Everyone needs a high quality knife set. If you have cheap knives, these will make all the difference.

Screw this.

I can get the Ginsu knife for 2 easy payments of $19.99

Are these SPECIFICALLY for onion cutting? Or is that just a strange name for the knives?

iamjakex wrote:Are these SPECIFICALLY for onion cutting? Or is that just a strange name for the knives?

Ken Onion is the guy's name. I bought a kershaw pocket knife with Ken Onion's name attached to them a long time ago.

I have yet to see an onion worth $150 to justify owning these knives.

More than a $350 dollar value, and great reviews for both knifes. I'll have to think about this a bit.

Ouch. If I was going to pay this much for a set of knives, they sure as **** wouldn't have a serrated edge.

Shun's a great name, but with no ability to use a knife steel for truing or re-sharpen these with any measure of ease at all when they /eventually/ dull, they'll end up as throwaways, no matter how long it takes them to finally degrade to the same level as any bargain-bin set.

maassen wrote:Ken Onion is the guy's name. I bought a kershaw pocket knife with Ken Onion's name attached to them a long time ago.

More about the guy.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ken_Onion

I don't want to want these knives...but I love them! I try to tell myself that a knife isn't worth this much money, but they are incredible...I am hopelessly lost.

They're both serrated....which means you can't really sharpen at home.

Not good.

I am always so tempted by these knives, but the price is hard to swallow. I have a reasonable set of Henkle's knives, that were probably a similar price, but it is hard to buy these as I am not unhappy with the knives I have.

Woot, I promise you - the day you put one of those giant knife sets with the butcher block from Shun up (preferrably the Onions), you've got a guaranteed sale.

This? I can't justify this. I'll give you the 600 bucks you want for the big set, but 150 for 2 just won't cut it. Har har.

http://preview.tinyurl.com/2d29ssu
$140 for the little one @ amazon (free s/h)

http://preview.tinyurl.com/2bar9mv
$230 for the little one @ amazon (via irawoods.com (also free s/h))

So, using my crazy math skills, that's $370 for the pair.

A video of one of the knives in action:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xzu4wZ72Yxw

It does more than onions! Or at least I hope it does.

What a second, this isn't a wootoff?! Shun Knives always = Wootoff!

Actually I have a Shun Classic 7 inch Santoku and it's a great knife. sharpens *very* well. If you have to ask "why so expensive", you have obviously never had the opportunity to hold a great knife in your hands.

With that being said, these are Serrated, which means you will have one hell of a time trying to sharpen them (You can...carefully). So when they go dull, that's about it. Not exactly a great deal .

I'm assuming those weird squiggles on the knife stands for shun ken am i rite :D

Talesin wrote:Ouch. If I was going to pay this much for a set of knives, they sure as **** wouldn't have a serrated edge.

Shun's a great name, but with no ability to use a knife steel for truing or re-sharpen these with any measure of ease at all when they /eventually/ dull, they'll end up as throwaways, no matter how long it takes them to finally degrade to the same level as any bargain-bin set.

Most knife/cutlery stores will professionally sharpen even serrated knives for less than $10. Of course, you need to have a knife store in your proximity to use their services and most have been put out of business by Wal-Mart...

Apparently these are also known for their ergonomic handles?

http://www.irawoods.com/Shun-DM0505-Ken-Onion-Series-9in-Multi-Purpose-Serrated-Slicer

I personally like the fact the big one looks like a mini-saw. muahahaha.

So there's no way to sharped these myself? I have to have them professionally sharpened? Sounds inconvenient.

I love serrated knife sets...well... anything serrated actually... the word is just... well... interesting? :-/

Looks like a good deal to me, however I don't think I cut onions often enough to justify that price tag!!

vlpronj wrote:More about the guy.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ken_Onion

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assisted-opening_knife

this is the sort of knife I bought, except you pushed on the back of the handle to open it. I got a citation for having a switchblade. I refused to pay (I planned on going to court, kershaw even sent me copies of the laws regarding switchblades) and I guessed they just gave up. this was years ago.

Shiftlock wrote:So there's no way to sharped these myself? I have to have them professionally sharpened? Sounds inconvenient.

According to this site, yes you can... with care. Mid page.

http://www.knifecenter.com/knifecenter/sharpen/instruct.html

I have a set of Shun knives. They are unlike any knives I've ever owned, including some others that were pretty expensive. They're so sharp, I've already accidentally cut myself three times, even though I've had them for only a few weeks. Although one of my knives is serrated (it's a bread knife like the big one in this set), I agree with the person who said that there will not be a good way to keep those serrated edges sharp. If you're considering Shun knives, you might want to wait for the un-serrated edged ones--especially if you plan on using the knives a lot. I love my Shun knives, but as I said, they're so sharp they're rather dangerous. Scary.

I have the larger one that came with my KO block set...

I must say, it's amazing.

I just bought a Ken Onion Shallot...like today, I'm a little freaked out, is Woot watching me 0.o

Wow! These things look really awesome. And expensive. 75 times more expensive than my wal mart "shappu" 8 knife set with bonus steak knives that can cut through a tomato and stay sharp enough for a hammer!

Unless I am mistaken, I thought all of the Ken Onion Series Shun knives were made of VG-10 Steel. The SG-2 steel is reserved for the higher end Elite Series...

Even the Shun Website has these as the VG-10 Steel...

Despite the fact that I already own these and think they are great, I think this needs to be clarified for everyone else.

slein wrote:I am always so tempted by these knives, but the price is hard to swallow. I have a reasonable set of Henkle's knives, that were probably a similar price, but it is hard to buy these as I am not unhappy with the knives I have.

Henckel's can't hold an Onion to these knives - hard to believe but true!

Anybody know what kind of material the handles are made from, and how durable it is?

Talesin wrote:Ouch. If I was going to pay this much for a set of knives, they sure as **** wouldn't have a serrated edge.

Shun's a great name, but with no ability to use a knife steel for truing or re-sharpen these with any measure of ease at all when they /eventually/ dull, they'll end up as throwaways, no matter how long it takes them to finally degrade to the same level as any bargain-bin set.

OK, just checked from shunknives.org... They will sharpen for free for life... here's a quote from the website...

First, your best option is to send the knives back to the Kai USA facility in Portland, Oregon. At the Portland facility, we can restore the factory edge to your blade for the life of the knife, at no cost to you aside from mailing the knife to us. Just make sure you include a return address and telephone number so we can contact you if needed.

To have your knives sharpened, send them to:

Kai USA
Attention warranty
18600 SW Teton
Tualatin, OR 97062

if you have a set of big, sharp knives, it shouldn't be very difficult to shun ken onion... >=b

I believe all Shun knives come with lifetime service, which means you can mail it to its US office for free sharpening, for LIFE.

Shiftlock wrote:So there's no way to sharped these myself? I have to have them professionally sharpened? Sounds inconvenient.

iamjakex wrote:Are these SPECIFICALLY for onion cutting? Or is that just a strange name for the knives?

Ken Onion is an award-winning American knife designer, and is the lead designer at Kershaw.

U beat me...

exsive wrote:OK, just checked from shunknives.org... They will sharpen for free for life... here's a quote from the website...

First, your best option is to send the knives back to the Kai USA facility in Portland, Oregon. At the Portland facility, we can restore the factory edge to your blade for the life of the knife, at no cost to you aside from mailing the knife to us. Just make sure you include a return address and telephone number so we can contact you if needed.

To have your knives sharpened, send them to:

Kai USA
Attention warranty
18600 SW Teton
Tualatin, OR 97062

I can confirm these will indeed cut through an onion.

I bought one of the Shun 3-knife sets during the last Woot-off, and I love them all. I'm skeptical about the need for high-quality serrated knives, though. You could easily opt for a decent 10-inch bread knife for closer to $30 and never look back.

I recognize that there's a lot of know how and hard work, not to mention expensive materials, that go into making a high quality knife. However during these times, when your neighbors are out of jobs and maybe some of your own family members are looking for work, it's hard to justify spending this kind of money on a knife. After all, many of us are on Woot to save money on more practical things.

A Chef's knife, santoku, and pairing knife trio would be awesome to see listed!