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My Livi/Takeda's are definitely not tamahagane. Partly because they don't look or shave like my western-style tamahagane razor, but mainly because I found an old post by Lynn where he's introducing...

I've got one of those original five, and it's a handful to hone. I wound up honing it on the 30k Shapton and the Nakayama and got it to shave pretty well, but it's still not up to the standards of...

Hmm. Maybe we should ask Lynn. I thought the Takeda stuff that Livi was using was sanmai tamahagane, that he was one of the few guys outside of Japan that was authorized to use it. But I could...

Yes, they're tamahagane, at least the middle layer is - it's a san mai blade, of course, with the tamahagane sandwiched between something else that's less expensive and somewhat lower carbon content....

I think it was the other way around. Tamahagane comes out of the tatara as a very porous almost spongelike bloom, and with extremely high carbon content as well around 1.5-2% IIRC, but the carbon...

They used to specifically state it was made from wootz. Phrases like "hand hammered" can apply to pattern welded damascus, and their discussion of the mystical properties of genuine damascus is...

Keep in mind that there are two very different steels that are called "damascus". The pattern-welded type, which is made from folding and forge-welding steels into layers, is what we've been...

You've got a good set of hones. With that setup you can do pretty much anything that you will ever need to do on a razor. The abrasive particles in the coticule are actually much coarser than 8k...

or they can at least sell one and use the proceeds to hire someone to kick your ass :-)

I agree with this. Certainly there are plenty of non-damascus blades with reputations of being difficult to hone. TIs have long had this reputation, which has been reinforced with their new C135...

Not that I'm aware of. There are two types of "Damascus" out there, the pattern-welded type and the Wootz type. The wootz type was indeed lost, but relatively recently (1700's), and this was not...

I've got two TI's and two Livi Takeda's (not sure if Japanese Tamahagane is considered damascus, but it is folded and has damascene patterning). My best shaver isn't one of these though. The two...

What you've been describing is essentially COGS - Cost Of Goods Sold, basically "what does it take for me to make this". Because the manufacturers *do* know the labor and other expenses involved,...

Or somebody would figure out a more cost-effective way to make it, or it would be valued the same way art is valued, purely on its aesthetic qualities with no real consideration for the labor...

It isn't. It's folded only a relatively few times The number of layers doubles with each folding. Start with two layers forged together, then folding will produce 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, 256, 512,...

On the contrary, sir. Yours is a common economic misconception. All that you say is well and good, but misses the fundamental microeconomic point. The effort that the maker puts into the product -...

Because people are willing to pay a lot of money for them.