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Ahh…ok, then I won’t bother asking😂😂😂😂

that’s about as non-committal as you can get🙂
 
Luftmensch said:
I take @friz on his word:



More westerns? Probably not any time soon.... hey @Fritz, I think you sold it (despite the sale being withdrawn)? You were disappointed in the fit and finish. It looks like a fairly mass production handle? And pakkawood scales?
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That is correct mate. No one was interested in buying my Yo Heiji here in KKF. I sold it somewhere else instead.
Fit and finish was not good, the steel though was very nice!
 
What steels does he use? I'm thinking semi-stainless or possibly stainless.

What sort of price range are we looking at for different knives? I'm not looking for a hard quote but, more along the lines of a 240mm Gyuto in semi-stainless is ... yen/$.

What styles are a no-go and which are his best? I'm thinking Honesuki/Garesuki, Santoku, etc. versus more common styles.

Thanks!
 
deskjockey said:
What steels does he use? I'm thinking semi-stainless or possibly stainless.

What sort of price range are we looking at for different knives? I'm not looking for a hard quote but, more along the lines of a 240mm Gyuto in semi-stainless is ... yen/$.

What styles are a no-go and which are his best? I'm thinking Honesuki/Garesuki, Santoku, etc. versus more common styles.

Thanks!
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Assuming that question was about Heiji, here you go: 伝統の打刃物　中屋平治 | 中屋平治は嘉永元年創業の打刃物鍛冶です
 
deskjockey said:
What steels does he use? I'm thinking semi-stainless or possibly stainless.

What sort of price range are we looking at for different knives? I'm not looking for a hard quote but, more along the lines of a 240mm Gyuto in semi-stainless is ... yen/$.

What styles are a no-go and which are his best? I'm thinking Honesuki/Garesuki, Santoku, etc. versus more common styles.

Thanks!
Click to expand...


He uses Iwasaki Swedish carbon steel clad in iron that is everybody says is like very pure white steel and is easy to sharpen, takes a great edge, etc. I’ve only used his mystery semi-stainless with stainless cladding. Supposedly, it’s SKD/A2, but whatever it is, it sharpens like any good carbon steel and has some extra bite to it, excellent for tomatoes, peppers, pretty much anything with waxy/rubbery skin. Also, once the semi-stainless takes a patina, you can pretty much treat it like stainless, very low maintenance.

As for style, his double bevel knives are geared towards food release so thick at the spine with a low grind wide bevel that gets very thin right behind the edge. If you’re looking for something to slide through carrots and sweet potatoes, look elsewhere. If you want to cut up a 5 pound bag of Idaho potatoes into fries and leave them sitting nicely in place on your cutting board or dice up a bunch of tomatoes that are on the riper side, Heiji is your guy. It’s a fun knife to use if you use it for the right things. A 240mm semi-stainless gyuto will run you about $275 USD with about a 4 month wait when ordering directly. Honestly, a very good price in my opinion.

I’ve read a lot of good things about his sujihiki and honesuki/garasuki because the thick grind doesn’t matter much for their purposes while the steel is excellent for slicing up both raw and cooked meat.
 
I went through Nakaya Heiji's website again and found this sentence.

鋼（青紙・白紙 etc）や地金（和鉄・錬鉄・極軟鋼）など、材料の指定ももちろん可能です。

They do list wrought iron as a possible cladding/jigane. Has anyone asked them about wrought iron before?
 
So judging by the experience maybe this should be renamed to Heji Soon(ish)? :D
 
xxxclx said:
I went through Nakaya Heiji's website again and found this sentence.

鋼（青紙・白紙 etc）や地金（和鉄・錬鉄・極軟鋼）など、材料の指定ももちろん可能です。

They do list wrought iron as a possible cladding/jigane. Has anyone asked them about wrought iron before?
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I couldn't even get him to do a stainless-clad iwasaki for me 😂
You could surely try, but the man's over the hill now and only makes what he wants to.

If you get the knife, I'd be first in line to take it off your hands 🥰
 
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On another note... these actually do look shockingly cheap... 24200 yen for the semistainless 240 gyuto? That sounds like an actual bona fide bargain.
Why are you even talking about this, normally it needs to be at least 500 dollars for people to get interested these days! :p
 
kpham12 said:
He uses Iwasaki Swedish carbon steel clad in iron that is everybody says is like very pure white steel and is easy to sharpen, takes a great edge, etc. I’ve only used his mystery semi-stainless with stainless cladding. Supposedly, it’s SKD/A2, but whatever it is, it sharpens like any good carbon steel and has some extra bite to it, excellent for tomatoes, peppers, pretty much anything with waxy/rubbery skin. Also, once the semi-stainless takes a patina, you can pretty much treat it like stainless, very low maintenance.

As for style, his double bevel knives are geared towards food release so thick at the spine with a low grind wide bevel that gets very thin right behind the edge. If you’re looking for something to slide through carrots and sweet potatoes, look elsewhere. If you want to cut up a 5 pound bag of Idaho potatoes into fries and leave them sitting nicely in place on your cutting board or dice up a bunch of tomatoes that are on the riper side, Heiji is your guy. It’s a fun knife to use if you use it for the right things. A 240mm semi-stainless gyuto will run you about $275 USD with about a 4 month wait when ordering directly. Honestly, a very good price in my opinion.

I’ve read a lot of good things about his sujihiki and honesuki/garasuki because the thick grind doesn’t matter much for their purposes while the steel is excellent for slicing up both raw and cooked meat.
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Round off the shoulders and it's a really sweet knife!
 
M1k3 said:
Round off the shoulders and it's a really sweet knife!
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I really want to 😅. But I also love that Heiji food release. If I round the shoulders, the rest of the knife above the bevels are dead flat, so wouldn’t it be kind of sticky? I’ve also considered pushing the wide bevels way up to make it a better all around knife and keep some gentle convexity on the bevels, but that would take a lot of time and burn through a lot of stone. I would love something closer to a Mazaki grind with Heiji semi-stainless.
 
I envy y'all that got a reply back. 4 emails and no response so far.

Just want a dang suji!
 
kpham12 said:
I really want to 😅. But I also love that Heiji food release. If I round the shoulders, the rest of the knife above the bevels are dead flat, so wouldn’t it be kind of sticky? I’ve also considered pushing the wide bevels way up to make it a better all around knife and keep some gentle convexity on the bevels, but that would take a lot of time and burn through a lot of stone. I would love something closer to a Mazaki grind with Heiji semi-stainless.
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Depends on what you're cutting. Very very thin slices of cucumber will be a little more sticky. Anything with some bit of structure will fall off. And cutting feel will go through the roof. Just depends on how much work you do or do not want to do.

Either way, his steel and profile are great! F&F can leave a little to be desired, unless you get it from JKI.
 
I heart his carbon suji.

The Gesshin Heiji is on my short list - to many knives, not enough time/money.
 
M1k3 said:
Depends on what you're cutting. Very very thin slices of cucumber will be a little more sticky. Anything with some bit of structure will fall off. And cutting feel will go through the roof. Just depends on how much work you do or do not want to do.

Either way, his steel and profile are great! F&F can leave a little to be desired, unless you get it from JKI.
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Can you share some pictures of your heiji? I’m curious how the shoulder is rounded. Thanks
 
I feel asking Heiji for rounded spine and eased choil is a mistake, you're better off taking the time for this and doing a nice job yourself.
I am very happy with the performance of my knife and if you judge purely by how it cuts it's amazing, but the spine wasn't rounded at all, and the heel he just runs across a grinder for 2 seconds.
It's not that bad, but it isn't particularly nice either.

He has accepted to round the spine and ease the choil though, it was even on a drawing he shared with me when discussing the profile.
The funny thing is that I also asked him to change the tip, of which he did a great job!
Its almost as if he thinks everything that doesn't impact cutting performance is just nonsense haha.

20210607_130131.jpg
20210607_130143.jpg
20210607_130042.jpg
 
baggyjorts said:
Anyone here ordered a nakiri direct? It seems it's possible - not listed under the knife types, but below says that "other shapes are possible" or something like that. Googling reveals fairly little, and I can't seem to find any photos of one. Would love to see one and hear some thoughts!

@nakiriknaifuwaifu, I saw this post. Did you end up ordering one?

https://www.kitchenknifeforums.com/threads/nakiri-decisions-heiji-or-tf-direct.49990/
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No, sorry I have not yet ordered direct, though I've spoken with him a few times. Went the TF route (with no regrets). Yes, you can still order a nakiri from him, but whether or not he is in the mood to agree with a thinner and taller knife (like I'd want) is uncertain.
 
baggyjorts said:
Gotcha, thanks both. Further searching found this BST post with some measurements (sans weight :( ) shocked that the forums search function actually found stuff I wasn't finding on google - used to reddit where the search function is a complete nightmare.

https://www.kitchenknifeforums.com/...i-stainless-nakiri-180-chestnut-handle.48698/
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yea see, 187mm nakiri at 53mm is a f'in spaghetti noodle of a nakiri

I prefer 60mm+ at that height, and Heiji was like "mmmmmmmmmm no" and then ignored me
 
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