Aug 4, 2011

Finger Stones

After my blog about Kitaeji Maintenance I got many e-mails asking for finger stones.
Today I made some finger-stones for my customers.


From left right:
Sword polish grade Uchigomori (Hazuya)
Sword polish grade Nakayama (Chizuya)
Hakka (soft stone very easy to use)
The tiny stones at front are some of the fingerstones I used to make the blog.
I used my wife's manicure coat for protection.

I can include a Hakka fingerstone for free to my customers who bought a knife.

A set of Uchigomori, Nakayama and Hakka can be included to the knife for a fee.

Please e-mail me if you want the finger stones included.

I think the shipping cost of EMS (1200JPY to US and 1500JPY to EU) for customers who do not buy a knife from me is quite expensive.

For those who are alright with the shipping cost they can make e-mail request or I recommend my friend Maxim at JNS.
You must ask him about sword grade Uchigomori and Maruka finger stones.
He has not the same but similar finger stones.

Two Petty plus One

Here are two petty.
One is from Shigefusa and it is a 150mm Kitaeji.







Another is a left hand (LH) 180mm Yoshihide SKD Migaki petty from Yoshida Hamono.



Though there is difference in maker and steel and length these two have very similar geometry.





Now the plus one.

I myself have a 180mm Kitaeji petty. I used it at my blog Kitaeji Maintenance 1 to 5.
Now I wanted to see how it compare to the out of the box Kitaeji.

Above is my 180mm petty which was polished with Hakka and Nakayama Maruka fingerstones.
Other than the fine "hairlines" with are on the new Kitaeji they look very similar. Both have some broad lines which are "characters" or "signature" of the Kitaeji. These broad lines are not so significant if you  have sunlight, They are significant if you have fluorescent light as light source. The picture was taken under fluorescent light.

Now I made polish with the sword grade Uchigomori fingerstone.



Above is my 180mm petty and below is the new 150mm petty.
The contrast of the broad lines decreased when I used the Uchigomori fingerstone.

So if you work under fluorescent light and do not like the "signature" of  the Kitaeji using Uchigomori fingerstones for maintenance would be a solution.

Aug 1, 2011

Flooding News Update

I got report about Shigefusa and Yoshikane workshop.

Yoshikane workshop was not affected.

Shigefusa workshop was affected but only little. His home is a bit higher than the streets and was not affected. Part of his workshop is a bit lower and got some flood but it is not so serious.

If there is a delay it will be only few days.

But part of the Sanjo city was effected and the river Igarasi is too turbid that water purification does not work. They have shortage of tap-water now.

This will be the last news about this subject.