The customer challenged clay designing, heating and quenching, and polishing (finishing work)
Forging the blade with Kobuse style construction.
Forging the core steel
Soft steel pieces and too hard steel pieces are selected, and forged out after 12 time foldings.
Forging the outer steel what becomes the edge
Dense and hard steel pieces are selected, and forged out after 15 time foldings.
Then the core steel and the outer steel are conbined within kobuse style.
Challenge by the customer
Clay designing is ugly.
Finishing part of the polishing was done by the customer. Those are Hazuya, Jizuya, and Nugui stages. Of course, it is the classical style (sashikomi style).
The result of this challenge shows that the clay designing is not important to call nice hamon out of the steel.