Anton's 200mm W2 Honyaki 'Extra Heavy' Gyuto

This knife is for one of my in general favorite people on this forum, lol. Anton Kudris. Nothing wrong with the rest of you of course ()...but I think most of us probably feel the same about the guy. Anton's just plain good people . There's a list of others as well, but I won't call them out since this thread is for Anton's knife lol.

When we started this knife together, Anton was concerned with two things. First, he didn't want the handle to be very ornate, but he wanted the dual taper handle. I know a number of you feel similarly about many of my handles...and it's definitely something I'm capable of 'toning down' for want of a better term. I personally love the simple 'simple' artistry inherent in a 'complicated' pattern laid out in such a small space. From a distance it looks basic, but as you pull in closer each little detail catches your eye and you begin to comprehend the complexity. I think the bog oak, bright nickel silver, and greyed out wrought were a great compromise between our two aesthetic viewpoints! Anton's other concern was forward balance...which is always a possible issue with very light and thin knives. The balance point on this knife is just behind the heel, giving it an extremely agile feeling in hand. In addition, I carried the spine further forward than I do usually in order to provide more inertia in chopping cuts, as well as to counter balance the wrought and heavy stabilized bog oak. The grind is intended as a general purpose grind with excellent food separation and anti stiction, but still maintains the laserish performance my knives are known for.

I've taken some 'repeat' pictures, with slightly different lighting or focal points to try to capture the personality of this blade. The chaotic but controlled hamon, the primal bog oak with the heavy, brooding wrought iron...in counterpoint with the bright nickel silver, along with the overall thinness of the blade and the needle point are all difficult things to capture properly in their own right....which makes capturing the overall feel even more so.

Specifications - 200mm long x 47.8mm tall x 4.4mm thick at the neck.

Steel - AISI W2 from Aldo at New Jersey Steel Baron
Handle - Stabilized (K&G) ancient bog oak (5460yrs old) from Mark Farley at Burl Source, with 165yr old wrought iron and nickel spacers.

I hope you enjoy the photographs!



Thanks for looking!

 

What gets me is the Big Oak handle. If I owned that I would have to tell everyone "it's Big Oak, guess how old it is.....wrong! 5,460 years old!"

 

Simple ELEGANCE!!! My goodness, one uber sexy knife!

 

That is a very beautiful knife. But I think I LOVE the grind! I am very curious how it cuts.

 

Gorgeous knife!

 

Thank you gentlemen!!

Thank you my friend! I cannot really speak as to how it cuts now. But I can absolutely show you how it cut before I sharpened it. To clarify, by 'sharpen' I mean actually put a primary bevel on it as you see in the above pictures. This video was made with the 'as polished' edge...only knocking the burr off with a few passes on a 6k stone at a very high angle.

As always lol...please excuse the general lack of knife skills!

Also, if you are using a cell phone it seems there are no annotations. You might want to turn down your volume a bit, as I didn't realize the music coming from my cell phone that I shot this with would be so loud!!

 

Gorgeous knife, Cris! The person who gets this knife is a damn lucky person.

 

That knife is too beautiful? Seems so perfectly proportioned and balanced. I'm with you Anton, some lucky person will own that knife. I bet he is in agony waiting to get his hands on it!

 

Right?!

Actually, I know he is because I've drug out shipping waiting for a tool so I can make one tiiiiiiiny little adjustment, lol. I just hope the knife is worth his wait for him!

 

Beautiful nice Cris and congrats Anton:cool1

 

No, I love Hurt as well. Great music. And you seem to be making a healthy salad .

Just kidding. The knife is the star of the video. Don't keep Anton waiting for too long .

 

Pico de Gallo!!!

And thank you .