I've decided that this summer I am going to learn to home. I already have some stones and other equipment from a previous attempt Addy honing SE blades and some rocks from other sharpening ventures. Here's my setup: L to R: 300/600 diamond plate Worn out 600 DMT(tried to lap the black Arkansas) 600/1200 diamond plate 3000/8000 generic water stone 1k King Deluxe Black Arkansas Small coti C12K Barber Hone (whipped dog) Glass tile and lapping film progression Up top balsa wood stop with iron oxide and chromium oxide. The victims: I'll probably start will the Gold Dollars, since who cares if I mess them up. I also have a ZY razor inbound from China. And finally to see my edges, a USB microscope and 30x/60x loupe Sent from my Galaxy using Tapatalk
Please post your journey often and with as much detail as you are willing - I am looking to learn in the not too distant future and will be very interested to read about it.
Congratulations, welcome to the club! That king likes to dish, you’ll want to flatten it with every use. You can do a lot of your mid work on the Coticule with a heavy to moderate slurry. Your set up looks a lot like mine when I got started, except my mid range stones were a Norton 4/8K. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Fantastic. I have been doing the same and it is starting to pay off, although I think I am overly reliant on my stropping skills right now. You have some stones there that look really interesting. Best of luck!
Well I spent about an hour trying to set the bevel on the GD 66. And I've come to the conclusion that either one the King is a slow cutter or two there's a ton of metal to remove on the Gold Dollar or three I keep screwing up my bevel. Most likely three. Sent from my Galaxy using Tapatalk
The Kings are notoriously slow stones. The best thing that I ever did for my honing was to get a Norton 220/1000 grit stone. It allowed me to quickly reset any bevel. The 220 makes fast work of an edge, that has the bevel ground off, due to chips, nicks, dings, cracks, etc. The 1000 end is about 3x faster than the King 1k. I use my King 1k after the Norton 1k. The King feels more like a 2-3k stone to me.
You have a nice mix of stones there. One hour on the king is quite a long time to not set the bevel. I have a Norton 1k and, with one exception, it’s never taken me more than a 200 laps. Try it again with a bit more pressure towards the leading edge of the blade. Try some X strokes as that might help. Honing gymnasts! If you don’t yet have one, a loupe could help you see where you’re making progress or areas of the blade that need more attention.
I was thinking about taking it to the 1200 diamond to get the heavy lifting done and then to the King to smooth out the jaggedness of the diamond Sent from my Galaxy using Tapatalk
Thanks Jim, I do have a loupe and I can see that it looks like I have a bevel to the edge, but I've had pocket knives that were sharper. Also there's a 2 or 3mm section on both the heel and the toe that aren't even as close as the middle. Sent from my Galaxy using Tapatalk
I don't have experience with Diamond hones. I will say that the Norton has impressed me. Also, they aren't pricey.
Take a break, change the tape, then resume again. This time with combinations of circular strokes, and x strokes. Concentrate on the areas that are not up to speed. When those areas feel sharp enough, use full blade x strokes only, to make sure the entire edge is even.
It could be both lol! I've seen factory Gold Dollars with no bevel at all on them, or half a bevel. They don't reject much. I've used diamond plates for initial geometry correction and your suggestion will certainly work. These days I like a Shapton Glass HR 500 or even a Shapton Pro 32o if needed. The SG 500 is a very fast stone. Diamond plate striae are a little harder to remove than striae from abrasive stones but either will work. Here is a rough outline of how I manage the 'fistful of Dollars'. 1. Hold the razor edge toward a bright surface and look down at the spine. You're looking for a bent, warped, bannana-shaped razor spine. If you have one, might want to try your luck with a different Gold Dollar. Or get a belt sander! 2. If it's straight, then I tape the EDGE and hone the spine straight and flat on both sides. They're usually a little low in the middle of the spine lately, which is OK unless you pull the heel off the hone when honing. Don't worry about spine wear, thay're too thick anyway. 3. Pull the tape on the egde and now set the bevel. They're also isually overground on the show-side heel, so make sure you're hitting all the edge with the hone by checking the striae with some kind of magnification. The sratch pattern should look the same toe, middle, and heel. I check for a set bevel mostly by looking at it with a 7x Hastings triplet. You should not be able to see the apex of the bevel at 1k. Please note that diamond plates and heavy pressure will raise a burr than can make you think that the bevel isn't set. If you have a burr, the bevel is set, at least where the burr is. 4. Once the bevel formed by the diamond plate is set by the first anrasive stone such that you cannot see the apex, it's just a matter of evenly polishing the bevel up to the finisher. Good luck! Cheers, Steve
Want to learn the "Touch" learn to hone from the top down Learn to maintain a fine shaving edge with a finisher, then work you way lower and lower. This teaches the proper feel and touch of the steel to the hone It will take much longer, and you have to invest the time. Trying to learn the most difficult part of honing first is the exact opposite of how we learn most every other skill
Wow! Very hip thread...Thanks Andrew for starting this...I'm digging it... And thanks everyone for the great advice....
@Linuxguile - I will be reading along. Honing is the only thing I don't do myself. Good luck with it... This might be my tutorial.
The key to a truly great shaving edge is the bevel set. You can actually get a very capable, course but capable, shaving edge from the 1K. All of the magic happens on the lower grits. Viewing the apex of the edge from nearly straight down is the most simple way of checking to see if the bevel is set.
Well I spent some more time with the GD66 on the King 1k. I really focused on keeping the spine flat on the stone and providing a little bit of torque toward the edge. Focusing on that I began to feel a "roughness" on the heel and the toe and really focused on those areas until the blade felt "smooth" along its entire length. I also began to understand what it means to apply pressure along the spine to the various sections of the blade. I finished with 2o laps of very light pressure and after this the edge actually felt quite sharp on the thumb pad. I don't know if i can get it any keener on the 1k but at this point I feel like I am ready to take it to the next stone in the progression. I have seen Glen @gssixgun mention the 1k challenge many a times so I though I would give it a go. I gave it 50 laps on the leather and did some test shaving on my cheeks with just water. The razor did shave but it wasn't overly comfortable and was a little tuggy, (this could be due to lack of prep and lather though). Next I will take it to the 3k and see what the edge feels like then.
