khashy
Senior Member
- Joined
- Nov 13, 2016
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This is a long over due review of the AI Diamond Jr plate from Watanabe which was passed around thanks to @nutmeg
I probably ended up having the plate in my possession the longest due to the Christmas holidays, so apologies...
Anyway on with the review.
To set the context of what I have used before, I should mention that in my rookie-er days I started by trying to flatten stones (all synthetics) by using the Naniwa stone fixer. Then tried an Atoma diamond plate and now the AI Diamond Jr plate.
I tried to test the plate on three 'classes' of stones: starter synthetics, better synthetics and natural stones.
For the starter synthetics, I had a couple of Naniwa Super Stones (800 and 3000) which were badly dished.
For the better synthetics, ie the ones I currently use, I tried a Chosera 400 and Chosera 1000, King Hyper 1000 standard in addition to Kitayama 8000
For naturals, I tried it on everything I had: Ohira shiro suita renge, Nakyama kita suita - very hard stone, Ohira Uchigumori, unknown Uchigumori stone with a whole lotta renge
Well it shouldn't be surprising to anyone that the Naniwa flattening plate just doesn't compare, so I won't even bother drawing any kind of comparisons to it.
Now, with respect to the starter synthetics, the AI Jr, just blew them away in seconds. I mean literally in seconds...
Here is a short clip of it:
https://www.instagram.com/p/Bcr5KtoHJmE/?taken-by=japanese_knives_collection
Up next were the better synthetics. These were also deliberately left super dished to test the performance of the see what the plate.
Here it is in action:
https://www.instagram.com/p/BdK1TJYn8Va/?taken-by=japanese_knives_collection
Obviously not as fast as the Naniwa supers but still remarkably fast and easy.
Up next jnats, I guess this is the true application for this plate and I did try it on all of my stones.
Here is a quick clip:
https://www.instagram.com/p/BdkozMTH0Cp/?taken-by=japanese_knives_collection
The stone in the clip isn't overly hard however the Ohira Uchigumori and the Nakayama are super hard and I would say that the feel and speed of the plate on those was very comparable to what you see in the video above.
I guess the thing that really stood out to me while using this plate was the handle. Even though the plate is much smaller than an Atoma 140 for example, the handle makes all the difference. You have so much more control over how much pressure you exert and where, that the size of the plate doesn't matter at all. This is especially helpful on naturals. It speeds up the whole process and also you'll never catch your fingers in between the stones and the plate (like I have done a few times). I was left with a very smooth stone surface on all of my stones when I was done.
The second thing which I found remarkably useful were the holes in the plate. I must confess I didn't really get the purpose of them when I saw the photos but it became very apparent very quickly as soon as I started using it. Essentially the holes form tiny reservoirs for water when using the plate. So I would place the plate on the stone and pour the water into the holes. That way, unlike the Atoma 140, I wouldn't be pushing the water off of the stone with every movement which meant that I didn't have to worry about water management at all. I know it's a small thing and you never spend hours on end using a diamond plate on stones but every little bit of improvement will count if you're doing this seriously.
This was a really long winded way of saying I really liked the plate. If I was using stones more than once every fortnight or so, I would definitely get one - it's worth the seemingly very high cost.
The plate is now with @fatboylim (sorry again for the delay) and will be sent back to @nutmeg when he is finished with it (unless we get other instructions).
Thanks again to @nutmeg and Shinichi-san for the opportunity to use this brilliant little plate.
I probably ended up having the plate in my possession the longest due to the Christmas holidays, so apologies...
Anyway on with the review.
To set the context of what I have used before, I should mention that in my rookie-er days I started by trying to flatten stones (all synthetics) by using the Naniwa stone fixer. Then tried an Atoma diamond plate and now the AI Diamond Jr plate.
I tried to test the plate on three 'classes' of stones: starter synthetics, better synthetics and natural stones.
For the starter synthetics, I had a couple of Naniwa Super Stones (800 and 3000) which were badly dished.
For the better synthetics, ie the ones I currently use, I tried a Chosera 400 and Chosera 1000, King Hyper 1000 standard in addition to Kitayama 8000
For naturals, I tried it on everything I had: Ohira shiro suita renge, Nakyama kita suita - very hard stone, Ohira Uchigumori, unknown Uchigumori stone with a whole lotta renge
Well it shouldn't be surprising to anyone that the Naniwa flattening plate just doesn't compare, so I won't even bother drawing any kind of comparisons to it.
Now, with respect to the starter synthetics, the AI Jr, just blew them away in seconds. I mean literally in seconds...
Here is a short clip of it:
https://www.instagram.com/p/Bcr5KtoHJmE/?taken-by=japanese_knives_collection
Up next were the better synthetics. These were also deliberately left super dished to test the performance of the see what the plate.
Here it is in action:
https://www.instagram.com/p/BdK1TJYn8Va/?taken-by=japanese_knives_collection
Obviously not as fast as the Naniwa supers but still remarkably fast and easy.
Up next jnats, I guess this is the true application for this plate and I did try it on all of my stones.
Here is a quick clip:
https://www.instagram.com/p/BdkozMTH0Cp/?taken-by=japanese_knives_collection
The stone in the clip isn't overly hard however the Ohira Uchigumori and the Nakayama are super hard and I would say that the feel and speed of the plate on those was very comparable to what you see in the video above.
I guess the thing that really stood out to me while using this plate was the handle. Even though the plate is much smaller than an Atoma 140 for example, the handle makes all the difference. You have so much more control over how much pressure you exert and where, that the size of the plate doesn't matter at all. This is especially helpful on naturals. It speeds up the whole process and also you'll never catch your fingers in between the stones and the plate (like I have done a few times). I was left with a very smooth stone surface on all of my stones when I was done.
The second thing which I found remarkably useful were the holes in the plate. I must confess I didn't really get the purpose of them when I saw the photos but it became very apparent very quickly as soon as I started using it. Essentially the holes form tiny reservoirs for water when using the plate. So I would place the plate on the stone and pour the water into the holes. That way, unlike the Atoma 140, I wouldn't be pushing the water off of the stone with every movement which meant that I didn't have to worry about water management at all. I know it's a small thing and you never spend hours on end using a diamond plate on stones but every little bit of improvement will count if you're doing this seriously.
This was a really long winded way of saying I really liked the plate. If I was using stones more than once every fortnight or so, I would definitely get one - it's worth the seemingly very high cost.
The plate is now with @fatboylim (sorry again for the delay) and will be sent back to @nutmeg when he is finished with it (unless we get other instructions).
Thanks again to @nutmeg and Shinichi-san for the opportunity to use this brilliant little plate.
