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ethompson said:
Nakayma Asagi
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Go on then - how on earth do you use a Nakayama Asagi for polishing? What tips and secrets do you have for me...

I have a very old Asagi, that may well be Nakayama going by the look and feel of it. It's probably not the hardest one out there (I'd say a high 4.5 or low 5), but it's still way too hard for me to polish on. Lovely razor stone though :).
 
cotedupy said:
Go on then - how on earth do you use a Nakayama Asagi for polishing? What tips and secrets do you have for me...

I have a very old Asagi, that may well be Nakayama going by the look and feel of it. It's probably not the hardest one out there (I'd say a high 4.5 or low 5), but it's still way too hard for me to polish on. Lovely razor stone though :).
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It’s a special stone, not sone magic technique on my part. I asked @nutmeg for recommendation on something that could bring a bit more mirror to my polishing repertoire while still leaving some contrast and he suggested this one. It’s hard, but just on the right side of the line where it is useful for kitchen knives. Once you get it going it actually gets to be fairly slick and comfortable, though not forgiving if you stop paying attention. It wasn’t cheap, but I’m confident he quite dramatically under-valued it.
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ethompson said:
It’s a special stone, not sone magic technique on my part. I asked @nutmeg for recommendation on something that could bring a bit more mirror to my polishing repertoire while still leaving some contrast and he suggested this one. It’s hard, but just on the right side of the line where it is useful for kitchen knives. Once you get it going it actually gets to be fairly slick and comfortable, though not forgiving if you stop paying attention. It wasn’t cheap, but I’m confident he quite dramatically under-valued it.
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BOOO!!!

I wanted some kind of secret handshake / wisdom passed down through the generations. And all I got was an arty picture of your utterly amazing looking stone ;). You could've just make something up, then when it didn't work I'd have put it down to my inferior technique, simple-mindedness and lack of craft.

Ah well, you've inspired me to give it another go anyway. I shall report back...
 
ethompson said:
It’s a special stone, not sone magic technique on my part. I asked @nutmeg for recommendation on something that could bring a bit more mirror to my polishing repertoire while still leaving some contrast and he suggested this one. It’s hard, but just on the right side of the line where it is useful for kitchen knives. Once you get it going it actually gets to be fairly slick and comfortable, though not forgiving if you stop paying attention. It wasn’t cheap, but I’m confident he quite dramatically under-valued it.
View attachment 187211
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Nothing like as smart, but the story of mine is an interesting one...

I couldn't tell anything about what it might be when I picked up as an ebay punt for $25AUD about a year ago, just that it looked a kinda light colour so probably wasn't a synth. I asked the seller about it; and he'd picked up about 10 years ago at a market, from an old guy who'd had it since he was an apprentice carpenter in Sydney in the '50s.

Even after I got it and started lapping I was none the wiser as to what it was. I probably hadn't heard of an Asagi at that time, and frankly you don't expect and old Aussie carpenter's stone to be a jnat, so it just wasn't on my mind. Until I put a knife on it... and then it was blindingly obvious.

No way now of knowing what mine it came from, but it has a lovely, distinctive silken feel to it, despite being quite hard. Apparently (according to someone who knows far more about this kind of thing than I do) the cut marks on the sides are likely to have been pre about 1920 ish. And happily those little hairline cracks can't be felt even under a razor, and haven't developed at all, touch wood.


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ethompson said:
Yeah, that’s a good looking stone! Definitely looks hand sawn by the sides
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Was certainly quite cool to find one on the cheap from a bloke on ebay, and I rather like that little bit of history. It was stones like that, and various others, that got me into using straights tbh. I found I had an increasing number of quite good quality stones that were functionally useless for knives, and I wanted to something with them.

I don't think I'd ever spend a decent whack of money on a jnat 'just for razors', so it's nice to have one. Though I fear it's not going to be anything like as good as your stone's results for polishing when I try later on.
 
Haven't polished my knives in ages due to working with them but got the bug after visiting a knife store. Togashi suji still has a small low spot and also pitting after "somebody" put in a slightly damp knife guard but couldn't be bothered getting it all if I'am going to use em again at work tomorrow. Munetoshi petty turned out quite okay for me.


 
jedy617 said:
Wow what did you use? I need to do that on my denka...
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I used sandpaper for cleaning up the grind pattern, synthetics up to 6k for the core (though this was a lazy job and most of the core grind marks still remain), and king 800 and various jnats and mud (aoto, suita, and I think an aiiwatani) for the finish.
 
tostadas said:
I used sandpaper for cleaning up the grind pattern, synthetics up to 6k for the core (though this was a lazy job and most of the core grind marks still remain), and king 800 and various jnats and mud (aoto, suita, and I think an aiiwatani) for the finish.
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Ah makes sense. Yup maybe one day I'll take the denka down with sandpaper to get rid of the grind lines. I'm surprised you were able to get so much contrast on stainless with jnats maybe I just have the wrong ones
 
jedy617 said:
Ah makes sense. Yup maybe one day I'll take the denka down with sandpaper to get rid of the grind lines. I'm surprised you were able to get so much contrast on stainless with jnats maybe I just have the wrong ones
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Yea you gotta play around with different ones for each steel. BTW, TF steel is by far the toughest I've encountered for polishing. Half my stones had zero effect on it.
 
Se1ryu said:
What grit Morihei Hishiboshi did you use for final polish on the secondary bevel??
Look nice
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Pretty sure I finished this one on the 4k (really an awesome stone).

I can't remember 100%, but that finish doesn't look like I went any higher. They are niche stones, but wonderful.
 
jedy617 said:
And speaking of denka, here is a basic kasumi I just did to mine. First time trying on stainless cladding...really was a pain in the ass. My jnats did not want to play nice. Basically took a few hours of finger stones and still didn't turn out amazing
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My first attempt at a Kasumi finish and on my 195 Denka. I've been putting this off for some time due to reviews like this. But to be honest I was pleasantly surprised. This was just a quick session using the stone pictured from an unknown mine as the finisher. Started with a 400 grit Sebado S, then 1200 Sebado S and finally this stone. I was careful not to make the angle too acute as I don't have masking tape and was worried about scratching the Ku excessively. I still have a couple of minor low spots to take care of but the blade road looks great even at this stage and performs better than before. Nice, even finish, good reflectivity and silky smooth to the touch. Hard to expect more from SS.

Denka blue.jpg

kasumi reflection.jpg

Denka Kasumi 2.jpg

Denka kasumi.jpg
 
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Corradobrit1 said:
My first attempt at a Kasumi finish and on my 195 Denka. I've been putting this off for some time due to reviews like this. But to be honest I was pleasantly surprised. This was just a quick session using the stone pictured from an unknown mine as the finisher. Started with a 400 grit Sebado S, then 1200 Sebado S and finally this stone. I was careful not to make the angle too acute as I don't have masking tape and was worried about scratching the Ku excessively. I still have a couple of minor low spots to take care of but the blade road looks great even at this stage and performs better than before. Nice, even finish, good reflectivity and silky smooth to the touch. Hard to expect more from SS.

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Looks great
 
Quick dirty kasumi on a TF Denka. Flattened and thinned on SG 220, 320 and 500. Spent 3-4 hours on stones and had 5 gram steel removed. Followed by 5 minutes on 400 grit and 800 grit sandpapers. Then quick kasumi by a 15-minute uchi fingerstone session.

This is my third TF and it’s a recent thick version (5 mm spine). It has a few low spots but nothing as deep as on my previous 3 mm thick ones. Feels like a handsome workhorse now.

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Hz_zzzzzz said:
Quick dirty kasumi on a TF Denka. Flattened and thinned on SG 220, 320 and 500. Spent 3-4 hours on stones and had 5 gram steel removed. Followed by 5 minutes on 400 grit and 800 grit sandpapers. Then quick kasumi by a 15-minute uchi fingerstone session.

This is my third TF and it’s a recent thick version (5 mm spine). It has a few low spots but nothing as deep as on my previous 3 mm thick ones. Feels like a handsome workhorse now.

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Cleaned up TFs always make me happy
 

Test polish for this kengata yanagi restoration I’m working on. Some great subtle banding comes through on very hard and very fine stones. Since I’m going to try and highlight that I need to drop back down to soft uchi and work more cleanly on the way up.
 
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