guess. They're a good looking knife though, and a quick Google has given me a pretty positive impression. VG-10 steel and apparently quite thin blades, so if they're similar in geometry to my Tojiro, they'd probably suit me fine. JCK site shows a 50/50 bevel, but a forum post quotes correspondence from Koki at JCK saying it's a 60/40 bevel. A few people say it's actually closer to 70/30 out of the box. That might fuck up my day trying to sharpen it, sounds like a recipe for a headache trying to learn something new and not wreck it's good looks at the same time.

The Kagayaki knives are priced even closer to the stuff Blueway on eBay sells, they look really good too. Good god...what have I done wading in to this?

My dilemma has gone from just choosing between the Tojiro stainless and Sakai carbon, to choosing between those and the Gekko and Kagayaki petty knives too.

Maybe I should just buy a fish knife and be happy.

 

[Pjotr]

........I don't know if there's any actual cutting benefit of the layered damascus steel, or if it's purely a visual thing.......

From what I've read it's purely visual. So's the hammered thing although that's got some origins in blacksmithing and might have been used during manufacture.

........Good god...what have I done wading in to this?

Nothing wrong with buying something you're going to use.

Talking of which, I've now got three full sized sharpening stones with grits of 320, 1200 and 5000 and a coarse grit diamond plate to true them up. All my own and my sons kitchen knives are insanely sharp.

 

[Mong.]

That's pretty much what I've read about damascus steel tonight, so I'll probably write that off and go for either the Sakai or the Kagayaki. Both of them are in the price bracket where I won't feel too bad if I use them to have a go with stones too. I'm thinking I'm gunna turn the Edge Faux over to dad so he gets maximum use out of it, and invest in a 1000 and 4000/6000 set for myself. Freehand sharpening does appear to be a challenge for a newcomer, but as with most things worth learning, worth it in time. I'm going to continue to accumulate a couple more Japanese knives, so I've decided I'll treat 'em right.

Did you get some new stones PJ or have you just expanded on previous ones? Does the diamond plate do the same thing as this or this from Korin?

 

[Pjotr]

That's pretty much what I've read about damascus steel tonight, so I'll probably write that off and go for either the Sakai or the Kagayaki. Both of them are in the price bracket where I won't feel too bad if I use them to have a go with stones too. I'm thinking I'm gunna turn the Edge Faux over to dad so he gets maximum use out of it, and invest in a 1000 and 4000/6000 set for myself. Freehand sharpening does appear to be a challenge for a newcomer, but as with most things worth learning, worth it in time. I'm going to continue to accumulate a couple more Japanese knives, so I've decided I'll treat 'em right.

Did you get some new stones PJ or have you just expanded on previous ones? Does the diamond plate do the same thing as this or this from Korin?

Although I have stones floating around for my woodworking tools, I don't use them the same way. I grind the blades (chisel, plane etc)on a bench grinder and then use the stone in one hand and a blade in the other. Fairly small stones in other words.

I bought all the knife sharpening stones. They're really nice and big. The diamond plate (DMT) I got does the same job as the Korin stone fixers although I will also use it for reprofiling and thinning knives. It's a smaller (6 inch) version which is more than big enough to flatten any stone and not too big to be used for other things.

I really would recommend trying free hand sharpening. It's fun and it's not that hard. Start with a medium grit (1000ish) and see how you go. It's a really useful grit and for all my stainless knives it's perfect. It leaves an evil, sharp, bitey edge on carbon steel.

Personally can't see the need to go past 4000-5000. The Suehiro 5000 I've got produces a mirror like finish as it is. I only really got that one for doing the back of the single bevel knife. Although I've started finishing all the other knives with it too, it's not needed in most cases (just fun to use).

 

[Mong.]

Which one did you opt for in the 1000 stone? I don't think I'd need an arato for a while.

 

[Pjotr]

Which one did you opt for in the 1000 stone? I don't think I'd need an arato for a while.

Well, because there's a really good tool shop just around the corner that stocks King stones, I went for the King 1200 (http://www.carbatec.com.au/japanese-waterstone-1200-grit_c21463). Reasonably priced too. I actually really like it. It does tend to dish and hollow out but if you're careful and turn it lengthwise a few times during a session it's not too bad. Nice feed back, soft and cuts like a champ. I swore I wouldn't need anything coarse for a while too but since I've had this stone (Suehiro 'Cerax' ceramic stone, #320 grit 'single size'. : Tools from Japan, Japanese woodworking tools direct from Japan.) I'm just making up jobs I can do on it. Lovely soft, lots of mud, great sound too. It does dish like a bastard if you're not paying attention but for the occasional arato user it's perfect. I'm using it a lot on my single bevel. Using the side of the stone (!!) to regrind the hollow back (ura) and the normal surface to take out the over grinds on the front face. Works a treat. It's amazing how much work it is even with a 320 grit stone.

 

[Mong.]

That is quite reasonably priced, as cheap or cheaper as anywhere else I've seen online. Is soft a desirable quality in a frequently used stone though?

Did the usaba arrive in poor enough condition that this is necessary, or are you just playing with your toys? :cheesy:

Are you finding that you have to do much more work after the 1200?

Seeing as we're now playing twenty questions, one more. How are you going at maintaining an angle while you sharpen? That's my main concern, and I'm wondering if ponying up for an angle cube or similar makes my $40 investment twice as expensive.

 

[Pjotr]

.........Is soft a desirable quality in a frequently used stone though?

No, not really but with the occasional flatten it works fine. You can just use some wet and dry sandpaper for flattening. It works perfectly. Within reason I'm not too paranoid about dishing.

Did the usaba arrive in poor enough condition that this is necessary, or are you just playing with your toys?

The usuba arrived in a very poor condition. I've only just managed to rectify it. Although I liked playing with the toys, I wouldn't want to do that again in a hurry. Basically re-grinding the hollow back of it took forever and got pretty boring.

Are you finding that you have to do much more work after the 1200?

Depends really. I'm quite happy to leave all my knives at 1200. The standard SS kitchen knives don't really benefit that much from a higher grit. I can feel the difference if I go to 5000 grit on my jap knives but on the other hand the 1200 leaves a nice bitey edge on those too. If you want to be able to slice tomatoes using just the weight of the knife you'll obviously have to go up the grit ladder. If it wasn't for the back edge of the usuba (which really does need to be deburred with a 5000), I probably wouldn't have a higher grit stone. As I've got one, I use it more than strictly necessary.

How are you going at maintaining an angle while you sharpen? That's my main concern, and I'm wondering if ponying up for an angle cube or similar makes my $40 investment twice as expensive.

That's the million dollar question. I'm sure my angles aren't that accurate (i.e a bit of rocker here and there) but my knives are more than sharp enough. What's the objective after all? I'm finding that I'm quite consistent at maintaining an angle. One side of the knife looks pretty identical to the other. I really don't think it's that important. If you want go in to tomato slicing competitions then it is. There's something Neanderthal about sharpening a tool on a bit of rock. It puts me in touch with my inner Philistine

Maintaining an angle on the usuba is child's play. It's a dead straight knife with really wide bevels.

 

[Mong.]

Well PJ, your thoughts on sharpening stones and also the Sakai usuba have helped me make two decisions.

I wasn't willing to risk getting a dodgy edge out of the box, so I opted for the 150mm Tojiro Shirogami carbon steel petty. It was a shade under $50 shipped, so it's cheaper and will hopefully come with a nicer edge than the equivalent Sakai. It is, however, still fitting as a bit of a project knife for me to work on. My second decision is to get a Bester 1200 stone, and use the Tojiro petty to get competent on it. Hopefully the petty will arrive at the start of next week.

In other news, my Opinel parer was getting a little dull so I gave it a going over with the EF 1500 stone and it's nice and sharp again. I have the No. 8, and I'm still surprised how often I reach for it. Handy to have a sharp little blade around.

 

[Pjotr]

Nice knife. Will be a great size to use on the stone. Looks like you'll be able to feel both primary and secondary bevels quite easily. I've read nothing but positive views on Bester stones so you can't really go wrong there. If it wasn't for the fact that I can walk in to a shop about ten minutes drive from where I live and buy King stones, I probably would have ordered one of them too. By the way, once you've found your feet a bit with free hand, don't be scared to use a bit of pressure. I find I can keep things on an even keel a lot easier through applying a fair amount of pressure. Let us know how you go with it. Watch out....stones are addictive.

The Opinel (mine's a No 8 carbon) is a great little paring knife. I rarely take it to a stone, just use a steel occasionally. So easy to keep sharp.

 

[Mong.]

Still bloody waiting for the Tojiro to come. I'm just about ready to bitch out the post office lady...

 

[Pjotr]

It's a pain waiting for things. Roughly two weeks is not that outrageous but admittedly I've had things arrive sooner than that from Japan.

 

[Mark1966]

I'm no knife expert but Everten usually have fairly reasonable prices on kitchen gear and are having a 10% promo on knives - see promo code below

 

[Pjotr]

I'm no knife expert but Everten usually have fairly reasonable prices on kitchen gear and are having a 10% promo on knives - see promo code below
View attachment 413

They also stock a load of Dexter Russell knives. They're mainly aimed at butchers and abbatoirs etc but they're really good knives at a really good price. if you want to dip your toes in to carbon they stock one or two of them too. I've got a Dexter Russell carbon filleting knife I found wedged in a beam of an old abbattoir which was scheduled for demolition. Amazing little blade.