Nothing will fly at me?
Nothing don't worry.
Hey guys! Welcome back to another episode of Guide To Life.
And today, I have a guest with me here
because we are going to be making knives from scratch
and I brought this psycho person here with me, Rozz
because she loves knives.
She actually brings here knives all the way to Tokyo where she bought them from just to get them sharpened.
Because I didn't know any better.
I didn't know there are actually people that can do that for me in Singapore.
Okay, but still... who actually travels with a suitcase full of knives?
I have boss of the place here with me, Guangjun.
And he's the knife-making expert.
So usually you can take a knife-making class with him
and it spans across five days but today we'll be having a sped up version
where we'll be learning how to make a knife from scratch.
Is that correct?
Yeap! TV magic version.
The first stage of knife making is forging
and we're gonna be using a really easy to use material. It's carbon steel.
What is this going to make into five knives or what?
Yah eventually five knives but you're only using the end today.
So the extended length so it doesn't get too hot.
I see, I see.
Here we have the furnace and this is also known as a forge.
It's currently at about a thousand degrees now and we're gonna put it in.
And once it's pre-heated, it should be the right temperature for forging.
Let me show you guys how it's supposed to look okay?
So the key thing is to move very quickly when the steel is actually hot.
When it's hot right, that's when you can have the most advantage.
Oh so this is when we flatten it.
We have to flatten it?
And this is how you draw out the width of the blade.
Alright, I'm gonna go do my forging now.
K**n*n* damn heavy.
Okay and you wanna to strike it.
Xiaxue: Nothing is happening. Guangjun: Just keep going don't worry. Just keep going.
And then I will critcise you after that.
Criticise you.
This is going to take 1000 years dude! It looks nothing like a blade for now.
Okay, can you go any harder?
It's a bit cold already. We can put it back in first.
Okay...
I think it's definitely more difficult than I expected.
I thought that when it was piping hot like red,
it would be quite soft like molten glass.
Like you can blow it and shit.
But no! It is still freaking hard.
I'm beginning to think that a knife doesn't need to be a pointy-ended knife.
It can be a square-ended knife.
Oh yah! Why can't we make a freaking cleaver? We can do that!
And people think that I can take a lot of pressure
and a lot of you know, beating because I'm like big.
I can't. My arms. They're like T-rex okay.
When she do the hammering, she's like...
I can't...
F****** heavy! Oh my god!
Raise it very high and then drop it down.
I have no arm strength.
Oh my god...
Normally it takes about two hours for you to produce something that looks kinda like a knife.
So two hours later it's supposed to end up looking like this.
Kinda like the very beginning of a medieval knife.
Erm yah which we are no where close to
but we're going to move on to the next stage to see what is going to be done next.
Oh my god...I love TV. I just love TV!
So you just kinda forged a knife out. I mean "forged" okay.
And now we don't need the handle anymore so we can just cut of the excess that we don't need.
Nothing will fly at me? Nothing. Don't worry.
Nothing flew!
Sparks flew! I didn't include sparks in the list of things.
You like sparkling things what.
Yah. But I don't like it flying at me dude.
So we're gonna try and grind this now.
So we're try and make it more knife like a bit more like this okay?
This is like a giant nail filing machine.
That's the first thing that comes to your head.
I'm a girl! Are there sparks flying out?
Yes. There's gonna be sparks.
So the first thing we're gonna do is we're gonna try and straighten the knife.
Huh? Your hand not hot meh like that hold?
Your hand not hot meh?
No it's not that hot.
Oh my god. It's not like a nail filing machine at all.
It's quite fun actually. I quite like this part.
This part fun right? Yah.
Wah not bad ah. Not bad ah Wendy.
Yah, she's very creative one. This is fun!
Okay.
Nice.
Now it looks more like a knife. Yes. Now it looks more like a knife.
Okay, hold tight ah. Hold tight ah. Don't let go ah.
I feel so badass!
Alright, so we're done with the grinding part so I guess the knives now look like knives.
And then the next step is to go for hardening right? Yes. The heat treatment.
But this feels kinda hard though.
Yah it's tough but it's not hard yet.
I mean it's hard for a material.
It's gonna get harder from here on.
Well sounds like a promise.
She likes it hard.
Okay, so now the knives are already ground to roughly the shape
which we did during the soft state
we're gonna do the heat treatment on it which involves first the heating of the steel
and then after that we're gonna cool it really quickly in water.
It's quite zen
the feeling.
So right after hardening after you quench the steel, the steel is very brittle
so we have to tamper it which is to reduce the hardness
by increasing the thoughness of the thing.
So it doesn't snap while you're using it.
So this is 180 degree celsius. We're gonna put it in for an hour
and after that we should have a workable steel and we can start the final finishing of the knife.
So it has been an hour and the knives are out of the tamper oven
and next step we're gonna do grinding part two back at this machine again.
So you can see the beginning of the silver.
You can see the end result what we're looking for is.
And this knife is actually what you call a Nashiji knife.
It has this pear skin texture.
This kind of rough texture which is the polished version of the forged finished.
What's the point of that? Just decor only?
Just decor, just show off like oh my knife is handmade one.
I'm going to show you quickly how we polish the scale.
So right now it's black as you can see it's all dark.
We're gonna make it a bit shinier.
Okay, so you can see it gets a little bit shiny.
So this method right actually allows you to make the knife shiny without changing the texture.
That's how you preserve the Nashiji.
So I'm going to let you guys try it now for five minutes.
Usually in our actual class this takes about an hour.
We can see this is roughly five minutes of work.
It has turn like that. It's very rough.
It's still a bit rough.
So sadly we don't have time to do the whole polish.
But we can see here we have the final product.
Which is something that is very shiny.
After it's polished it looks nice but it's only a knife if you can cut well with it.
So now I'm going to show you guys how to sharpen a knife.
And for this purpose we'll be using mainly wet stones.
So no machines here?
Today we're learning what you can do at home.
And of course the last stage of sharpening is always done by hand.
If you are a professional.
Very seldom you'll have machines that are fine enough to do the work that we do here.
Finger underneath the knife.
Roughly this angle is good enough.
It's not critical, just don't go too low.
If you go to low you'll scratch the finish of the knife and you'll have to re-polish it again.
This stone is soaked in water and if it gets too dry
you just get a bit of water from underneath here and drip it on top.
Why does it need to be wet? To reduce friction?
It is to reduce friction. It also helps to break down the stone.
So as you are going the stone actually disintegrates.
And that is part of the reason why the cutting surface is always fresh.
And it also prevents clogging.
You see all the metal dust right, it gets washed away as you're sharpening.
Okay, so I was sharpening for awhile already, how do I know whether it's like sharp enough
to go to the next stage or whether it's sharp?
We're gonna cut some paper to see the meaning of sharpness okay?
I'm gonna show you first a very sharp knife here
and it's one of our sharpest knives.
So you can watch here.
Woah...
Woah! So satisfying!
Oh my god! Look at that!
So I'm gonna let you try this now.
And then we're gonna let you use the knife that you "sharpen" and the you tell me if you are...
You mean you sharpen too.
Yes baby!
Wah shit I need this knife!
You do!
Okay you need to learn how to sharpen your knife to reach this state.
Eh let me use my lousy knife.
Ah c*** c*** b***! Ah doesn't even cut.
That's terrible.
It is a very very coarse swear word.
Like I never realise it
cause I'm always the one saying it.
Okay so err...
let's try and see er...
what's causing that.
Can I help you a bit here because this needs a bit of work.
Anyway I'm gonna help you here a bit because this stone a bit precious
so if you go too hard on it might ruin my stone.
I'm gonna help you.
Yah they're very nerd about their stones.
I've never sharpen a knife in my life.
Seriously?
Yes. If it's blunt I'll just deal with it being blunt.
That's very bad!
In fact a lof of people in Singapore thinks that knives are like you buy it
then you use it and when it's not sharp you throw it away.
Yah! Yah!
A lot of people think that and I'm like what?
Alright so, our knives are sharpen to a good enough standard now
and it's time to slot it into their handles
which are pre-made my him already.
So let's put it in.
That's why she said.
It doesn't go in. That's what she said too.
Lubricate it.
I do not want to imagine you all in any sexual position.
Stupid Rozz.
So you put it in then you can give it a light tap on the table.
It'll tighten up.
Like that?
No the other way!
Angsty sia... Okay let's go.
Oh yes! Okay very good! Now it should feel snug and tight.
Rozz you want to do one?
Do not make that sound though.
Oh...
Easy entry.
I would appreciate my knife a lot more now. Seriously.
I hope you guys won't throw your knives away when they're blunt okay? Come and sharpen them properly.
I will not try to bargain as well next time when you tell me it's expensive.
Cause if you actually make this you'll charge how much?
Come on...
I don't know $2000?
Five days of my time leh!
It's very long leh.
Alright, so we've come to the end of the episode.
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Bye!