Kitchen-Samurai
Well-Known Member
I hope all of you had a Merry Christmas! Mine was certainly nice, not least since I got a new set of sharpening stones: the Morihei Hishiboshi 500, 1000, and 4000 splash & go stones.
These stones are fairly new to the market, and the information on them is limited, so I figured that sharing my impressions might be of interest to some of you. If you have any specific questions, please let me know and I’ll try my best to answer them.
The stones are supposed to have a ‘natural stone feel’, and work especially well on single or wide bevel knives, as well as for creating contrast between hagane and jigane. From my understanding, they are non-magnesia bond splash & go stones, which contain a mix of synthetic and natural abrasives. I should state that I have several years of sharpening experience on synthetic stones, but no personal experience with J-Nats.
This is not a full review, but a first impressions thread. However, I have tested these stones in multiple sharpening sessions, with different steels (carbon and stainless), and side by side with other well-known stones (incl. Gesshin stones, Naniwa Pro/Chosera, Shapron Pro, King).
This post will cover my first impressions on how this set performed on a Takeda NAS Gyuto (AS with stainless clad). In a later post, I will give you my thoughts on how they compare to other stones (see above).
Here you have them, nice full-size stones (clearly bigger than, e.g., Naniwa Professional stones). I love the looks; I think the monochromatic color scheme along with the Japanese writing looks brilliant. However, the 500 is too dark (especially when wet), so it’s hard to see how much metal gets removed. They should have started with a lighter shade of grey. Also, the 1k and 4k are too similar in color. I have flattened all stones before the first sharpening, they were reasonably (but not perfectly) flat out of the box.
Morihei Hishiboshi 500: Even though this is a splash & go stone, it will absorb some water. That’s what most coarse splash & go stones do, and not a big deal for me. Water consumption during sharpening is very good for a coarse stone, you will need a couple of drops here and there, but nothing major. The stone feels nice and medium-hard, and the scratch pattern is even and what I would expect from a 400-500 grit stone. I don’t have any objective means to measure how quickly it cuts. My feeling tells me it’s medium to medium-fast, but, honestly, I don’t care too much about this, so take this with a grain of salt. You can work up some mud, though I wouldn’t call it a particularly muddy stone. I felt it benefitted from making a little slurry with my Atoma 140. Minimal contrast off of this stone, I had hoped for more. Might well have been my inaptitude, though. When wet, the stone gets so dark that you cannot really see whether metal is removed or not. All in all, a really nice coarse stone though.
Morihei Hishiboshi 1000: Although this stone also gets darker when wet, you can still see when metal is removed, so that’s not an issue. Nice feeling stone which is also medium-hard and can create some mud. However, as with the 500, I preferred it with a little more slurry from my Atoma 140. Just feels a bit more creamy. It is clearly finer/smoother than the 500, and holds water maybe a bit better. Apart from that, they perform similar. The scratch pattern is even but again, I was not able to create a decent contrast. First assessment: nice mid-grit stone, especially for wider bevels.
Morihei Hishiboshi 4000: Now we’re talking. Very smooth stone, creamy feeling, nice feedback, holds water even a bit better than the 1k. Lighter in color, so you can more easily see what you do. As it’s siblings, it benefits from a little head-start with the Atoma, and, again, I would guess it’s medium fast. The hagane gets nicely polished, while there is some haziness to the jigane. Not really a jaw-dropping Kasumi finish on my first attempt, but it’s a start. While I felt during my first sharpening session that both, the 500 and the 1k, are nice stones and worth the asking price, this stone kind of clicked with me immediately, on first assessment the stand-out stone of the bunch.
In my next post, I will talk about sharpening a stainless steel knife, and compare the Morihei stones to better-known stones.
These stones are fairly new to the market, and the information on them is limited, so I figured that sharing my impressions might be of interest to some of you. If you have any specific questions, please let me know and I’ll try my best to answer them.
The stones are supposed to have a ‘natural stone feel’, and work especially well on single or wide bevel knives, as well as for creating contrast between hagane and jigane. From my understanding, they are non-magnesia bond splash & go stones, which contain a mix of synthetic and natural abrasives. I should state that I have several years of sharpening experience on synthetic stones, but no personal experience with J-Nats.
This is not a full review, but a first impressions thread. However, I have tested these stones in multiple sharpening sessions, with different steels (carbon and stainless), and side by side with other well-known stones (incl. Gesshin stones, Naniwa Pro/Chosera, Shapron Pro, King).
This post will cover my first impressions on how this set performed on a Takeda NAS Gyuto (AS with stainless clad). In a later post, I will give you my thoughts on how they compare to other stones (see above).
Here you have them, nice full-size stones (clearly bigger than, e.g., Naniwa Professional stones). I love the looks; I think the monochromatic color scheme along with the Japanese writing looks brilliant. However, the 500 is too dark (especially when wet), so it’s hard to see how much metal gets removed. They should have started with a lighter shade of grey. Also, the 1k and 4k are too similar in color. I have flattened all stones before the first sharpening, they were reasonably (but not perfectly) flat out of the box.
Morihei Hishiboshi 500: Even though this is a splash & go stone, it will absorb some water. That’s what most coarse splash & go stones do, and not a big deal for me. Water consumption during sharpening is very good for a coarse stone, you will need a couple of drops here and there, but nothing major. The stone feels nice and medium-hard, and the scratch pattern is even and what I would expect from a 400-500 grit stone. I don’t have any objective means to measure how quickly it cuts. My feeling tells me it’s medium to medium-fast, but, honestly, I don’t care too much about this, so take this with a grain of salt. You can work up some mud, though I wouldn’t call it a particularly muddy stone. I felt it benefitted from making a little slurry with my Atoma 140. Minimal contrast off of this stone, I had hoped for more. Might well have been my inaptitude, though. When wet, the stone gets so dark that you cannot really see whether metal is removed or not. All in all, a really nice coarse stone though.
Morihei Hishiboshi 1000: Although this stone also gets darker when wet, you can still see when metal is removed, so that’s not an issue. Nice feeling stone which is also medium-hard and can create some mud. However, as with the 500, I preferred it with a little more slurry from my Atoma 140. Just feels a bit more creamy. It is clearly finer/smoother than the 500, and holds water maybe a bit better. Apart from that, they perform similar. The scratch pattern is even but again, I was not able to create a decent contrast. First assessment: nice mid-grit stone, especially for wider bevels.
Morihei Hishiboshi 4000: Now we’re talking. Very smooth stone, creamy feeling, nice feedback, holds water even a bit better than the 1k. Lighter in color, so you can more easily see what you do. As it’s siblings, it benefits from a little head-start with the Atoma, and, again, I would guess it’s medium fast. The hagane gets nicely polished, while there is some haziness to the jigane. Not really a jaw-dropping Kasumi finish on my first attempt, but it’s a start. While I felt during my first sharpening session that both, the 500 and the 1k, are nice stones and worth the asking price, this stone kind of clicked with me immediately, on first assessment the stand-out stone of the bunch.
In my next post, I will talk about sharpening a stainless steel knife, and compare the Morihei stones to better-known stones.
