Was looking at past peter's of kensington posts in an attempt to find some deals on pens, when I saw that this popular knife deal from 3 months ago is now even cheaper by $10. I know absolutely nothing about knives, so had a search around the web, and the price looks really good. The 27cm one is also at $99.2, enjoy :)
Tojiro DP3 Chef's Knife 24cm $80.8 out of stock
Tojiro DP 3 Chef's Knife 27cm $99.2
Is it cheaper to buy it here on sale or in Japan?
I just came back from Japan … it is actually really hard to find Tojiro. You can probably find VG10 gyuto knives for about $120 (after converting from yen).
The above prices are very good, you won't see it much cheaper than that. Especially for 24cm and 27cm. I think I paid $90 3 years ago for my 21cm Tojiro DP3.
Thanks for the reply.
VG10 gyuto - That's an excellent price! Where do you recommend looking in Japan?
The Tojiro knife being advertised here is a VG10 gyuto.
In tokyo, the nishiki fish market has a couple famous knife makers. In osaka i took a trip to Sakai where that area is renowned for knife making and went into JIKKO and got me an expensive damascus gyuto. But in osaka you can go to the touristy shopping strip and there is a few very big kitchen shops (can't remember the name, it's near Dotonburi area…TripAdvisor will show you). Go visit Tower Knives too, foreign guy runs it.
I didn't hit up kappabashi, but that was one i should had visited.
Not quite. Tojiro have their own factory in Niigata prefecture, Japan and put their own brand on their knives. The Tojiro DP chefs knife is a gyuto shape, with a core made of VG10 steel.
There are many different shapes of japanese blade that have evolved for different specific uses (deba-bocho, yanagiba bocho etc). Some of them are even designed for one particular type of fish only. "Gyuto" is the name of this particular modern blade shape (it roughly means "beef blade"). Of the common Japanese blade profiles it is the closest to that of a Western chef's knife. The DP range is particularly suited to people used to Western knives because of the shape of the handle.
VG10 is a high end stainless steel manufactured by Takefu Special Steel Co Ltd. It's sold by Takefu to various high end cutlery manufacturers and commonly used in good knives. For a stain resistant steel it's relatively hard, takes a good edge and holds it for a long time. (more info here: http://www.zknives.com/knives/steels/steelgraph.php?nm=vg10)
Hard steels make great cutting surfaces but can be brittle (ie can chip easily) if used to harshly. The Tojiro DP knives have a core of VG10 steel sandwiched in a protective "jacket" of softer steel. This is a common technique in Japanese knife-making that ensures you get a good cutting edge, and a knife that has some toughness (provided by the softer steel). Handily this also allows the knifemaker to use less of the more expensive steel, without compromising on the quality of the cutting edge. (diagram: http://www.tojiro-japan.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/sp…)
You can see an independant review of the Tojiro DP 24cm gyuto here: http://www.zknives.com/knives/kitchen/ktknv/tojiro/tojirodpg…
the $A has dived against the yen in the last few months. I had a brief look at knives when I was there in Nov/Dewc last year, and never saw prices anywhere near this good
If you are going to Osaka or Tokyo Aritsugu are decent, won't be in line with these prices though. I find it to be worth a few extra dollars when you can feel and see them before purchase, also the engraving makes it more personal and it's always a good day out knive shopping in Japan.
I inteded to say something about you, then I realised you would make another crap. OK here is my neg
lol… only one?
Not another crap! She's already gone twice today..
Delivery is $11 to Melb before applying the discount
the idea if in melbourne is to buy multiple items, they do combined shipping and are cheap …… $11 for a huge box of frypans ….
I do have to admit they sometimes have some real bargains, even with the shipping cost. They also do partial shipments, last time they shipped was was in stock and another box arrived few days later …….
24cm out of stock
oooh, glad I jumped in when I did last night
great knives at an amazing price. i have this knife at home. do the tomato cut test when you pull it out the box, so satisfying.
make sure you get decent selection of whetstones for sharpening though.
which whetstones do you recommend Karlos
not sure, you may have to google it.
i made the mistake of buyig this when i got my knives
http://www.everten.com.au/tojiro-knife-sharpeners/tojiro-pro…
and i dont think it works very well at all, i've never been able to get my knives back to the sharpness they were when i first got them using the ceramic pull through sharpener.
after looking on google for whetstones for japanese knives, the Tojiro ones are actually on the cheaper end by almost half.
http://www.everten.com.au/tojiro-knife-sharpeners.html
from a couple of videos ive watched, they recommend getting 3 grades of whetstones with different grit values.
this guy gives a good explanation
https://www.quora.com/How-many-different-whetstone-grits-do-…
just for reference, im shocking at keeping my tojiros sharp, but they are still useable. sometimes i get frustrated though at their lack of a fine sharp edge, so i should really get into the whetstones.
I'd go for a Japanese brand that specializes in abrasives.
Probably King brand for cheaper stones
If you're willing to spend more, Shapton ("ha no kuromaku" range, also sold as Shapton Pro) or Naniwa Chosera if you want to spend big bucks.
There's a few Japanese eBay sellers that sell these pretty cheaply. More expensive stones will have a tougher binder and more abrasive so are likely to be more aggressive and harder wearing, but less forgiving for beginners. Cheaper stones will be softer and more forgiving but will dish quickly and need to be flattened more often.
You will need at the very least a 1000 grit stone and a 5000-6000 grit stone. If you want to make your life a bit easier you can also add a 2000-3000 grit.
There is a well known American knife maker called Murray Carter who trained in Japan and inherited his master's family's lineage of bladesmithing. Murray won a "sharpening olympics" competition on a blade enthusiasts forum against a few other professional bladesmiths and sharpeners just using two fairly cheap King brand stones (1000 and 6000) followed by a quick strop on some newspaper.
a strop, btw, is a piece of leather you drag the knife backwards over, to hone the blade. some people recommend using it with a rub in compound. ebay and google are your friends here.
http://www.instructables.com/id/How-to-load-a-strop-Knife-Sh…
also the article above was quite useful in explaining.
In a pinch a piece of newspaper without any compound will do. After my hanokuromaku 5000 grit, I find stropping the edge against some newsprint is enough to put as much polish as i would want on a knife. If it's good enough for a professional bladesmith it'll do for me.
Carter has a video in which he sharpens a dull knife on a concrete block and strops on a piece of cardboard. He says sharpening is 95% technique and 5% equipment.
@simulacrum: yup, technique is key. I'm still practicing using my Sigma 1000 and Suehiro 5000.
FYI Stuart from this website is nice and helpful, recommended by forums. I bought my stones from him.
http://www.toolsfromjapan.com/store/
Otherwise, yeah KING is common in Japan but it's heavy to bring back with you! I personally found them to be cheaper online than in store in Japan.
@kickling: Yeah I found the same.. started with an edgepro knoock off that I got replacement stones for. But once I tried freehand sharpening I found i was happier with the results. I bought a set of 3 shapton ha no kuromaku when ebay had the voucher sale going last year. I've heard you can get slightly cheaper prices on the higher end stones esp the chosera line.
There's a bloke that runs a tool shop in Japan and sells natural japanese nagura stones quite cheaply online as well. I ordered one and found it pretty helpful with my 5000 grit shapton (which is prone to slicking up and getting a bit "sticky").
A worthy alternative is the Edge Pro or its knock off which can be dailed in for precise angles to be sharpened at which is required of knives like these. Perfect for people who are new to sharpening as it removes a large degree of estimation.
The benefits are discussed in detail here:
http://paste-and-cut.com.au/community/threads/knives-knife-s…
and here:
http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum-replies.cfm?t=1868535
:( I wanted to pick a 24cm knife and it is all gone now including 27cm.
Cheapest I can find on ebay for the 24cm is $92 delivered: http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Tojiro-work-DP-cobalt-alloy-steel…
270mm is still in stock
Na it's out of stock. Click on it and you can see
Ah I'm seeing a different screen because I bought one. Tried adding to cart and of course, I wasn't allowed to :)
Why in the world would you shop anywhere else?