Thread: Kamijo Yukio, revealing the secrets of steel

There's some good info about Mr Yukio Kamijo here (thanks Fikira)

https://historyrazors.wordpress.com/2016/12/08/iwasaki/

Now I have a few of these razors on the bench at the moment. I'll say, once they arrived and I opened the package, all my other projects got put aside immediatelly. I posted this on Instagram a few days ago.



Here it is clearly visible, the razor on the left got cleaned by someone with a rotary tool, leaving those ugly marks, which I assume are in the 400 grit range.

The razor on the right is a different story. It came with a proper polish, not top-katana-togishi grade, but I like it a lot. Tarnished and lightly pitted due to aging I suppose.



So I started playing around with the Dremel-polished razor. I took a piece of Chosera 1K and gave it some rubbing, to erase the old marks. Then I went ahead and used several other stones to mellow down the 1K marks. I used Botan, and a few (ji-to and ha-to) Uchigumori stones.

The outcome so far is this.


A few observations. I rushed through this and one of my stones scratched the steel. I think I know now which one, so I have a plan for remedy. I do not intend to completely remove the 1K marks... or rather, I won't kid myself, I'm no sword polisher. What I want to end up with is a clean polish that will display, what it displays now, which is how the handle of the razor was forged to meet the cutting edge. I won't attempt removing the pits, as that would require seriously coarse grinding.... well, not yet anyway.




I will add to the thread as I progress. I will also be showing the other one, as I'll try to alter its polish minimally, only to remove the tarnishing and attempt to bring out that same hardening line, which isn't visible at the moment.

Thanks for looking!