ultrasharp or maybe not so

[Azull]

Ok, here's my attempt.

First I tried with my tanto, It's 440 stainless steel, has a hollow grind and is actually sharp enough to shave with. I use a Naniwa 1000/3000 water stone initially and finished with a leather strap to give it that little bit extra. But I failed. The back of the blade is rather thick and it pushed the cigarette parts apart while cutting through. So the last bit of paper still tears.

 

 

Then I tried with an ordinary kitchen knife. Sharpened with a sharpening steel and again a leather strap. This did the trick. Though I could probably get a smoother cut with a little more polishing

I'm holding the cigarette with some pliers because... well, safety first. I already nicked my thumb :P

 

Vid:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X378z5dnaDw&feature=youtu.be

 

 

 

Edited March 6, 2014 by Azull

[Yoshi]

I am currently in the process of gathering the items required to do this.

[Muratus del Mur]

now we have an ice breaker :D

 

do you think it will do the same if cut slower?

"ordinary kitchen knife" could be a vg10 steel , depends on budget, any clue how "ordinary" it is? just asking

 

i must admit i nevr thought about cutting it with a fast cut, i only tried with slow motion, i do not yet realize if its harder or easier yet, but i will try.

 

Till i see the next vid to compare, all i can say is IMPRESSIVE!

 

How long did it take from start to success, with the time spend on trying, sharpening, etc, and how many cigarettes you destroyed in the process?

 

:D

 

waiting for more!!

ps, i want to see a pic of the used knife to see something about the blade, thanks

[Intrigue]

oh! Great work Azull! I hadnt tried it fast either, and going slow just caused lots of tearing after halfway. I'll have to try it your way... and with the pliers too, I like all my fingers where they are :)

[dst]

I tried fast but the blade I have used is too thick. I need to find something slimmer.

I tried with something slimmer but it doesn't have the weight to cut such a strange...thingy.

[Yoshi]

http://yoshi.40cakes.com/MD/
(After taking the pictures/videos, I transferred them to my computer, but had to wait for the website admin to give me the pass to upload them, so I ended up just getting the indexes and everything ready without any formatting, and then today in the morning I was able to start the upload, and I'm currently at work, so I will fix the formatting and any errors when I get home.)

So these were my attempts at this, both with pictures and videos.

I started with a stainless steel spring assisted knife, then used a machete (unknown metal), and then a fillet knife (again unknown).

Initially I used the spring assisted knife and I did a test cut, that while seemed to have started well, ended up tearing towards the bottom half.

Instead of doing an initial cut with the machete, I decided to just start with the sharpening. As you can see, the machete was pretty dull, I had found it at a house in my line of work, and always wanted an excuse to sharpen it. I ended up just using a hand grinder, and nothing more.

I then used a knife/blade sharpener(will take picture of it later) on the spring assisted knife blade, and then a palm sized oilstone, and then finally another sharpening item which I do not know the name of (will take picture later)

I also used my dad's fillet knife, which is already pretty sharp, but hadn't been sharpened in awhile. I didn't end up sharpening it at all due to not wanting to ruin the blade. I think I used it wrong, and therefore it didn't slice properly.

And then, just for kicks, I ended up heating up my spring assisted knife blade with a lighter for 30 seconds, which seemed to do nothing.

I couldn't use any of the random kitchen knives we have seeing as how my mom would end up using it on me after finding out I 'ruined' one of her knives.

All in all, it was fun, and I'm still not done with this.

[EDIT: Fixed up the link formatting a bit.]

Edited February 25, 2014 by Yoshi

[Azull]

This this the kitchen knife I used in the vid. It's cheap stainless steel, bought it a while ago in a local supermarket. I think it cost 3 or 4 euro. If you can tell me what you're looking for Mur, I can take another pic, different angle or maybe closer if my phone cam can handle it.

 

 

 

 

With the tanto I spent about an hour sharpening. Preparing the water stone took about half an hour. Grinding the knife about 20 minutes and another 40 minutes with a leather strap. 15 cigarettes destroyed and one thumb slightly damaged, trying to get a clean cut. 

 

The kitchen knife, sharpening about 45 minutes. 15 minutes with a sharpening steel and 30 minutes with the leather. Only 2 cigarettes destroyed. Both were a clean cut, but I didn't film the first try. 

Add some more time for experimenting, taking pics, filming, uploading and such. All in all it kept me busy Sunday afternoon :)

 

A slow cut is definitely harder to do than a fast slice. With a flat blade, speed and keeping the blade properly aligned it doesn't have to be that sharp to cut the cigarette decently.  

When moving slowly the quality of the blade's material is probably more important. You can certainly get a better edge on it.

 

I'm going to try cutting a cigarette slowly next. Thinking about using a ceramic knife. I'm curious how exactly you (Mur) did it with your razor.

How did you hold the cigarette? Did you cut up or down? Did you push the blade through, or did you slice?

Edited February 24, 2014 by Azull

[Intrigue]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m4WrbUjRSYA&feature=youtu.be

 

Well, here we go. Tried a good Kiwi kitchen knife (the favorite in my knife drawer), a smaller Korean knife, and a big ol' monster of a knife (some Chinese brand i'm not familiar with from the asian grocer). Nearly got it with the Kiwi, so I'm going to try to finish out the edge a bit more, or improve my technique, one of the two.

[Muratus del Mur]

Intrigue and Azull to consider for the first place for now... I incline to consider Azull's cut much cleaner than the ones i saw in Intrigue's video..in fact..Intrigue's cigs look more like broken than cut with one of the knifes (but one does it acceptable)

Yoshi ..I CAN'T OPEN YOUR VIDEOS.. please fix that somehow, upload on youtube or something

 

Still nobody to show me a slow cut ...i guess that will be the final round

 

(@yoshi i will continue o try to open the videos and get back with a reply about them)

 

 

I guess who thought this is a trivial or too simple contest realizes now its not quite so :D

[Muratus del Mur]

UPDATE:

i managed to open yoshis videos too

 

 

from what i see now, you all used the fast method...the cleanest cut i saw so far is from Azull, Intrigue and Yoshi achieved similar results..with the very important mention that Yoshi put considerable effort in sharpening the blade (at least from i can tell in the video, Intrigue used already sharpened knives, correct me if not so)

 

I want to see a slow clear cut... but if nobody does it i will select a winner from current entries.

 

I've managed to do it with a shaving blade and a razor, just to test if its possible. There is a little catch to it...especially at the end where there is nothing to hold against the cut cig part that will not cut off completely....unless... (i let you discover unless what)

 

I admit i failed to do it till now with a knife in a slow clean cut. I managed to cut it 95% perfectly, but the last part is so damn tricky.

You can practice on fine paper tubes, much cheaper than cigs.

 

If someone does it, wins, if it will pass too long time and nobody does it I will select winner(s) from the existing entries

 

Thanks for participating in this contest :) 

[Intrigue]

You saw correctly, the last bit of mine tore on the first one, and the second two started tearing at halfway. I figured out a way to cut slow, but I wasn't sure if it counted as "One motion" or not. Will do it again tomorrow and upload. It's probably not what you had in mind at all, but it was the only way I could make it work with a kitchen knife.

 

So far as them being already sharpened, the first had been previously sharpened, and used as well, so I put a bit of an edge back on the Kiwi with a stone and the strop (probably not more than half an hour worth of effort since it wasn't very dull), but the others were just as they were when I bought them and after a little bit of use (probably not enough to make a difference really).

Edited March 4, 2014 by Intrigue

[Intrigue]

Updated attempts, this time slowly instead of hacking at it. Just to reiterate the last post i made,  this is probably NOT what you had in mind when you said a slow cut since the cigg is not stationary at all, and if so, no worries. Thought I'd just throw it out there anyway just in case it would work as well.

 

First vid is kind of slow at an angle and then the other way I tried to do it from the other day. Neither cut is clean (both have tears).

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q5soNJUiHzQ

 

Second vid is another slow with having the cigg spin across the blade, cut was clean so far as the paper, but it looks like the blade didn't reach deep enough to cut the tobacco fully.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HJ_laLRHmbg

 

And, the last one was the same technique, with more force, which just resulted in bending the cigg right past the filter, and still didn't cut through the tobacco (big twig right there instead of a leaf).

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IaRe4Z44UVQ

 

In case this is in fact very wrong, I'm going to keep trying to do the slow angle thing, since i got most of the way through, but the very last part is so tricky! I get down to maybe 3 mm of paper left, and it tears every time :(

Edited March 4, 2014 by Intrigue

[Shadowseeker]

I want to do this but the workshop is not open till the 10th apparently...so guess I can't participate, at least not without doing it with really dangerous tools, which I won't attempt.

[Muratus del Mur]

that second video is the most unexpected way i saw :)) ...sadly no, its not what i had in mind, but i admire the ingenuity :))

 

The first video is what i had in mind, but, sadly the last part is not clean cut

 

 

this is vlid for everybody, don't be shy to post also stranger or more original ways you discovered,...i am looking for a certain thing, but, i might reward somehow also the impressive attempts

 

(ps: Don't try filming slow motion or altering the cig content to better support the slow cut...thats not original but simply rude attempt to cheat, so don;t go that way)

[Fire Starter]

Damn... a slow clear cut? You serious?!? This requires skills, that are probably already preventing the person, who possesses them, from having some time to even find MD :D

[Ary Endleg]

When I was trying this I haven't tried fast cut I did slow cut and nearly made it. I also find it odd that my cigs are two times more denser than the cigs people showed in this video, so...

[Azull]

So, I've tried a slow cut with various knives and techniques. Cutting down, cutting up, moving the cig instead of the knife, somewhat circular motions of knife and/or cig, moving veeery slowly. But no clean cut through that last little bit of paper so far. Though it was very close a couple of times.

I will let this rest for now because there are other things that require my attention :P  But I might give it another try at some later time.     

Edited March 11, 2014 by Azull

[Shadowseeker]

First tries, failure. Going to post back once I get better results, with video as well then.

[Ackshan Bemunah]

[SIGSEGV]

Edited November 12, 2014 by Ackshan Bemunah

[Muratus del Mur]

Akshan, if you are too lazy to try then be also lazy to mention it. I don't think 3 blades would make a difference anyway

 

yes..doing it slowly requires skill, a skill that can be perfected ... but the actual skill is to sharpen beyond what is normally considered "very sharp"

 

my chrome-vanadium blade gave up eventually :))..who thought a cig could become such a hassle to cut clean. I managed to cut a pencil clean but a cig..its harder :))

 

I picked the winner for now... but i am leaving this topic open till last moment maybe someone does the trick

 

I will help you a bit. a 45deg angle, clean cut till 99% of the cig, then a twist perpendicular on the remaining paper... that does the trick with a razor. Holding the cig vertically also helps, or hold it horizontally but cut from below ..this adds the weight of the cut part to help you cut clean. A rotation move (as i already saw) does the trick if the blade is ultra hollow ground or does not have an angle change. Commercially you will not find any blade sharpened like that, unless very expensive ones that are actually beveled...but its easy to achieve that shape within one day of grinding a blade manually, or a couple of minutes of doing it with an electric tool.

 

For your curiosity, get an old type of razor blade, the big one, is still available to buy at very very cheap prices in malls, or disassamble a 'modern' single use shaving..thing (not sure how its called)... try with that. It will not be valid for this contest, but its for your curiosity to see if you lack the skill or the blade ;)

 

 

 

There are two points in this challenge, one or the other are fine for me. Either learn to sharpen a blade, or learn to use it for delicate stuff.

 

I must say i am not satisfied with the results, but i am satisfied with the amount of effort you put in trying it, in making a movie, and in trying over and over again

[Muratus del Mur]

For my own reference, Azull, Intrigue, and Yoshi ..i should pick one of you .. but not sure who deserves the most

 

- Azull came closest to what i asked, but a fast cut is debate-able

- Intrigue found an unexpected way to do it, nothing about grinding the blade however

- Yoshi worked a lot to grind his blades himself, but not so great results

 

correct me if i see it wrong

 

 

[Azull]

Seems right so far.

[Tipu]

Lets reward all three of them, simple hehe

[Intrigue]

However you decide works for me. It was an interesting thing to try to do, but after several packs... well, i kinda gave up :( Guess I'm just better at sharpening garden tools than knives.

[Yoshi]

To be perfectly honest, this was a contest.  If nobody was able to successfully complete it as per the rules, then nobody should receive the prize.  

With that said, If you have your heart set on giving the rewards out just for our participation, I did not complete a smooth cut while fast or slow, therefore I don't think I deserve to be in the standings.

Azull did successfully do a clean cut, and I think that they deserve the kill weapon.
Intrigue got really close, and I think that they should receive the custom item.


This was awesome, and I wish I had more time to perfect grinding a blade and making is as sharp as possible.  Maybe in the future I'll try to attempt this again.