Hello and good evening.
I was reading the thrad "Pakistani knives are they all junk" and wanted to post but it has been closed.
Ok few words about me:
born and bred in Germany and of mixed origin pakistani/italian.
interested in knives but not an expert...not yet
Since my father travels to Pakistan once a while he has often been adviced to start selling knives and axes in Germany too.
A lot of their stuff is going abroad mainly to the USA where they sell bulk quantities.
So my father came to me and said like since you know to work with the computer you can sell knives and stuff online.
I said yeah why not...I ve been to ebay since early days. But as I looked deeper into the matter I got to know pakistani knives are in a mayority junk
although about 100.000 people more or less are employed in this very sector.
The reasons are can summarize as follows:
1. choosing of bad steel ( mild steel with less than 0,2% of carbon so not heat treatable and does not hold an edge, you have to sharpen all the day)
2. no or bad heat treatment ( they only use coal furnaces so you can not control the temperature)
but as you know there are a lot of videos where they show they are heat treating, means they put the blade in the coals and the quench it in oil, but
the tempering is missing out
so the blade could be hard but break as well or it was not hard in the first place because it was low carbon steel
stress relief heat treatment is not done
the blade is cools up to fast instead over hours
3. sharpening is done on "rolling stones" so the sparks are flying everywhere ( the edge gets extemely hot again and becomes soft, here we should be using a belt sander
with a frequency control are sharpen with low speed) maybe also the angle is not right
4. fit and finish ( you find residues from glue, scratches on the blade, brass starts to get green, the "damascus" blades get rusty before they even arrive to the customer)
So it seems to be impossible to change that unless I am the one
In the past months I have been to few black smiths hear in Germany also in Solingen to learn the proper way
It seems that the only steel available in Pakistan for knives which is suitable in a way is DS steel which is way ahead comparing to mild steel but
not at all a steel which is the first choice for knive makers in the west
So that means the steel should be imported
Further the machines like furnaces or good belt sanders are unlike to be found there, need to be imported as well
Then the workers of course need to be eduacated how a knife should be sharpened the right way
The only thing I find reasonable and feasible in Pakistan are the leather sheaths.
I will try my best to manufacture good knives in Pakistan with the know how from Germany, I am still in contact with few black smithes here
I just wanted to share my story and know your thoughts
I was reading the thrad "Pakistani knives are they all junk" and wanted to post but it has been closed.
Ok few words about me:
born and bred in Germany and of mixed origin pakistani/italian.
interested in knives but not an expert...not yet
Since my father travels to Pakistan once a while he has often been adviced to start selling knives and axes in Germany too.
A lot of their stuff is going abroad mainly to the USA where they sell bulk quantities.
So my father came to me and said like since you know to work with the computer you can sell knives and stuff online.
I said yeah why not...I ve been to ebay since early days. But as I looked deeper into the matter I got to know pakistani knives are in a mayority junk
although about 100.000 people more or less are employed in this very sector.
The reasons are can summarize as follows:
1. choosing of bad steel ( mild steel with less than 0,2% of carbon so not heat treatable and does not hold an edge, you have to sharpen all the day)
2. no or bad heat treatment ( they only use coal furnaces so you can not control the temperature)
but as you know there are a lot of videos where they show they are heat treating, means they put the blade in the coals and the quench it in oil, but
the tempering is missing out
so the blade could be hard but break as well or it was not hard in the first place because it was low carbon steel
stress relief heat treatment is not done
the blade is cools up to fast instead over hours
3. sharpening is done on "rolling stones" so the sparks are flying everywhere ( the edge gets extemely hot again and becomes soft, here we should be using a belt sander
with a frequency control are sharpen with low speed) maybe also the angle is not right
4. fit and finish ( you find residues from glue, scratches on the blade, brass starts to get green, the "damascus" blades get rusty before they even arrive to the customer)
So it seems to be impossible to change that unless I am the one
In the past months I have been to few black smiths hear in Germany also in Solingen to learn the proper way
It seems that the only steel available in Pakistan for knives which is suitable in a way is DS steel which is way ahead comparing to mild steel but
not at all a steel which is the first choice for knive makers in the west
So that means the steel should be imported
Further the machines like furnaces or good belt sanders are unlike to be found there, need to be imported as well
Then the workers of course need to be eduacated how a knife should be sharpened the right way
The only thing I find reasonable and feasible in Pakistan are the leather sheaths.
I will try my best to manufacture good knives in Pakistan with the know how from Germany, I am still in contact with few black smithes here
I just wanted to share my story and know your thoughts
