After forging in the die, the knives are stamped out of the forging blank and then roughly ground, calibrated and cleaned. This is followed by so-called ice-hardening: the knives are cooled to -80 °C to improve the structure of the microstructure in the blade steel. In the next step, the knives are tempered in two stages. Tempering is a term used by the knife makers in Solingen. Tempering means that the knife is heated again and thus made unbreakable. Now the blade is pre-ground. This is followed by the pre-grinding of the back of the knife, which is the upper part of the knife. This is followed by the fine grinding of the back of the knife and the grinding of the transition between the blade and the handle. The back of the blade is now pre-ground for the attachment of the handle and provided with retaining bars. Then the blade is fine-ground. The Solingen knifemaker also calls this "pliesten". This gives the blade its distinctive surface. The handle is now placed on the retaining bars, glued and adjusted. Another five or so work steps are required to adjust the handle and blade so that the transitions between wood and steel are smooth. These five steps must then be repeated with a finer abrasive belt. Now the upper part of the knife, the back, gets its fine grinding. This is followed by the finest grinding of the flowing transition between the blade and the handle. Then the knife handles are pre-polished, followed by fine polishing. Only now does the knife get its sharpness trigger, because the knife edge, also called the bevel, is now sharpened (the knifemaker calls this "honing"). The trigger is polished so that the blade slides better through the material to be cut. In the next step, the GÜDE logo is etched onto the blade. Cleaning and quality control are the final operations. After that, the knives are sheathed for protection. Last but not least, the knives are packed in a gift box with the GÜDE pit cloth and the appropriate labels are applied. The finished knives are now stored and ready for shipping.