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Some Misunderstanding with Sumi e Brushes

1, Portion of accessories
The portion of accessories have been increased in past decades, but this is not a profiteer behavior as some users believed. For decades, farm raised animal hairs have dominated because wild animals have been protected by laws. Farm raised animal hairs are softer, therefore compared to what on ancient books, more stiff hairs are added in the formula to enhance the elasticity.  Now we back to the first misunderstanding, in the current situation, a long head brush simply by goat hairs is almost not unusable—cannot back to the original shape after applying one stroke.
 
However, too much accessories added make the brush rigid and hard to use. How to balance the formula is a challenge. This is another reason for the factories to keep the detailed formula secrecy --- good factories maintain their advantage in competition; bad factories seal their cheap accessories.
 

2.Bamboo shafts
Some users purchased several bamboo shaft brushes and got upset by the textures of shafts are different. Unlike wooded shafts which are painted uniformly, bamboo shafts are from natural bamboo. There are no two pieces of bamboo stems are exactly same in the world. 
 
3. Something users should know
  • Horse Hairs in the weasel hairs brush
Some user is confused about the horse hairs are added in weasel brushes. From my understanding, beside reasons have discussed, horse hairs are longer than weasel hairs, and are good to make long head brushes which is a trend in the current market.  It is hard to find a weasel hairs brush with the head longer than 5cm.
 
  • Manmade fibers
 High grade manmade fibers are more expensive than animal hairs. Meanwhile low-grade fibers are really cheap. Utilizing manmade fibers or not , as well as the portion and quality used, depends on factories’ experience and ethic.  When purchasing inventory samples, I did encounter couple low quality brushes-- the fibers added are awful.  Therefore, good suppliers select the factories very carefully.


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