Thread: Japanese Natural $$$

Originally Posted by Jimbo

Oz mate, I have tried lapping mms and mms, even took it to cement to try to get past it. It has the toxic su or whatever So calls it. It is a very hard stone, and lapping it is quite difficult and time consuming. I have not given up hope on it yet, as So tells me it could be a very good stone if I can get past those layers. But I have to admit since I got the Asagi I have not really tried more lapping.

James.

How much would it cost to send it to its homeland? I'll give it a proper ceremony...

There is a huge jump from the retail stone shop like Pro Shop Hokuto in the countryside outside of Tokyo to the boutique in Kyoto of the mine owner Hatanaka-san. And there are other mine/owner run retails in Kyoto also, and the fellow like me or So-san selling on the internet or out of our shops.

Originally Posted by zib

Very nice. It's like the Nakayama hall of fame. What makes some worth 35,000 and other Nakayama's worth only 500 usd. The one's we buy from Old School, 330 mate and the like, I mean, They are great hones and work well. What then is the difference.
Even So at Japan tool as Bruno mentioned has very expensive stones. he showed me one Identical to my Asagi, which has Maruichi Stamps, etc..All the Kanji, So's was 2000.00 while I paid 425.00, so What is the difference. I would love an education on this....I have several Japanese Naturals, Kiita, Asagi, Suita, and they are amazing. I never paid over 500 for any of them....

Stones are graded and priced almost before they leave the mine, a miner following a seam has a pretty good idea what came before in this strata and what will follow. Once it is in the cutting room it is a done deal. These guys are so in tune. Just think how much you would know about stones if that is all you had been looking at since you were a teenager and now you are 50 years old.

The stone you bought for $500 is only worth $500, after all you bought it from a professional, he knows and you trusted him. The next level of pricing is the $1500 to $3000 range. These stones are finer and cut faster and are usually larger. Above $3000 it will become more exotic as you go up, clearer, certain colors, larger sizes, renge, nishiji, black renge, any thing that adds rarity or speed. For users these upper price points represent the ability to get the finest edge possible in the quickest time. Savant sharpeners or sharpeners who are expected to have the sharpest tools and ego maniacs will be buying these stones. People using these stones will have sharper tools or razors than you do, and they know it.

Anything above $15,000 is investment grade or fun money toys for the super rich or gifts which is a big thing in Japan. There will be stones that pass from hand to hand with no money involved for various reasons, like charity, obligations what ever. Also the samuri culture continues in Japan behind the scenes, a culture where money is not the object and honor is all. Have you ever heard of a face passport?
Alx

Stefan, I generally agree with you.

Originally Posted by mainaman

As Alex mentioned the really expensive ones are just consistently uniform and you know that after 1/2" into the stone you are still getting the same quality grit. Cheap stones, cheap by the standards of Nakayama, would have some "impurity" not uniform color, or not exactly the true color etc.
My Asagi just because was not the true color(just slightly darker) cost me 500 bucks, and according to So it would have been 2k+ if it was not for the color.
Another consideration is the stone performance. I learned in my talks with So, that Asagi are very scratchy and therefore not all Asagi are good for razors, only the ones with finest and least scratchy grain. Kiita is even more expensive because its not as abundant as Asagi, since the layer was depleted before the Asagi layer. Kiita also is not really suitable for razors unless there is a very hard stone which is rare and brings the price even higher. Kiita in general is for tools and knives because they are not generally hard, not as hard as Asagi at least.

Asagi are not really a super rare stone structure from the mines of Kyoto, they come from the tomae stratas, and are usually a light color gray and can have some streaks of other minerals in them. Most if not all of the mines had a tomae strata that contained asagi stone. Asagi are generally hard and can be regarded as scratchy and they were overlooked as usable stones up untill just recently for general sharpening because they could scratch the blade if used by sharpeners with less experience. It tkes a very even hand to use an asagi with just water. The invention of the diamaond plate has changed all that, now with super hard stones a little slurry can be raised with a diamond nagura (diamond plate) and this helps in drawing the tooth out of a really hard asagi toishi. Without the slurry blades tend to skip over the stone without really bitting the grit. Because of this there are a lot of leftover asagi stones in stock in Japan. The suita stones were so easy to use and the asagi so troublesome that the suita got bought up and used while the asagi were left on the shelves.

Every mine had some strata of asagi, and they were usually from the deeper strata in the mine, compressed under millions of tons of other rock above it. Some are very very fine and are great for razors. For other tools the edge off an asagi is a difficult nut to crack. Just like other stratas, not all asagi is created equal.

Kiita stones of a certain yellow are gems to use, very fast cutting and some can be the finest of grit. Also you can find kiita stones with light brown spots of nishiji minerals which enhance cutting speed.
Alx

Alex,
I did not meant to say that Asagi are rare, just that they appear to be scratchy and razor quality ones are not so abundant. So pretty much said the same, high quality Asagi is really hard, cuts fast, and its scratchy, but because of that inexperienced person can mess up an edge very easy.

Stefan
I will go along with that. alx

These photos show some asagi and kiita stones.
www.thejapanblade.com/color_stones1.htm

Originally Posted by zib

Very nice. It's like the Nakayama hall of fame. What makes some worth 35,000 and other Nakayama's worth only 500 usd. The one's we buy from Old School, 330 mate and the like, I mean, They are great hones and work well. What then is the difference.
Even So at Japan tool as Bruno mentioned has very expensive stones. he showed me one Identical to my Asagi, which has Maruichi Stamps, etc..All the Kanji, So's was 2000.00 while I paid 425.00, so What is the difference. I would love an education on this....I have several Japanese Naturals, Kiita, Asagi, Suita, and they are amazing. I never paid over 500 for any of them....

Rich, I've had a 35k Subaru and several 1200 Hondas. The latter is pathetically slow and often dubbed the torqueless wonder. It's really evident the quality and performance you can get with higher priced vehicle. Price is fraction of modern day supercar but is still a turbo with actually decent gas and symmetrical AWD. Here, one can only presume the stone in question cuts faster and larger.

Originally Posted by Jimbo

Oz mate, I have tried lapping mms and mms, even took it to cement to try to get past it. It has the toxic su or whatever So calls it. It is a very hard stone, and lapping it is quite difficult and time consuming. I have not given up hope on it yet, as So tells me it could be a very good stone if I can get past those layers. But I have to admit since I got the Asagi I have not really tried more lapping.

James.

Have you thought about using a belt sander to try and get through that surface?

Just got my Kiita from O_S today.

This has been a really educational thread guys.

Thank you.

Oh, the eye candy is killing me!!!!

Lynn