My BNIB Narra honyaki gyuto wedges badly

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So yesterday I got a response from him and I realise I was wrong. I didn’t contact him first before creating this thread, giving him no chance of making it right. There are a lot other knives that he made that didn’t have a problem. Simply generalising my experience to the whole of his brand is not right. The reality is I bought it second hand and he his full right to question its authenticity. As his previous customers pointed out, he is a stand up guy - this is true. He told me how sad he was that I was this harsh to him and that had contacted him first, he would have made me a new one without a problem. Nevertheless, he is going to make me a new one and I’ll definitely be posting pictures when I receive it. I’d like to express my appreciation and apology to Narra. I do not want to ruin his reputation and cause any real damage to his livelihood.
 
Briochy said:
So yesterday I got a response from him and I realise I was wrong. I didn’t contact him first before creating this thread, giving him no chance of making it right. There are a lot other knives that he made that didn’t have a problem. Simply generalising my experience to the whole of his brand is not right. The reality is I bought it second hand and he his full right to question its authenticity. As his previous customers pointed out, he is a stand up guy - this is true. He told me how sad he was that I was this harsh to him and that had contacted him first, he would have made me a new one without a problem. Nevertheless, he is going to make me a new one and I’ll definitely be posting pictures when I receive it. I’d like to express my appreciation and apology to Narra. I do not want to ruin his reputation and cause any real damage to his livelihood.
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good on you to report this and handle the situation properly, well done
 
You shouldn’t beat yourself up over it. If it were me I’d also vent some publicly. It seems like it didn’t occur to you that contacting the maker was the thing to do until the forum suggested it. Glad everything went well.
 
in the meant time Briochy, it looks like you have a Narra to practice thinning on. There is an australian website called japanesetools, they sell big, thick, flat glass plates for 20aud and adhehsive backed sandpaper starting at 3aud. I had found a big 300mm+ japanese beater knife while I was over there working in kitchens and wanted to thin it. This seemed like the best/cheapest option, infinite flattening and thinning. https://www.japanesetools.com.au/collections/stone-flattening
glass-plate-etc-trans_0009_Complete-Sharpening-Kit-5_1800x1800.png
 
Oui Chef said:
in the meant time Briochy, it looks like you have a Narra to practice thinning on. There is an australian website called japanesetools, they sell big, thick, flat glass plates for 20aud and adhehsive backed sandpaper starting at 3aud. I had found a big 300mm+ japanese beater knife while I was over there working in kitchens and wanted to thin it. This seemed like the best/cheapest option, infinite flattening and thinning. https://www.japanesetools.com.au/collections/stone-flattening View attachment 65611
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Oh, I already bought a stone off from KnS.
http://www.knivesandstones.com/naniwa-gouken-aramusha-220-grit-sharpening-stone/
Yesterday I thinned the knife to the point that I declare it 'usable', took me 2 hours. The tip needs a serious thinning to be able to horizontally cut an onion. Probably will take further 2 hours just to thin the tip area.
 
You'd lose any potential convex grind using that method though right? Flat grinds generally have worse food release.
 
madelinez said:
You'd lose any potential convex grind using that method though right? Flat grinds generally have worse food release.
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But that's true with thinning of any kind right? Also, usable knife is better than unusable one for sure.
 
Briochy said:
But that's true with thinning of any kind right? Also, usable knife is better than unusable one for sure.
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I agree a thin behind the edge flat grind is definitely better. I always thought a small flat block (the size of an eraser longways) with sandpaper attached might help preserve some convexity. Not sure to be honest.
 
labor of love said:
Well that’s cool. So are you getting an identical knife?
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Idk haha probably. Happy to report tho that thinning is progressing well. It can't exactly do the cool flippin' onion horizontal cut, but not far from it. I'll probably thin it an hour more then go onto polishing. Wouldn't have believed in a million year that the first knife I'm thinning is a hard-ass honyaki.
 
Just because you're using a flat abrasive doesn't mean you're making a flat bevel. Precision machining guys have to be very careful in their lapping technique to make flat surfaces rather than convex. Fortunately for us the effect works in our favor.

What I like to do is apply pressure with my fingertips right at the edge (working in sections) to get it down to a nice thickness (say 0.2mm). To maximize retained convexity, you can lift gently on the spine with your support hand.
Then, if it wedges, I thin further up the blade, targeting ~1mm thickness 1cm behind the edge (this is subjective and depends on your goals). I do that by applying fingertip pressure at the relevant location.

Couple more notes about sandpaper for those that are interested:
A surface with some "give" will conform to a convex surface. I've mentioned this recently in another thread, but I like a layer of two of sandpaper for finishing up/blending.

Secondly, adhesive isn't necessary with sandpaper. I may not have been coat on this earlier. A slight dampness (water) will stick sandpaper to any smooth flat surface (glass, granite, a flat stone) remarkably well. This is sorta like how a glass will stick to a counter or table with condensation.
 
Briochy said:
So yesterday I got a response from him and I realise I was wrong. I didn’t contact him first before creating this thread, giving him no chance of making it right. There are a lot other knives that he made that didn’t have a problem. Simply generalising my experience to the whole of his brand is not right. The reality is I bought it second hand and he his full right to question its authenticity. As his previous customers pointed out, he is a stand up guy - this is true. He told me how sad he was that I was this harsh to him and that had contacted him first, he would have made me a new one without a problem. Nevertheless, he is going to make me a new one and I’ll definitely be posting pictures when I receive it. I’d like to express my appreciation and apology to Narra. I do not want to ruin his reputation and cause any real damage to his livelihood.
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Can we add this as a sticky to the top of the thread?
 
Briochy said:
So yesterday I got a response from him and I realise I was wrong. I didn’t contact him first before creating this thread, giving him no chance of making it right. There are a lot other knives that he made that didn’t have a problem. Simply generalising my experience to the whole of his brand is not right. The reality is I bought it second hand and he his full right to question its authenticity. As his previous customers pointed out, he is a stand up guy - this is true. He told me how sad he was that I was this harsh to him and that had contacted him first, he would have made me a new one without a problem. Nevertheless, he is going to make me a new one and I’ll definitely be posting pictures when I receive it. I’d like to express my appreciation and apology to Narra. I do not want to ruin his reputation and cause any real damage to his livelihood.
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Good resolution. Would. You mind posting this as an edit to your original post? For forum users down the line, they may read your först post while doing research but not go 4 pages in to find how it ended, and it would seem fair to the maker.
 
DisconnectedAG said:
Good resolution. Would. You mind posting this as an edit to your original post? For forum users down the line, they may read your först post while doing research but not go 4 pages in to find how it ended, and it would seem fair to the maker.
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I don't think the forum allows me to edit a post after 30min
 
Oui Chef said:
in the meant time Briochy, it looks like you have a Narra to practice thinning on. There is an australian website called japanesetools, they sell big, thick, flat glass plates for 20aud and adhehsive backed sandpaper starting at 3aud. I had found a big 300mm+ japanese beater knife while I was over there working in kitchens and wanted to thin it. This seemed like the best/cheapest option, infinite flattening and thinning. https://www.japanesetools.com.au/collections/stone-flattening View attachment 65611
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LOL!!
 
Good to hear the thinning isnt isnt taking too long
 
I've not liked this thread from the start, nothing about it is in keeping with the "gentlemen" nature of the forum.

I'm thinking a Reader's Digest version (you kids call it TL/DR or some such for reasons that elude me) would look like this.

OP buys a second hand knife that does not meet expectations. Opens a thread with hostile title, describes knife as "fricken wedger" accuses maker of everything but being a Methodist, "warns" any reader to never buy a knife from him.

On post 15 someone suggests he contact maker. Next couple pages are why that won't work. Contacting maker is constant theme (and rightly so) of suggestions.

Another maker suggests post may not be fair to maker.

Mods change title of thread to something less antagonistic.

OP admits he was "angry" when he initially posted, hence the inflammatory title. Still describing knife as "not usuable".

In post 62 Kipp offers to fix the blade if he can remove handle. OP does not want to pay for a new handle to have the $400 knife fixed and have all of this resolved.

Contact is made with maker. OP publicly posts initial private messages that were exchanged, further denigrating the maker.

In post 92, OP posts that maker has offered to make him a new knife. All is good in the world. The maker is a stand up guy, OP offers an apology.

In post 93, OP is planning to start thinning his new "free" knife.

If the OP ever "owned" his part of this mess, buying a 2nd hand knife, from an unknown maker, and a $400 honyaki at that, I missed it. A reasonable person would acknowledge they were taking a chance and missed.

If the OP had exercised even a modicum of hesitation before condemning the maker, and sought a reasonable solution instead, the mods would not be spending time trying to un-phuck this mess.

Will leave this up for a couple days, probably truncate the thread some (or a lot) and lock it down over the weekend.
 
For reference this is a summary of consumer guarantees under Australian law. The laws are reasonable. It is worth noting what they say:

Rights to a repair, replacement, refund, cancellation or compensation do not apply to items:
  • ...
  • bought as a one-off from a private seller, for example at a garage sale or fete (but you do have rights to full title, undisturbed possession and no unknown debts or extra charges)

In other words, you bare all the risk in private transactions. The responsible way for you to ameliorate that risk is to do research and ask questions. After assessing the risks you should not spend more than you are willing to 'gamble' given the information you have assembled. You are purchasing sight unseen.
 
daveb said:
OP buys a second hand knife that does not meet expectations...
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Luftmensch said:
...Rights to a repair, replacement, refund, cancellation or compensation do not apply to items bought as a one-off from a private seller...
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I'm glad you guys can see it this way.

I've seen some of my knives going on the BST with a profile that looks nothing like what I originally sold. There's a noticeable problem with the way some people sharpen which I could highlight, but that might put a negative spotlight on certain users and could possibly decrease the value of some people's holdings. So far I've publicly kept quiet, only privately mentioning how to avoid the potential problem to the buyers of new knives. I'm really not sure if I should come out and say anything.
 
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But still... being second hand it gets complicated when guarantees and warranties come up, whether it's BNIB or not.
Kudos to Narra for dealing with the problem regardless.

I dunno, maybe my post was related but a little off topic. It's something that's been on my mind, and this is a way I can talk about it without starting a new thread.
 
I don't think the maker should be responsible or have any obligation for the performance of a second hand knife, doubly so for custom knives. The original owner could have caused the problem through sharpening/thinning or specifically asked for it to be that way in their order. Right now I have a rather expensive knife that has some cosmetic damage from a friend that sharpened it, I'd never sell it to another person without paying the maker to restore it to brand new condition or without a very large warning stating it doesn't represent the maker's typical quality.
 
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