# Kikuichi Monji Nakiri Refurb WIP



## cotedupy (Apr 6, 2021)

I bought an old and rusty Nakiri on ebay.

I bought it because it was sold as Kikuichi Monji, and an old thread here seemed to suggest it might be alright... I figured @JBroida knew what he was talking about. Apparently the kanji also say 'Betsusaku', which I assume might be the name of the maker (?) [Edit - apparently not]

Here is my Nakiri:







And here she is, shorn of her handle, and in her bath of vinegar:






And here with most of the rust sanded off coarsely:






I then take her on a whirlwind tour up to 2k and have a wee look at the choil and spine. Both of which I quite look of tbh (though please excuse my crap pictures). I will do this sanding run again properly, and have a go at the tang &c., but it's ok to be getting on with:











The other reason I bought this, as you will no doubt have noticed earlier, is the natty vintage blonde horn ferrule-thing on the original handle. Which I will obviously be incorporating into the new handle...


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## Qapla' (Apr 6, 2021)

Kikuichi and Kikuichimonji are different companies, from what I'm seeing.
_Bessaku_ is a pretty meaningless marketing term that means "especial-made".


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## cotedupy (Apr 6, 2021)

Qapla' said:


> Kikuichi and Kikuichimonji are different companies, from what I'm seeing.
> _Bessaku_ is a pretty meaningless marketing term that means "especial-made".



Ah does it now, ty! (And yes - I think you're right - this is from Kikuichimonji in Kyoto I believe. At least that's what it was sold as, and has been translated as by someone else here.)


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## cotedupy (Apr 6, 2021)

I had grown tired of the relentlessly tedious chore of sanding things with sandpaper, and so decided to move on to the endlessly fascinating pastime of sanding things with stones. Here was my lineup; King DL 800, King DL 1200, Morihei Binsui, Suehiro 3k, Willunga Slate #7, Maruoyama Shiro Suita.






Again this was really just a cursory run through. I spent about a minute or so on each stone, to see what they'd do with sharpening and polish, as I'm going to be re-sanding. Not that you'll really be able to tell much from the quality of my photos anyway.

After the two Kings (excellent stones, very good kasumi), I went to the Binsui. This was apparently rated at 1-2k, but certainly feels coarser than the King 1.2k. And it definitely left the knife blunter with some pretty dodgy scratches:






Suehiro 3k up next, which I'd never tried before for polishing. Very impressive; knife is now nice and sharp again, and mirror-ish on the edge:






The polishing from the slate isn't as good, and the edge is now *slightly* cloudier. In terms of sharpening though, it finishes finer; I try the HHT... no dice. Maybe I need to wash my hair. Or get a life. She's gliding through kitchen towel nicely though:











And last up the Maruoyama (7-8k). This gets us back to proper shiny on the edge (and it's an excellent kasumi stone), and an even sharper, more refined, finish than the slate. It's effortless through paper towel though seems less good on a rizla. But guess what it can do...











I'm rather liking this knife so far.

TBC...


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## khashy (Apr 6, 2021)

cotedupy said:


> I had grown tired of the relentlessly tedious chore of sanding things with sandpaper, and so decided to move on to the endlessly fascinating pastime of sanding things with stones. Here was my lineup; King DL 800, King DL 1200, Morihei Binsui, Suehiro 3k, Willunga Slate #7, Maruoyama Shiro Suita.
> 
> View attachment 121559
> 
> ...


Keep posting progress, it’s enjoyable to follow


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## cotedupy (Apr 6, 2021)

khashy said:


> Keep posting progress, it’s enjoyable to follow



Ta! It's a bit sad that I'm going to have to blunt this edge to go back to sandpaper. Though I've learnt the hard way (several times) that I don't want to be doing a sanding progression on a sharp blade .


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## dafox (Apr 6, 2021)

cotedupy said:


> I bought an old and rusty Nakiri on ebay.
> 
> I bought it because it was sold as Kikuichi Monji, and an old thread here seemed to suggest it might be alright... I figured @JBroida knew what he was talking about. Apparently the kanji also say 'Betsusaku', which I assume might be the name of the maker (?) [Edit - apparently not]
> 
> ...


The taper on that blade looks great!


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## cotedupy (Apr 15, 2021)

So I've not yet got round to doing another sanding progression on the blade, but I did knock up the beginnings of a handle yesterday...

First I sawed the end off:






Glued the horn back onto it, and sanded down the wood, so we now have a ferrule with a pre-drilled tang slot, and a piece of Elm burl for the main part of the handle:






The horn is quite thin, I'm not going to be able to re-purpose it as an oval or octagonal handle. This'll be the first d-shaped handle I've ever done. Though with the ferrule epoxied onto the wood it should give me a good guide. I'm quite happy with the shape of the results off the belt sander:











I've also given the handle some taper, cos I like tapered handles. But because the horn is quite thin and old it has an almost translucent greenish quality, which might look a bit weird imo. I may have to take it off and put some black horn on instead, which would be a shame. These pics are off belts and oiled, before hand sanding:






Though when I wang the blade in it looks a bit better. Maybe that blonde will work with a polished blade. What do we think...?


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## cotedupy (Apr 18, 2021)

We're basically almost there now. I'm going to give it one more last sanding run as some of those rust marks at the end I'll be able to get out I think. But I'm really quite happy tbh, the handle came out just beautifully 

(And it'll probably need a little bit of correction on stones too, as it has a bit too much belly atm for my tastes.)











Q. - Should I bother trying to put a kasumi / polish on it? I get the feeling it wouldn't be desperately even, and would take a long time to get semi-reasonable, so am tempted to leave the whole thing shiny...


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## IsoJ (Apr 25, 2021)

Great writing and awesome work and the handle turned out top. Just hit heavy patina with the blade .


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