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Is there a difference between sharpening a Japanese knife compared to a German knife?

Question

Daniel Poll

Answer

It's a really good question. Actually, some knife makers now are essentially blurring the lines between these two Styles but there are some key differences in the classical sort of design of a German or European style knife versus a Japanese style knife in short the German or European style knife tends to have a much thicker spine a much larger amount of Steel actually in the blade. It's a heavier blade a thicker blade and then at the very end of the blade where the blade needs the handle their tens to be a very full or three quarter bolster, which is essentially a heavy thick piece of Steel that runs the the length of the back of the blade that helps protect the hand and provides some stability to the blade. Don't typically see this in Japanese style blades. what it does from a sharpening perspective if you're looking at using a sharpening stone or even like a honing steel. Is that right? Where the where the back of that bolster meets the blade there's a possibility for essentially over sharpening in that point and I've seen many many cases of examples where because it's not just a clean straight line across the entirety of the blade you have this little point where it's thicker. There's a tendency to stop there and essentially over sharpen and sometimes have a small little indent which over time can become a little bit of a u shape. In in that blade. So the challenge there essentially is over time. If you're not careful with that European or German style blade with that bolster that one little spot. You can create a little bit of a divot and thus have a small sort of indentation not a pure straight line running the length of that blade aside from that. There's no real core differences between sharpening. Again, these companies are now even using blending different types of steel or certain types of Steel that were once preferred by Asian knife producers are now being used by European knife producers and vice versa. But stylistically there's there's not a whole lot of difference in terms of sharpening.