Shun Fuji - are they paying attention?

[mhlee]

Likewise. To be quite honest, I am impressed that Shun has really established itself in the US. I think they've also helped launch more than a few people to become interested in better knives by becoming the "new standard." They certainly got me to look at even better knives, although I've never purchased a Shun.

Their ability to penetrate the market is a success story. But I will say that I highly doubt they are watching forums such as this one. If anything, they're getting feedback from places like WS and SLT - consumers there will spend more for knives than the average professional and are a much larger consumer group. I would also say it's pretty clear that looks (rather than actual cutting performance) is driving development. If the performance were good, we would have read that here - the Zwilling Kramer was bought by several forum members. But, I would guess that because we don't read about Shun here, most forum members have given up on their knives. And, based on the numerous threads we've had in the past about profile v. geometry, I think most members here wont buy a Shun just because the profile is new, or even if the handle design is new.

[ams]

I am far from someone you would call a "knut" but I will say I do work in a high end kitchen and the number of Shuns outnumber everything else 2:1.

[Pensacola Tiger]

I was in a Williams-Sonoma this afternoon and had a chance to handle a Shun Fuji. The meiji derived handle felt very good, but then, I'm right handed. I wasn't able to cut anything, but I have to admit I wouldn't mind having one, if only the price was a little lower. For not much more, you could have a Marko custom or one of Dave's gyutos.

[Tristan]

Shuns just seem odd in my hand. For the price, I would just go with customs and or true blue japanese blades. Customs to support the community and to be a little spendy, japanese for unbeatable quality/price utility.

Well, unbeatable is relative. but yeah.

[bkdc]

No Shun-bashing here. I own two Fuji's and for the superlative fit and finish, the price is not bad at all. I was able to buy an 8 1/2" chefs on eBay with a 2mm chip on the tip (an easy repair) for half price from the normal W&S selling price. I bought another brand new carving knife (sujihiki) also at half price. They are good performers and for the price I paid, I have absolutely no complaints.

For shorter cutting sessions, the weight is a big plus. For longer sessions, I still prefer Takeda -- my gold standard for how a gyuto should behave.

The profile is so much better than on the CTS Shuns. Balance is slightly forward -- very well done.

[Gator]

...
A better analogy might be to liken shun to Microsoft (and lately, Apple). I know someone will disagree with this, but.....Microsoft's operating systems have undergone very few changes under the hood in quite some years. The first really good innovation was in windows XP where they moved completely away from a dos based system. Since that time, they have done very little to the basic structure of their operating systems (although they would have you believe otherwise), ...

I suppose this will be OT, but without being a hardcore reverse engineer, you can't really make a statement like that. For one, MS moved away from DOS a lot earlier than Win XP, it was Win 95, and NT was there already - 1995. Later those two merged into XP - 2001. What's under the hood in Windows is very complicated, and does go under significant changes and upgrades from release to release, not always successful either. Vista anyone? UI tweaks alone wouldn't cause it to suck so bad And Win 7 wouldn't be so much better performer just on UI tweaks. Most of the users see UI tweaks, but it's not that simple to tell that new release of your OS has new thread scheduler, or improved task switching algorithm, and those are the most complicated and time consuming things to develop.
Shun is no MS by any means, they do not have neither market share, nor influence, Wusthof/Henckels may be. Not all of their designs are success, but they do try to innovate and mix things up a bit.

[bkdc]

Just wanted to comment that the new Shun Hiro is also not a bad knife. There are some finishing irregularities on the 'tsuchime', but I'm puzzled because by the appearance of the cladding. The boundary between the tsuchime/damascus jigane and the hagane is not a flat smooth grind. Instead, it appears as if a patterened tsuchime/damascus tsuchime was 'stuck on' on top of an already ground hagane. The boundary where the jigane meets the hagane has this raised 'stuck on' appearance as if the jigane wasn't present during the entire forging and grinding process (as if the tsuchime/damascus layer never underwent grinding/honing) but was, rather, applied at the end.

I don't know how this works technically or how it affects the steel. Just an observation.

The Hiro is definitely THIN! I recall it being thinner across the entire blade than other Shuns. Unfortunately, it's another CTS profile.

[dmccurtis]

I think that's probably a result of the core steel etching deeper than the cladding.

[EdipisReks]

I think that's probably a result of the core steel etching deeper than the cladding.

yep. when i've etched clad knives i've often times gotten that effect.