Japanese web info list

Miura knives
Kitchen Knife Forums

Help Support Kitchen Knife Forums:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
R

refcast

KKF Supporting Member
Joined
Aug 29, 2018
Messages
2,071
Reaction score
4,212
Instead of making many more different threads, I'll just post new findings in a single one.

Blacksmith woodworking tool discussion blog: old and new
http://dekoboko-supporter.blog.jp/
Old woodworking blacksmith masters and their design / performance
http://blog.livedoor.jp/new_alces/
Info on Toyama
"

Made by Shuji Toyama Aogami Steel Honyaki Yanagi blade 300mm.

A
hand-made forging knife craftsman known to Sanjo, Niigata Prefecture, a town of cutlery, Shuji Toyama
is a Yanagi knife that is manufactured by integrated production at a smithy with a focus on hand-forging.

As some of you may know,
Shuji Toyama
made kitchen knives as the first Shuji Honjoji at the top brand Tadafusa about 30 years ago, and
became independent as Shuji Toyama when he reached retirement age. bottom.

After independence, Tokyu Hands approached Shuji Toyama to open a booth, but he was so obsessed with the story that he
refused because he was concerned that the number of production would increase and quality could not be maintained.

The work with the ultimate in essence has become a highly acclaimed gem both domestically and internationally, and if you look at Instagram etc., you can see posts that foreign kitchen knives enthusiasts like to use.

He is a very enthusiastic craftsman, and
recently he is old, so the number of production is small, and
now he only wholesales to the companies with whom he has been associated for a long time.
Especially for Honyaki knives, they are very valuable because they are rarely made even at the request of an acquaintance.
I have never seen anyone other than me selling at online auctions.

This time it will be exhibited without
a pattern, so please enjoy it with your favorite pattern.
In addition,
we have been running a kitchen knife sharpener in Niigata prefecture for 25 years . If you wish, you can also attach a handle, so please contact us.

Finally, please enjoy the uncompromising work of the kitchen knife craftsman, from blade cutting to polishing and every detail. "

外山修司作 青紙鋼本焼柳刃 300mmになります。

刃物の町、新潟県三条の知る人ぞ知る
手打ち鍛造刃物職人、外山修司が鍛冶場で
手打ち鍛造に拘り一貫生産で作製している柳包丁です。

ご存知の方もおられるかと思いますが、
外山修司さんは、30年程前にトップブランド忠房にて、
初代本成寺修司として包丁を作っており、
定年を機に、外山修司として独立しました。

独立後、東急ハンズから外山修司さんのブース出店の話を持ちかけられたものの、
生産数が増え、品質を守れなくなることを懸念し断ったという逸話があるほど、拘りの職人です。

神髄を極めた作品は国内外からも、とても評価の高い逸品となっており、Instagram等を見ますと外国人の包丁マニアが好んで使っている投稿が見られます。

大変拘りの強い職人さんで
最近は、高齢ということもあり、生産数も少なく
現在は、昔から付き合いのある業者にしか卸しません。
特に本焼きの包丁に関しては、知り合いの業者からの依頼でも、滅多に造られないため、大変貴重な一品です。
ネットオークション等では当方以外で出品している方を見たことがありません。

今回は柄無しでの出品となりますので、
購入者様の、お好みの柄を付けてお楽しみ下さい。
また当方、新潟県内で25年、包丁研ぎ屋を
営んでおります。希望があれば、柄の取り付けも可能ですので、ご相談ください。

最後に、刃付けから磨き、細部に至るまで、妥協のない包丁職人の作品を、是非ご堪能下さい。


jnat and porperties
https://minobu.repo.nii.ac.jp/?action=repository_uri&item_id=437&file_id=22&file_no=1
jnat blog "London"
https://freet1977.exblog.jp/i12/
 
Last edited:
Japanese language pdf that describes different japanese whetstones and characteristics across Japan

Around the Buddha sculpture:
Natural whetstone and its properties

Izao Yanagimoto


仏像彫刻の周辺：
天然砥石とその性質
柳 本 伊左雄
 

Attachments

  • minbfb01_103L.pdf
    598.3 KB · Views: 31
Last edited:
Got a shigenobu ajikiri clad knife . . . Kurouchi finish with only two stamps in the back, shige and nobu. Steel feels like TF white 1 but harder, lower in carbon, slightly better edge taking, and slightly better toughness. I accidentally snapped the tip. . . Very milky looking and smooth without looking glassy too. Catches onto hair like tf but cuts a bit more mercilessly.

Hardest Japanese carbon steel kitchen knife steel I've sharpened it think . . . Haha. Similar to honyaki. I'm gonna sell it sometime, didn't cost too much thankfully.

PXL_20211202_190046157.MP.jpg
 
Hideaki Yamamoto information


Mr. Hideaki who had been trained the family business by the first father and Kiyojiro Yamamoto from the junior high school age polished the arm under uncle Masakazu Ueda, and stood alone at the age of 25. As a result, "I want to go up as long as I do it, I always tried to do top work", and many skilled chefs have come to use "English" kitchen knives. Its aspirations and brand power are

Translated from Japanese by microsoft

中学時代から初代の父、山本清次郎さんに
家業を仕込まれた英明さんは、のちに叔父上
田政一さんのもとで腕を磨き、二十五歳で独
立。「やる限りは上へ行きたい。常にトップ
の仕事ができるように頑張った」結果、数多
くの腕の立つ料理人が「英」銘の包丁を愛用
するようになった。その志とブランド力は具

The article also mentions Jon broida at the end, haha

http://fuuseisha.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/27e4f98adf27f35b8096c52ab90c95be1.pdf
 

Attachments

  • 27e4f98adf27f35b8096c52ab90c95be1.pdf
    1.6 MB · Views: 6
Not web info, but a review. Takahashi Kajiya grinds and fit and finish are the least consistent out of anything I've ever had. I believe he doesn't have a regular waterwheel . . . I think he has a tiny retail sized one. There is a Google arts page online about it. Supposedly he hand forges everything without a power hammer, but he does have one in the shop

White 2 steel. Feels like white 1 though. Coarser diamond stones can cause the edge to crumble. Reground mine and still need to finish it completely. Expect a ridiculously narrow or short tang that doesn't fit regular Japanese handles. I say ridiculous because it makes fitting on a handle a good bit more troublesome. Mine had a mild reverse distal taper from handle to tip. The tang was barely the thickest part. . . Spine was also too thin . . . Like 1.5mm and shinogi area was like 3mm before I thinned it to around 2.3mm. Well, I say too thin, because I'd prefer a thicker spine if closer to the edge it was thinner. The handle was also loosened easily because of the tang.

On par with top smiths steel wise though for white . . . .took me a while to conclude that because I needed to regrind it.

So think TF wabi sabi but x 4. TF had a fairly even blade road. Takahashi did not. . . Like a deep gouging overgrind at some parts. . . Which is not good, but I've done that before on a waterwheel, so I know how easy that is to do. But the Takahashi had the heel set up to use a bit like a deba, so idk. Some rural smiths do that.

There are tiny pinprick delamination spots on mine which I was actually looking for because I wanted to see if there was indeed a correlation between this and steel, and there kinda is. . . .maybe. They could have also just not been as thorough to remove all the oxide bits from the weld. There is weird crystaling on the hard steel very very much like a good honyaki or tamahagane, having handled both. . . So if youre a metal polisher that might be cool for you. . . It's distinct crystals of hard and soft steel exactly like when I've seen Japanese Swords. Steel feels crispier than tf white 1. More honyaki like feedback in my opinion.

Steel crystal picture after rough regrinding. . . Shinogi is rounded, etc.

PXL_20211230_065131716.MP.jpg
 
Last edited:
You’re being generous here - mine looked like it was ground by a toddler. I’m confident I could have done better in my first go on a water wheel… blindfolded. Comparing this to TF is wholly unfair to the TF. The state I got mine in was utterly unusable. There was a 2mm hole in the edge and multiple smaller overgrinds that needed fixing. In a couple spots I got these absolutely wild floppy foil edges where I think the edge got cooked during grinding. In other areas I has a similar experience where anything coarser than a 500 grit stone at <20* chipped out the edge. I also have the reverse distal taper and a useless tang - gonna need lots and lots of epoxy to mount that bad boy up.

I’ve gotten a decent, though thiccc, slicer out of mine now that I’ve worked through all the crud. The steel (and iron cladding for that matter) is some of the harder Shirogami I’ve felt. If I end up keeping it, it’ll be because it is so damn fun to polish. There is wild carbon migration like you see on the Kono vintage carbons, a sporadic haze in the core that reminds me of tamahagane, some fun super-bright crystalline structures, and banding in the iron if you take it fine enough. Still working through my polish on this one and find it to be a pretty ideal stone tester as different levels of refinement bring highlight different effects.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Latest posts

Back
Top