The One Stone Challenge

[David Weaver]

Maybe more of a challenge for everyone else, I've pretty much been following it already.

But by the one stone challenge, I mean picking one stone (that you already have) that you will use for your entire sharpening process, and using it for everything (all of your planes, all of your chisels). And no breaking from it to cheat with any other stones.

You're allowed two other things:
* a grinder or a coarse stone if you don't like to use a grinder, but only one, not two coarse stones, etc.
* some kind of bare strop with no compound. Leather would probably be best, but folded newspaper or burnished MDF would also work. Some kind of strop is needed if you're using a stone that's got enough bite to remove wear from the edge of a tool.

You can slurry your stone or whatever is needed to make things work.

I've been working almost entirely with a single washita stone, but I've got other stones that I could do it with if I was willing to let them settle in (some of the modern arkansas stones that are called "hard arkansas" but not translucent or black, a 1200 sigma power II, a fine india, a bester 2k, ...).

Anyone up for it?

One of my woodworking buddies was raised by a father who was a carpenter in england. He had 4 planes and two stones in his box and he had pretty much worn the planes out. His two stones were a carborundum coarse stone and a soft arkansas or washita (I didn't know enough at the time to know what they were, and he threw them away - the fine stone was probably a washita).

[Steve Friedman]

I suppose a double sided stone would be cheating, huh?

David, interesting exercise, but kind of like trying to play a full round of golf with a 7 iron (Tin Cup reference). Might be fun to try once, but why not use the other clubs if it makes your job easier.

Or, what about prepping some stock with just one plane? I'm just trying to be funny, but I could probably flatten and smooth a board with a #7, but it would take a lot longer and involve a lot more work that doing the same thing with 3 planes. Same thing with stones. I could probably sharpen with one stone, but other than as an exercise, why would I want to when it's easier and quicker to use 3 . . .. or 4 . . . or 5 . . .?

Steve

[David Weaver]

Well, if you get a decent stone to do the exercise with, it's not nearly as bad as playing golf with one club. It's more an exercise in how to get the most out of a stone.

I haven't lost any time using one stone, but we'd obviously lose a LOT of time if we tried to dimension with one plane.

It's definitely quicker and easier to use one stone than it is to use 3 or more, though it does take a little experimentation.

[Tony Zaffuto]

Not much of a challenge David! Concave grind, washita and strop. Occasionally my translucent and my strop is charged with green compound.

[David Weaver]

You're right tony, with a good washita and a strop, it doesn't amount to much. A couple of my washitas (though I almost only use one of them) are knocking on the door of translucent sharpness, and because they do the same thing every time a little easier than the trans and there's no searching for angles when you use only one stone, I'd say it makes woodworking a more pleasant experience.

The next thing that I'm going to do with them is see if I can get a chisel at 25 degrees or more to pass the hanging hair test.

It's not unreasonable to get a half thousandth thick shaving out of a stock stanley sharpened with a washita stone. The shaving is a bit different than the same type of shaving out of a shapton 15k edge (the shapton is keener, and the shaving more waxy), but it still holds together and it's still only a half thousandth thick.

I like the feel of parers off of the settled in washita better than off of the shaptons. They are plenty sharp, but they have a more regulated feel in a cut where not overcutting matters. A shapton edge can get slippery paring a bevel.

There are other stones that should be able to do it. I know the hard ark from "natural whetstone" that I have is lacking some of the fineness you'd expect in a hard, but it has plenty of cutting ability to do the same as the washita after it's settled in and still be fine enough to shave hair. When I got that stone, it was $29 for a 10x3x1 stone, which I've since figured out is too big for practical purposes, but it should still illustrate that one stone might be better for general work than a whole lot of stones. It's quick!

[Sean Hughto]

While I used to use water stones a lot, and still use them occasionally, I pretty much always go to oil these days. Of my oilstones, my favorite is one a relative bought me at an antique place. I think she liked the craftsman made box with the leather glued to the top. But I have fallen in love with the stone inside. It is yellowish with mottled brown running through it and is fast cutting - its kind of weird how it does not seem hard like a black or translucent, but doesn't dish noticeably even with a good deal of use. I have no idea what it is, but can tell it is natural, and the box puts it from no later than the 30's I'd guess. I suppose I cheat as I finish with a green oxide charged strop - just a couple strokes to polish.

BTW, how can a stone be too big? To big to keep flat or what?

I flatten mine with the DMT plate. In fact that plate helped me see what this old stone was as it quickly cleaned off the aged dirt steel and hardened oil or kerosene that covered it when it came to me.

[David Weaver]

Yeah, too big to keep flat easily. It's nice if you can get the whole stone width covered with a plane iron or chisel back fairly easily, it keeps it from hollowing in the middle.

What works well freehand and what works well with a guide are two different things, though and the guide users probably are the reason we see 8x3 stones. I don't like oilstones with guides, you can't get the most out of them.

Can you take a picture of the surface of your stone? Washitas have a bit of the quality you're describing, they don't feel hard, but at the same time you can push an edge into them and not gouge them. I could gouge a charnley doing that, which is a fairly hard stone that's also novaculite like arkansas stones, but it's not as hard as the novaculites in the US. So the washitas must be pretty hard, despite the trade label on some of them as being soft. It's probably more that they're coarse.

[David Weaver]

Well, I tried to take a picture or two of shavings off of a freshly sharpened iron. These are just at about half thousandth, but they don't quite hold together like they would off of a shapton. The (not very good) quality of the cherry that I planed in both cases didn't help, though, either as the first edge was completely quartered and the second piece wasn't especially great quality either. I just don't have any boards right now that present an edge that looks like the face of a flatsawn board (which makes the nice uniform shavings without 1 micron sharpness).

The washita will raise a wire edge on the iron on this plane fairly easily still, for 3 or 4 hones before I have to grind. Reparing damage is another story, but that's still not a big deal, just grind it out instead of honing it off.

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While using two shapton stones and a grinder was almost as fast as this (and would tolerate more alloyed irons), there is something much more satisfying about this process - maybe it's the sense that you're getting something for nothing, or the fact that there is no flattening of stones (I don't touch the stone with anything else but chisels and irons), etc. I fiddled with these as a novelty at first, but it's stuck as something permanent.

Out of the 8 washitas I have, this is the only one that's a "real" lilywhite. Strangely enough, though, it's also probably the coarsest of the bunch along with another norton stone that's of lower quality. The other stones are a bit finer. It's not a good time to buy them right now, and that's too bad.

Maybe this weekend I'll try something with aluminum oxide in it.

[James Taglienti]

Sean's stone sounds like a washita... David you said some of your washitas near translucent in edge quality- I was candling some hard arks with a flashlight earlier (I know living on the edge right) - I candled a few washitas and surprisingly they transmitted some light too.

I'm wondering if I could handle this challenge with a grinder and a coarser coticule.

[David Weaver]

I have a coticule that I got from george that would do this if it's slurried. It says it's a barber deep rock stone on the label, but it's pretty coarse if it's been agitated and takes a lot of razor strokes on clear water before it settles down - it's very strong cutting.

Give it a shot. They have the abrasive shape to be good at this.

I'm sure the dirty looking stone that I linked a couple of days ago (that I've since lapped and cleaned) would transmit a lot of light. It looks like yellowed tooth enamel, and some of the others that I have (the woodworker's delight and probably this one pictured above don't have any translucense to them at all).

[Tony Zaffuto]

Let's go in a different direction for a moment: For the benefit of those fairly new to the trade/hobby, are there presently any new stones/suppliers that have a product that can achieve "one stone" results? With these new stones, what is the break in period?

For the record, I would suspect that a company such as Spyderco could come up with concoction that could approach a Pike Lily White.

[Chris Griggs]

Not at all the same as a Washita, but I would think you could use a Chosera 3k as a pretty good 1 stone solution. Aggressive enough that it will raise a burr, and the edge of it is pretty darn fine. Been a while since I've used a Cho 3k though ...do you still have yours Dave? Thoughts?

[Graham Haydon]

Nice concept, I did the same thing myself. I found it liberating rather than a challenge. I still have other stones at hand should I need them but I'm fine using my 8 x 2 India combo with a strop. Planing Idigbo end grain was great and Idgbo is not the nicest thing to work with.

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[Kees Heiden]

Can you plane western red cedar absolutely smooth with the edge you get after the one stone method? There are always these bits of early wood inside the cathedrals of flatsawn wrc that aer particularly difficult to get real smooth if your edge isn't ultimately sharp. Just curious if you can get an edge fine enough to handle that kind of stuff.

[Derek Cohen]

But by the one stone challenge, I mean picking one stone (that you already have) that you will use for your entire sharpening process, and using it for everything (all of your planes, all of your chisels). And no breaking from it to cheat with any other stones.

You're allowed two other things:
* a grinder or a coarse stone if you don't like to use a grinder, but only one, not two coarse stones, etc.
* some kind of bare strop with no compound. Leather would probably be best, but folded newspaper or burnished MDF would also work. Some kind of strop is needed if you're using a stone that's got enough bite to remove wear from the edge of a tool.

You can slurry your stone or whatever is needed to make things work.

I've been working almost entirely with a single washita stone, but I've got other stones that I could do it with if I was willing to let them settle in (some of the modern arkansas stones that are called "hard arkansas" but not translucent or black, a 1200 sigma power II, a fine india, a bester 2k, ...).

Why Dave?

Anyway, this can be done with one stone alone plus grinder.

1. Tormek wet grinder to create primary bevel to edge of blade. This will permit a minimum microbevel at the equivalent of 1000 grit if you use the smooth re-grader.

2. Sigma 10000 or 13000 to finish.

It is academic since why would one? The extra effort and wear needed over using a couple of extra stones .... ?

Regards from Perth

Derek

[Graham Haydon]

Not sure Kees, I don't use a great deal of Western Red Cedar, not sure if I have any here in the rack. If I do I will did it out and give it a try/

[David Weaver]

Not at all the same as a Washita, but I would think you could use a Chosera 3k as a pretty good 1 stone solution. Aggressive enough that it will raise a burr, and the edge of it is pretty darn fine. Been a while since I've used a Cho 3k though ...do you still have yours Dave? Thoughts?

The chosera would work fine. I don't have mine anymore, but if I was going to use a synthetic stone, that was the first one that comes to mind since it's a pretty strong cutter for a stone that's got 4 micron particles in it.

[David Weaver]

Nice concept, I did the same thing myself. I found it liberating rather than a challenge.

Me, too. That's exactly why I brought it up. I think if a group of folks try it, they might find out that they like it and it's not something similar to camping and going from a diesel pusher camper to a fridge shipping box.

[David Weaver]

Can you plane western red cedar absolutely smooth with the edge you get after the one stone method? There are always these bits of early wood inside the cathedrals of flatsawn wrc that aer particularly difficult to get real smooth if your edge isn't ultimately sharp. Just curious if you can get an edge fine enough to handle that kind of stuff.

I'd imagine you can. You can still shave hair off of your arm easily. Very easily. I know what you're saying about the earlywood, though - it's like a pile of dust between hard walls just waiting to ruin your day. The driest thing I've planed, though, has been old pine and some quartered cherry that wasn't properly dried and has very dusty crumbly early wood. Still planes up to a shine.

[David Weaver]

Let's go in a different direction for a moment: For the benefit of those fairly new to the trade/hobby, are there presently any new stones/suppliers that have a product that can achieve "one stone" results? With these new stones, what is the break in period?

For the record, I would suspect that a company such as Spyderco could come up with concoction that could approach a Pike Lily White.

I think the closest thing to a lilywhite in terms of edge finish would be an inexpensive "hard" arkansas from natural whetstone. All of the stone makers seem to have somewhat different stones when you get below the non-porous level. NW's hard will break in, but it's still got quite a bit of porosity. It is, of course, not as desirable to use as a lilywhite, but it's a lot cheaper. I haven't liked anything of dan's that wasn't their hardest stones (which aren't going to work for this), but their hardest stones are great.

Chosera 3k is good, it would give a few hones before needing a regrind.

I think probably a lot of the 5 micron type 3000/4000 stones that are floating around would be able to do it. I'd rather use a natural stone, though, because of how well the edge responds to a bare leather strop.

If spyderco made something between their medium and fine, it would do it - you could let it settle in like an oilstone.

[Maurice Ungaro]

David,
Not being a rust hunter, do you have any suggestions for vendors of new Arkansas stones? I came across this place http://www.naturalwhetstone.com/aboutus.htm
Any comment on their products?

[David Weaver]

Why Dave?

Anyway, this can be done with one stone alone plus grinder.

1. Tormek wet grinder to create primary bevel to edge of blade. This will permit a minimum microbevel at the equivalent of 1000 grit if you use the smooth re-grader.

2. Sigma 10000 or 13000 to finish.

It is academic since why would one? The extra effort and wear needed over using a couple of extra stones .... ?

Regards from Perth

Derek

There is less effort in using the washita than there was even with using two shapton stones. As graham stated, I think some folks might find it illuminating. Where it would be especially illuminating would be for the folks who move toward using old vintage stuff they've boxed up, and use it with a stone and strop that it was designed for. It becomes instantly more interesting when you find out how well the vintage stuff, an oilstone and a bare leather strop work together.

The downside might be fear that the surface finish will suffer, but on cherry (which is probably the most common hand tooler wood here), the finish at common pitch off of the washita is still better than any finish on cherry at 55 degrees. So that goes out the window. Where the whole process would be most detrimental would be for the power toolers who have adopted only hard and exotic stuff (1800 janka +) and only smoothing something a power tool has already prepared.

I know you do more than just power plane and run out ripples, but you might be on the wrong side of the hardness spectrum with all of that quasi metal you guys call wood down there.

What I've found so far is that I wouldn't use an aluminum oxide finish stone because it's just not fast enough.

What's also been illuminating is that I can get quite a lot of work out of a stock stanley iron before I go back to the stone for a refresher, and the grinding of such an iron is 4x as fast, the chips come out faster on the rare occasion you neglected to notice dirt on a board, and when you go down the rabbit hole of mostly hand dimensioning that I've gone down, it isn't an issue to want to be able to take 1200 feet of 1 thousandth thick shavings instead of 900.

I have literally cast off every modern iron except the muji irons (because I don't have anything else that fits them, and on the rare occasion that I use them, I do cheat - I'll eventually find cast steel irons that will go in them, though).

But to be clear, I'm using a single stone and vintage irons now because it's faster and easier, not to fiddle. It wasn't faster and easier at first, I had to learn the stone better, but it has become faster and easier.

I also wish I wouldn't have willy nilly just replaced every bad iron in planes I sold to people as a courtesy so they'd have a good iron, because I now have a #7 sized plane that will need a new iron and literally gave away all of my good vintage stanley irons. I may end up having to make a #7 bench plane iron out of O1 so I can control how it ends up.

The biggest negative thought that I have about this whole process, actually, is that the washita is absolutely the ideal stone for it, but they have become an absolute ripoff on the used market and someone who will always be married to a jig and modern stones may instantly find out it's not for them and get stuck holding a stone after the excitement wore off. I don't mind wasting my money, but if I suggest something and someone else's money is wasted based on my advice, it's unacceptable.

[David Weaver]

David,
Not being a rust hunter, do you have any suggestions for vendors of new Arkansas stones? I came across this place http://www.naturalwhetstone.com/aboutus.htm
Any comment on their products?

All of their stones are decent. I haven't used their black stone, but maybe someone else could clarify whether or not it's any good. I actually have one of their "black translucent" stones and find it just to be a gray translucent and not at all like a black ark.

I'd buy fine stones at dan's, they've got the best non-vintage fine stones I have seen bar none.

But for hard arks and anything softer, I'd buy something from NW. If I was buying their hard again, I would call the guy and ask him if he'd cut me one 8x2 or so. I bought a soft (that I sold to archie...I wonder if he would like to sell it back....), a hard, which is coarser than a vintage hard, and the black translucent. They've all been good. when you get to the true hard stones (the high density white, black and translucent stones) there's not a huge big deal of difference between vendors. When you buy soft arks and hard arks that don't cross into the non-porous territory, there's a gigantic difference between the stones from different vendors, attributable I guess to what's in their mines.

[David Weaver]

For anyone else wanting to go along with this, use of the double iron properly in a vintage plane makes this whole deal a twaddle. It's worth learning as part of this - tearout becomes unassociated with the level of plane sharpness, so even as you're fiddling around before your stone settles in, you won't have to deal with tearout or ruined pieces.

[Maurice Ungaro]

Thanks for reminding me about Dan's. Just went to his site and noticed this:
** Special ** Hard Select (fine) 6 x 2 x 3/4-1 Mounted Bench Stones $30.00 while supplies last **


While 6x2 may not be sublime, it's still a good deal, wouldn't you agree?

[David Weaver]

Yeah, that's a good deal. It might be too fine, but if it is, you can scuff it.

[Steve Friedman]

Funny that there's a parallel thread going on about finding a middle stone to bridge the gap between a 2000 and 16000. Different strokes . . .

Steve

[Matthew N. Masail]

I also found it very liberating. takes me half the time and is always good. if it's not good enough it's 30 seconds to go back to the stone.


I think you don't have to use such a fine stone if your going to use compound on the strop, I get really good edged from my sigma 1.2k + compound on a strop, but I don't
know how well this would work with a hollow grind which is sensitive to strop work. I use a convex bevel as of last week.
I think there is smoothing to be said for using the finest stone you can to reach the burr if it's speedy.

[Matthew N. Masail]

tried it today while I was out of home. all I had was a new cerax combo stone 1000\3000 grit (more than enough but no strop). went straight to the 3000, then stropped on my pants (fabric not jeans), got a really good edge, shaved hair (whatever I have left of it) without a sound and a light touch. however if the blade needs a lot of work to get a burr I'm not sure the 3000 has enough cutting power, it's a surprisingly "burnisher" stone, especially considering the 6000 is soft and rough.

[David Weaver]

Thanks for reminding me about Dan's. Just went to his site and noticed this:
While 6x2 may not be sublime, it's still a good deal, wouldn't you agree?

Yeah, that might be a good stone for a one stone type of thing.

I traveled to the site, too, and just bought three things and had several back and forth conversations with them about various stones. I wish someone could figure out how to get them into the claim that has the pike stones.

[Sean Hughto]

http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7413/12980981914_a9049ec76f_b.jpg

stone is 8x2x1

[Chris Griggs]

That sure looks like a Washita to me Sean! Nice! That color pattern screams Pike mine.

I wish Norton would reopen that mine.

[David Weaver]

Yeah, that's a washita.

[Jim Koepke]

I haven't been getting involved in this discussion. Thought about it today while working on sharpening a 7/16" beading blade for a #45. I need to get a few more slip stones. Probably 1 each oil and water.

My combo 4K/8K Norton could do most of my blades that are in decent shape. That stone is getting a bit thin.

With oil it seems to work fastest with two stones. A soft Ark and a trans Ark.

jtk

[David Weaver]

I figured I'd shoot the middle of your combination with Dan's and order one of their hards and scuff it up and go from there. We'll see how it works.

Using only one stone makes the process more specific (in terms of what you do and what kind of irons and chisels you'll prefer), but none of the things I've given up (A2, V11, Chrome Vanadium gummysteel) have amounted to any increase in time, I think the opposite has occurred (spending less of a balance of time on the tools vs the amount of time using them).

The shame of it is, it's actually getting pretty hard to find some of the vintage irons in sizes other than 2" for a price cheaper than I can just find a whole plane at a couple of my honey holes.

Stanley tool parts thinks that $11 is a reasonable ship charge on a new one, too, which brings the price to a few bucks short of $30, which is ridiculous. I'd rather just make my own irons than pay that, and making slotted irons by hand isn't much fun.

At any rate, we'll see how shooting the middle of your routine with a newer production stone goes (vs the washitas that handle the routine well without adding a second).

[Sean Hughto]

Thanks for the info. Can one of you aficionados tell us all the Washita bedtime story? In my mind it would go something like this:

Once upon a time, there was a mine in Arkansas (New Hampshire?) that contained unique rocks, ideal for sharpening. Seven dwarves would descend into the mine singing every morning and work all day cutting out 8x2x1 blocks of the precious. On the left side of the mine was a vein of rock they called Lilly White, that was hard and sublime. On the right was a vein of mottled yellowish stone that cut lighting fast and when treated with oil wrung from the bodies of a carnivorous fish common in the Great Lakes to the North was unbeatable. Unfortunately, around the time of the WWII, the dwarves died out, and since no one taller than 3 foot tall can get in the mine, no new stones have been produced for more than 60 years. Many have begun to think the mine is a legend, or that all the magic stones have been mined out long ago, but some believe the dwarves will someday return and ....

But seriously, what's the deal?

[Noah Wagener]

From what I've read about Japanese naturals the particles breakdown in size so you can have a wide range of possibilities. I know you David and Chris have written that a stone polishes finer with no slurry but they seem to say the opposite; that you want a slurry as a buffer so you are not actually contacting the stone at all. And the slurry gets finer and finer. I've seen the magnifications of the razor with and without slurry and it would appear that a clear stone definitely produces finer results. Maybe the particles in a lot of the Japanese stones are breakdown fast. I think at Lee Valley they say the particles of a King breakdown as well so maybe you could use a 1,000 and build a big slurry and just try and slide it along the mud after you have the edge set.

You guys seem to saying that a dense stone that holds its particles is the best stone for this. One that has been broken in (dulled?) In my mind a softer stone would work quicker at the start but i do not know how long it would take for its particles to breakdown to fine.

I messed around with this stone:

284107284108


It is sold as rough/medium. It raises a big burr quickly and gets somewhat fine edge.

What is happening in an unloaded strop? And why the material for the strop need to have a little give?


tried it today while I was out of home. all I had was a new cerax combo stone 1000\3000 grit (more than enough but no strop). went straight to the 3000, then stropped on my pants (fabric not jeans), got a really good edge, shaved hair (whatever I have left of it) without a sound and a light touch. however if the blade needs a lot of work to get a burr I'm not sure the 3000 has enough cutting power, it's a surprisingly "burnisher" stone, especially considering the 6000 is soft and rough.

Matthew, did you let the 3,000 clog so you could burnish with it. Maybe i do not understand the concept of burnishing. Could you explain that? I think of it as more rubbing than abrading.

cheers

[David Weaver]

It goes like this - somewhere in a single valley in arkansas, perhaps near oklahoma, pike mine owned a claim on stones that are different than any stones anywhere else. They are only in that valley, and they come out in huge chunks (like hundreds or thousands of pounds), different than a lot of the other valuable arkansas stones that come out in bits and bobs, and as someone from dan's told me yesterday, there is something like an 11% yield from the rocks that make trans stones.

Anyway, pike had at least some underground mines, because I"ve seen pictures of donkeys pulling carts. I don't know if all of the good stuff is underground or if some is on the surface, but that's where it comes from. There's still supposedly a lot of it there, but norton owns the claim and norton says it's too expensive to set up an operation to extract more and then have to send the stone up to new hampshire where they process stones and then presumably run it through their vast blob of retailers at $100 a pop.

With some back and forth, it's not like the other miners don't know where the stone is, they just don't have the ability to get it and I don't think too many people outside of the woodworking world know much about it.

When they dug the stone up in the 1800s, and started marketing it in the UK, it pretty much ate the market and sent everything else in the UK out to pasture (the hone slates, the idwals and charnleys (which are novaculite)). It was obviously the dominant do-all stone here, too, though you can find less lovely soft vintage stones.

The rest of the details, we're learning about going backwards (like the fact that there are differing labels on the ends of some stones that have the same label on the back - fine and soft, etc).

In the old literature, it looks like pike sold rosyred/lilywhite, no 1, and no 2s (never seen a no 2). Whether or not the very old stones that don't have a label on them were sold without a label, or if it was just taken off, I don't know (as in, was the stone mined for a while by others or several miners before pike retailed them as very specific grades, or was some of it let out even while pike was mining it and sold with no label, no clue).

You can pretty much spot something from that area by looking at the structure of the stone on fresh ends that haven't been worn in (you can pretty much tell from the surface, too). On a soft vintage stone, the stones look like a collection of particles with space in between them. On the pike claim stones, the "real" washitas, the structure is like a reciprocal - it looks like a structure with empty cells where the grains would be. They are like the reciprocal of a non pike soft.

Toolsforworkingwood sold the newly minted lilywhites up to several years ago, they put them back on the market for just a bit. How well they sold, I don't know. Norton's business model and desire seems to be to push the trans stone, which to me is odd because their trans stone is OK, but Dan's trans is better. Nobody has a soft stone that matches their pike stone, though, but it's esoteric at this point, I guess, when the washitas don't like modern steel and they would cost 4-5 times as much as a simple aluminum oxide stone.

I'm sure there is also a reality check in how many people love the washita. There are enough of us to apparently drive the price up to wacky levels, but if norton put the washita back in production, I'd bet they'd quickly find that they'd saturate the market though the magic of internet forums has introduced an international market for them outside the UK.

You can see that in the UK, they still sell well. Actually, all of the american novaculite stones have always sold well in the UK, even when the pikes had a dip in value here and you could get nice lilywhites for less than the cost of new.

You can see if you can find sales literature on google showing the prices of the old stones, but back in the early 1900s, same as with the premium razor stones, silicon carbide and aluminum oxide stones started popping up at the same price as washitas and eschers, etc, except for perhaps the uncommon types (for example, a large y/g escher brand thuringian in the early 1900s was $7 or $8 - which would be a princely sum now given that would've taken two days' wages from any skilled trade - but their much more common stones, like a blue 1.5x7, which is several lifetimes' razor sharpening for a skilled user - were about $1-$2).

Those stones that were marketed by carborundum corporation (that were corundum or some kind of silicon carbide) aren't worth much now, but they probably took a big bite out of the arkansas stone market back then because they're everywhere.

[Tom M King]

David,
Not being a rust hunter, do you have any suggestions for vendors of new Arkansas stones? I came across this place http://www.naturalwhetstone.com/aboutus.htm
Any comment on their products?
I bought a set from Halls a couple of years ago. The last set I bought was in 1974 from Smith's, but they don't sell them like they used to. Hall's also made a custom set of triangular files for me, and were very pleasant to deal with. The stones are nice, and I'd buy from them again.

My first set of Arkansas stones were thrown out in the yard when a tornado hit a shop I had. The Washita and Soft stones were broken, but I continued to used the prized Washita halves for years until I got around to getting a new set.

Graham, I'm still gonna get that Black stone to you when I get someone to carry it across. Postage comes close to the cost of a stone.

I did the one stone thing, sort of, yesterday. We needed to clean up an old beam, and the iron in the scrub plane was not only dull, but blunt. I ground it on a CBN wheel, and went right to the Norton 8000 stone since none were soaking, and that stone doesn't need soaking. That got it sharp enough to shave with quickly, but since the Diamond Lapping Film was right there-I keep it on the drain board mounted on a 9x12 surface plate. I stropped it on the two finest grits, and polished the back a bit on the film. Total time from blunt to super sharp was probably around a minute.

These days, I only use oil stones if we are on a cold job site, and the sharpening bench is a table saw.

[David Weaver]

From what I've read about Japanese naturals the particles breakdown in size so you can have a wide range of possibilities. I know you David and Chris have written that a stone polishes finer with no slurry but they seem to say the opposite; that you want a slurry as a buffer so you are not actually contacting the stone at all. And the slurry gets finer and finer. I've seen the magnifications of the razor with and without slurry and it would appear that a clear stone definitely produces finer results. Maybe the particles in a lot of the Japanese stones are breakdown fast. I think at Lee Valley they say the particles of a King breakdown as well so maybe you could use a 1,000 and build a big slurry and just try and slide it along the mud after you have the edge set.

You guys seem to saying that a dense stone that holds its particles is the best stone for this. One that has been broken in (dulled?) In my mind a softer stone would work quicker at the start but i do not know how long it would take for its particles to breakdown to fine.

I messed around with this stone:

284107284108


It is sold as rough/medium. It raises a big burr quickly and gets somewhat fine edge.

What is happening in an unloaded strop? And why the material for the strop need to have a little give?



Matthew, did you let the 3,000 clog so you could burnish with it. Maybe i do not understand the concept of burnishing. Could you explain that? I think of it as more rubbing than abrading.

cheers

I'm not sure I buy the slurry thing with japanese stones. They cut a finer edge on clear water, one only needs to shave with a razor sharpened by them to tell. If there is a magic trick where you have to use them with slurry a certain way to get the slurry to "break down" into little particles, i've yet to see it or a picture of the particles before or after crushing. They cut faster on slurry and that might lead people to think they're cutting finer - simply because they can finish the job on slurry due to their cutting speed.

The finest edges are a bright polish. Period. The super high dollar japanese stones will still leave soft steel or iron just a bit dull, but they will polish the hardened metal to a bright polish. Any of the nonsense about them making a hazy edge that's sharper than a polished edge is poo. There is an in-between where the edges a step below the finest may be fairly sharp and hazy compared to something like a shapton 5,000 stone which polishes without making as fine of an edge as you'd expect for the polish, but the very finest edges are bright polish, natural stone or not.

Same thing occurs with oilstones - if you use one with light pressure on a razor for a few hundred strokes (something you might do once when you first prepare a razor that's not been used in a very long time), it will bring the razor edge to a nice bright polish - more so than tools probably because you can afford to use lighter pressure, and oilstones respond in fineness to pressure very well.

[David Weaver]

Example of soft arkansas that's not washita (ebay).- it bugs me a little that people call stones "pike" that don't have a label. Ebay seems to be full of "escher" stones without a label, and "pike" stones without a label because of unscrupulous sellers who see what sells for more in sold listings. If you buy stones like these, you probably won't get what you expect and you'll be out money when you're honest at sale.

171146925623

Anyway, stone like this will settle in and cut slower, but the edge isn't fine like it is off of a washita. It just never gets there, whereas a washita easily makes a delicate wire edge with a nice uniform dull haze (no deep scratches) that comes off and leaves a nice keen edge.

Example of a stone with color not that much different that is a washita:
261390007167

I hassle Chris G when I find stones like the second one. After I buy them. "hey, look, i found another one!", and the damage lapped out of this one nicely.

It's a good example of the stones that aren't pike label having much more variation than the ones that are. Actually, the ones that aren't pike (or some other woodworkers label) have all been finer. I'd imagine they'd be less desirable to someone working with a grind stone and one bench stone.

Sometimes it's kind of hard to tell if a stone might be a washita or not, and the only way you can really tell is to sharpen something on them. It becomes easy to tell.

Still, like mentioned above, it's a bit esoteric. Do they sharpen an edge as finely as a translucent arkansas that's settled in? no. they really are ideal for a one-stone use, and they make a good soft stone when agitated for someone who wants to use one stone and compound or two stones. Not a good stone for someone who relies on guides, though.

[Tony Zaffuto]

Several comments:

1. In one of Roy Underhill's books, he detailed natural stones in a section, along with "inferring" locations. In the book, he also told of hiking into the site, picking up discarded pieces and finishing them for sharpening. As Roy has showed up at the PATINA gathering (next week in Damascus, MD), if anyone runs into him, maybe he will spill the beans? The last time he was there, he did not have on red suspenders or his trademark cap.
2. Sometime ago, I remember having an emailed conversation with a person from Norton about the Washita stones. He said they has no plans to bring the stones back and that everything the Washita could do their "medium India" could do.
3. I've had conversations with "Dan's" about Washita's and I got the impression if there was an order for a number of stones, they would produce a short run. David - since you're conversational with them, find out size and maybe we could do a group buy?
4. Stay away from low-cost stones that call themselves "Washita's". I picked one up a few years ago that was more a "soft Arkansas" than anything.
5. I'm going to have to dig through my pile of vintage stones, I know I have a couple of Washita's with labels & boxes, definitely a lily white and maybe a #2. I have a couple without labels, that have little apparent wear, but have a pinkish tinge to them - maybe a #2? In fact my favorite bench Washita is one that is pink, but I've always attributed that to a century of loving use by the former owner and type of oil used.
6. I am a confirmed O1 steel fan and have little use for A2 or any of the other more exotics.
7. Maybe we can start a "photo reference" sticky for labeled/identified stones?

[David Weaver]

2. Sometime ago, I remember having an emailed conversation with a person from Norton about the Washita stones. He said they has no plans to bring the stones back and that everything the Washita could do their "medium India" could do.


That's funny!!

[David Weaver]

I have one of dan's versions of the washita on the way. They were clear that it is not going to be like a pike washita. I'd imagine that it will be a coarse soft stone, but it didn't cost that much compared to a finisher, so I figured I'd try to see if it's a good coarse stone. I get the sense that it's a stone they don't sell a lot of, and they don't have access to the pike stones, unfortunately.

Like the places where welsh slate comes from, you can probably find washita material laying around in ark at the pike mine location, but I don't know what the laws are now about it. Welsh slate used to be valueless and the places didn't care if you picked some up and took it (from what I've gathered), but that's changed. I can't remember if they let you take just one, or if none is the rule now. I don't know what's around there (at the pike location) but I wouldn't be surprised if the answer was "not much".

I'd imagine anything that you have that's pink wouldn't be a no 2 unless it was very uneven. I think the no 2 is probably a stone that's extremely mottled or inconsistent, just a hunch. I have a combination stone that probably wouldn't even qualify as a no 1, but I can't find anything negative about the mottling other than appearance. I'll take a picture if I can. By mottling, I mean expanses on the stone that have no pores.

[Sean Hughto]

Well that's interesting and all, but its got nothing on the dwarves and magic. ;-)

Thanks!

[David Weaver]

Yeah, they're not that magical. There will be no religious conversion or visions of the future after you touch one.

[Kim Malmberg]

I think simplifying a process can be a huge timesaver. Also most of us would do better on a golf course if we understood to bring fewer clubs. I recommend this. Several of by best rounds have been played with half a set of clubs. When you have less considrations you tend to let your brain work for you rather than against you. I like this idea and I will try it out.

[Rob Young]

David,
Not being a rust hunter, do you have any suggestions for vendors of new Arkansas stones? I came across this place http://www.naturalwhetstone.com/aboutus.htm
Any comment on their products?

Good stones. The wooden boxes they put the stones in, not so much. But then you are buying the stone, not the box.

[David Weaver]

http://www.wkfinetools.com/hUS-mechTools/PikeMfgCo/Press-Books/History-OilStone/1902-history-OilStone.asp

A pasted bit of literature from 1902 on wiktor kuc's site. Presume that the pike company wrote it.

It suggests that stones were sold without labels and people tried them until they found something they like. The same method should be employed with japanese stones now, but taking the mine stamp off of a japanese stone through use is a no-no.

I wondered why there would be soft arkansas stones of lesser quality in vintage form when the pike stones were so widely distributed, but also found some retailers who sold three stones "soft stones, washita stones, and arkansas stones".

The arkansas stones weren't labeled as hard arkansas, but they certainly would've been translucents or black stones, and the soft stones they sold at a cut rate so that they would be less expensive than the pike mine washita stones.

[Tony Zaffuto]

But what exactly is a "soft Arkansas"?

I've tried several new (and don't ever recall seeing a vintage stone labeled as "soft Arkansas") and I've never seen anything I've liked. They have been either sold off, or in the pile labeled "OK to loan to idiot neighbor".

[David Weaver]

It's a low density stone from somewhere other than the pike mine. The only ones I've tried that I actually are the ones from natural whetstone. I sold the one I had to archie, kind of wish I hadn't, but they're inexpensive enough I could get another one if I felt the need.

Bad ones are frustrating to use because they're always slower than you expect them to be, and they're not very fine. You have to keep on them with a diamond hone to keep them cutting fast.

Once you have a washita that you would agitate with a diamond hone, there's no need for them.

[Brian Ashton]

Maybe more of a challenge for everyone else, I've pretty much been following it already.

But by the one stone challenge, I mean picking one stone (that you already have) that you will use for your entire sharpening process, and using it for everything (all of your planes, all of your chisels). And no breaking from it to cheat with any other stones.

You're allowed two other things:
* a grinder or a coarse stone if you don't like to use a grinder, but only one, not two coarse stones, etc.
* some kind of bare strop with no compound. Leather would probably be best, but folded newspaper or burnished MDF would also work. Some kind of strop is needed if you're using a stone that's got enough bite to remove wear from the edge of a tool.

You can slurry your stone or whatever is needed to make things work.

I've been working almost entirely with a single washita stone, but I've got other stones that I could do it with if I was willing to let them settle in (some of the modern arkansas stones that are called "hard arkansas" but not translucent or black, a 1200 sigma power II, a fine india, a bester 2k, ...).

Anyone up for it?

One of my woodworking buddies was raised by a father who was a carpenter in england. He had 4 planes and two stones in his box and he had pretty much worn the planes out. His two stones were a carborundum coarse stone and a soft arkansas or washita (I didn't know enough at the time to know what they were, and he threw them away - the fine stone was probably a washita).

How bout no stone at all. I've not used stones for years. I still have the first Japanese stones I bought in the early 80s and they have very little wear. I also have a 200 grit water stone that has lots of wear but that's all from my kitchen knives. Decades ago I went to an MDF disk that spins at approx 300rpm that's charged with white buffing compound; straight from the grinder to the buffing wheel. Haven't had a reason to use a stone ever since.

[David Weaver]

You can do that, could be a separate thread.

I tried one of those inexpensive sanders at one point with an abrasive belt and a leather disc with compound. It worked, but I'm too stingy and it went too fast. I did fling an iron with the leather disc, too. 300 rpm would be a good speed.

I still have the inexpensive sander, of course (4x36 belt and 6" disc and another 10" disc sander separate - both of those I usually beat on to work metal - they're both handy for that)

[Tony Zaffuto]

Back to the "soft arkansas" comments, David: what do you mean by "agitate with a diamond hone"? I've never tried that (but to be honest, my stones are basically vintage and already broken in). I do have a few modern Nortons laying around, and by agitate, are you suggesting just to "re-face" the surface with a diamond stone and if so, what make/grit/type diamond hone are you referring to?

[David Weaver]

Yes, dress the surface with a diamond hone. Something in the 200 grit range. finer than that will grade the ark to some extent.

I haven't used silicon carbide to dress an oilstone (for fear that little bits of it will stay on the surface) but that might be a decent idea, too.

Diamond hones don't really like coarse arkansas stones that mucy. I have a 220 grit DMT "bench stone", the ones with the plastic raised base, and it got pretty beat in the middle right away from using it on oilstones.

Maybe an old carborundum/crostolon coarse stone would work, too. Haven't tried it. IT would probably sound and feel like sticking your head out of the car and letting your teeth scrape on a galvanized guard rail as you go down the road.

[Tony Zaffuto]

Haven't bought any toys today, so I just ordered a DMT extra coarse diamond hone. Curious to see what this will do for the "newish" oilstones I have laying around. Of course, I may have to send SWMBO on a shoe shopping spree so I can get the stones into the dishwasher without getting caught (again).

[David Weaver]

Coarse stones only for that DMT, obviously. It'll scratch up the surface of any nice hard black or translucent stones.

[Graham Haydon]

I bought a set from Halls a couple of years ago. The last set I bought was in 1974 from Smith's, but they don't sell them like they used to. Hall's also made a custom set of triangular files for me, and were very pleasant to deal with. The stones are nice, and I'd buy from them again.

My first set of Arkansas stones were thrown out in the yard when a tornado hit a shop I had. The Washita and Soft stones were broken, but I continued to used the prized Washita halves for years until I got around to getting a new set.

Graham, I'm still gonna get that Black stone to you when I get someone to carry it across. Postage comes close to the cost of a stone.

I did the one stone thing, sort of, yesterday. We needed to clean up an old beam, and the iron in the scrub plane was not only dull, but blunt. I ground it on a CBN wheel, and went right to the Norton 8000 stone since none were soaking, and that stone doesn't need soaking. That got it sharp enough to shave with quickly, but since the Diamond Lapping Film was right there-I keep it on the drain board mounted on a 9x12 surface plate. I stropped it on the two finest grits, and polished the back a bit on the film. Total time from blunt to super sharp was probably around a minute.

These days, I only use oil stones if we are on a cold job site, and the sharpening bench is a table saw.

Cheers Tom! Though I regocnised the name :). No pressure on that stone, as and when will be fine. I feel I need to come up with something in return. Let me know if you see any UK moulding planes you would like and I'll gladly ship in return.

[Graham Haydon]

David, it's interesting you mention the UK love for the Washita. Joinery text of the late 19th century and early 20th century is littered with glowing praise for them.

Also on Welsh slate, now that's a way to get a cheap polishing stone http://www.inigojones.co.uk/products/Honing-Stone.php $10.00 > £6.00. I have one and it comes with a slightly textured surface that needs bedding in or dressing, can't complain for £6.00. It is suggested that it polishes to around the 8000 mark and the makers advise water. However it works just as well with my favorite honing juice which is baby oil.

[Tony Zaffuto]

David, it's interesting you mention the UK love for the Washita. Joinery text of the late 19th century and early 20th century is littered with glowing praise for them.

Also on Welsh slate, now that's a way to get a cheap polishing stone http://www.inigojones.co.uk/products/Honing-Stone.php $10.00 > £6.00. I have one and it comes with a slightly textured surface that needs bedding in or dressing, can't complain for £6.00. It is suggested that it polishes to around the 8000 mark and the makers advise water. However it works just as well with my favorite honing juice which is baby oil.

What is your method of "dressing/bedding in"? I've got an inkling to order one.

Postage to the US is $28.00 per stone, no matter how many are ordered. In dollars, the cost is $6.95 for the stone, totaling $34.95 with postage, so this is not a very high priced purchase!

[Graham Haydon]

Tony, I had a recent convo here, I could copy an paste info but just a quick to visit http://www.ukworkshop.co.uk/forums/inigo-jones-dragon-s-tongue-honing-stone-t77337.html

[Tony Zaffuto]

Tony, I had a recent convo here, I could copy an paste info but just a quick to visit http://www.ukworkshop.co.uk/forums/inigo-jones-dragon-s-tongue-honing-stone-t77337.html


Thanks! Will do.

[Tony Zaffuto]

Tony, I had a recent convo here, I could copy an paste info but just a quick to visit http://www.ukworkshop.co.uk/forums/inigo-jones-dragon-s-tongue-honing-stone-t77337.html

Good read & guidance. I do believe I shall try this stone in my quest for bald arms (to match my head!). Seriously, I am going to order one, for two reasons: it seems it will be a bit finer than my hard arkansas and second, it seems it will cut a tad finer than my hard arkansas. Actually there is a third, I have a stone I have not ever used, that appears to be slate and I would like to do a comparison.

[Graham Haydon]

As was aluded to elsewhere about stones, I don't see it is a "game changer", it's just a blooming good value slate hone that will last for ages!

[David Weaver]

David, it's interesting you mention the UK love for the Washita. Joinery text of the late 19th century and early 20th century is littered with glowing praise for them.

Also on Welsh slate, now that's a way to get a cheap polishing stone http://www.inigojones.co.uk/products/Honing-Stone.php $10.00 > £6.00. I have one and it comes with a slightly textured surface that needs bedding in or dressing, can't complain for £6.00. It is suggested that it polishes to around the 8000 mark and the makers advise water. However it works just as well with my favorite honing juice which is baby oil.

It might not surprise anyone (graham, I don't know how long you've been reading) to know that I've been through all of the welsh slates I could try. The only thing I really haven't tried are the dalmore blue and a good large version of the tam-o-shanter hone graded for fine work. I do have a scrap of the latter, I just haven't seen a good tam o shanter full sized bench stone nor a dalmore blue (I don't even know if the latter comes from scotland) and have been told they are not as fine as one would expect.

The dragon's tongue is a good inexpensive option for tinkering. It's too bad UK post has blown up the ability to ship things here inexpensively. I guess they can't be shipped under small packets postage?

[Tony Zaffuto]

$28.00 for shipping, David! I added 2 & 3 to my cart and for each additional stone, the price increased by another $28!

[Graham Haydon]

Not long David, I only became aware of this forum after a chance encounter with Chris G on another forum. Well it seems you are quite the journeyman of stones! I think think the packets get kinda bigger to protect the slates I guess.

Have you tried old Turkey stones? They also seem quite prized by 19th century woodworkers.

[David Weaver]

$28.00 for shipping, David! I added 2 & 3 to my cart and for each additional stone, the price increased by another $28!

Yeah, UK shipping is difficult. It's not the fault of the seller, it's the UK post - they just don't have any good options for lighter weight things like Japan does, for example (where EMS for the same thing might be $12 or $15).

The only hope is finding something small enough that it fits in small packets service, but I don't know the constraints around that. Sometimes, you can get plane irons, shaving soap, etc, that qualifies as small packets, but I haven't yet gotten a stone that does.

There still are some things that are inexpensive enough in the UK that it's worth looking, but anything bigger than a backsaw had better cost hundreds of dollars to make it worth the extra shipping cost.

[David Weaver]

Not long David, I only became aware of this forum after a chance encounter with Chris G on another forum. Well it seems you are quite the journeyman of stones! I think think the packets get kinda bigger to protect the slates I guess.

Have you tried old Turkey stones? They also seem quite prized by 19th century woodworkers.

I think folks over here use the world turkey stones less, and sometimes for the wrong stuff. My interpretation of the turkey stone is that it's a fast cutting washita, as opposed to just a soft arkansas stone that is not as good of a stone. Does that reconcile? I know that the UK has no in-between stones locally, and stuff coarser than a slate hone before the washita arrived there was stuff like sandstones, etc, and the washita blows those away.

I do like the charnleys and such, but they usually bring a lot of money over here and the price of all of that stuff has gone through the roof since the shavers picked it up (at least some of the things appear to be a bit more reasonable), and when you get to the end of the day with the UK hones and ask whether or not they're better than a black or translucent arkansas for woodworking on the fine side, I think the answer is no. They are certainly suitable as fine stones, though, and better than anything else in the US other than the arkansas stones (and the finest slates make very good inexpensive razor hones).

I like them with oil as you do, they cut finer.

[Graham Haydon]

Can't beat a bit of oil. The Turkey stones always seem expensive, I keep an eye out but with no joy yet.

[Chris Griggs]

Not long David, I only became aware of this forum after a chance encounter with Chris G on another forum.

And we are glad to have you here. This forum is way better :)...looks like Tom King found his way over here semi recently as well. Always nice when additional knowledgeable people such as yourselves join us.

For those who don't know Graham, he makes his living doing some real nice woodwork/finish carpentry on the other side of the pond. http://gshaydon.co.uk/products

[Jack Curtis]

I'm with Derek here, and in addition this thread seems somewhat absurd. David's ostensibly talking about using a single stone; but every other message he says he's buying another stone or three (admittedly this could be stone-buying inertia that could take years to heal :) ). How do you decide which stone is capable of sharpening every type of metal under all conditions? I get it that you're all assuming the use of a grinder, but grinders incorporate stones, right? And multiple stones at that. And you always get a hollow grind, which seems to be fine with most of you but not with me.

Also, different stones work differently depending on the metallic composition of your edges. Because of that I tend to buy only high carbon (white paper); but the odd A2 (such as the LV miniatures) or HSS (turning tools) or PM will often sneak in. Those exceptions must be accommodated with more time and/or less sharpness if not different stones.

In the process of choosing that one stone you've got to buy many stones. What do you do with all those ultimately extra stones? What if some of these actually worked particularly well in some conditions? You really want to keep them and incorporate them into the process for some tools. So basically this may be a worthy goal, but impractical and illogical and potentially expensive.

If you have only one type of metal for all your tools, perhaps you could use a single stone, many say they do this now; but ...

[David Weaver]

I think the opposite is true, many people say they refuse to use a single steel, especially if it is something that agrees with natural stones. I'd figure the biggest hurdle in all of this would be convincing someone that they can use only carbon steel and they won't be spending every second at the sharpening bench. All of the things that irritate me about other types of steel (soft chrome vanadium chisels that make a big wire edge that just folds back and forth over and over unless you use a super fine stone, ...that kind of thing) have just gone away.

I just got another stone off of ebay, too. :) There's some inertia there.

As todd hughes used to say, "i sort of collect them". Except with todd, that was just about everything it seemed - the rarer and more odd, the better.

I am curious if there are other stones that would do as well as the washita, because there isn't anything reasonable about washitas right now. Before I ever screwed around with trying to get one oil stone to do everything, I was squeezing more out of synthetic stones, and razoring really brought all of this about, because you don't get a whole lot of good out of any natural stone with a razor until you learn to use it and derive an edge from the process that is better than you'd generally get with a woodworking tool where heavier pressure is par for the course.

I will sharpen anything I can get my hands on in the house, including toenail clippers, utility knife blades, cheap scissors...anything (knives, too, of course). Even if my stones go into disuse because I'm just using one at the bench, or at least one at a time, it's no big deal. I've got a bunch of rocks from kyoto sitting in the drawer, probably about about a dozen (and no junk) and they haven't seen much action, but I'm sure that in the long term, they'll be fine.

Another thing that made me curious about this is that NBSS (According to bill tindall or someone) puts out fine indias and they don't go finer. Presume the carvers use something to step up from that, though.

Anyway, I don't have any need to actually use all of the stones regularly, they are safe in a large bench of drawers. It's the synthetics that I don't really want to keep too long, they turn into pumpkins when the next new thing comes out.

[Graham Haydon]

Cheers Chris :), Tom does some pretty sweet work too http://www.historic-house-restoration.com/windowwork.html

I'm not sure I find the thread absurd. I'm not sure what NBSS is or who Bill Tindal is but I will repeat (sorry for that) that a fine/coarse India is a perfectly good way to prepare edges. Yep, I do have a way to grind but grinding and honing have normally been two seperate things. I'm not sure I fully understand why an India wont work so well on newer steels. I bought a UK version of the woodriver and it has a T10 RC 60>63 Water hardened blade (I have no idea what that really means) but it is hard and sharpens fine on an India. It even produces proper shavings once you reshape the LN copied cap iron.

284149

[don wilwol]

interesting challenge. I don't understand some of the elaborate processes some go through for sharpening. I uses one hard oil stone. Hollow grind on the grinder, then free hand on the stone. Pull the burr on the strop. Sharp, done and move on.

[David Weaver]

T10 is similar to 1095, or more or less a good plain modern version of carbon steel. India should sharpen anything that any other aluminum oxide stones do, but anything should sharpen t10 if it's not too hard.

I suppose the stroke wars will make people want something that's got more alloying in it so they can go longer between sharpenings, but I think at this point, I'd rather have t10 if it's done right.

NBSS is a well respected school around here that teaches serious woodworkers, and not just people looking to learn to cut dovetails or play woodwork but avoid doing anything difficult.

Nice work fellows, by the way. Most of us are pikers - gentlemen woodworkers who do little, but try to do what we do well. There are a few exceptions, like George Wilson, and a few others in other sections of this forum that are absolutely world class.

[David Weaver]

interesting challenge. I don't understand some of the elaborate processes some go through for sharpening. I uses one hard oil stone. Hollow grind on the grinder, then free hand on the stone. Pull the burr on the strop. Sharp, done and move on.

I guess that's what I'm getting toward, and using that one stone, if you need to get a little extra out of it, experience with it will allow. It's not something maybe that a beginner who pulls a guide backwards on 5 separate stones would do, but your experience with it allows.

I never had an elaborate sharpening setup, but did use two ceramic stones a lot - one medium stone and one very fine stone (the very fine stone more or less replaces the strop, but of course abrades metal readily so it's not identical - it just keeps the process short). I still think that's a very good process, it's quick.

If I can get a few folks to experiment with this (so called, but not really) challenge, especially the folks who mention having 4-6 step routines that take 4 or 5 minutes to complete, and see that the surface quality of their planed wood is still quite good, that's not a bad thing.

It's not really for a move of economy, I passed that idea LONG ago when I started wasting money on stones. I still waste money on stones.

[george wilson]

I say,David. You do swing!! You have gone from being an invererate stone hog to using one? I predict that in the future,you might end up sharpening a piece of iron ore on a rock from your driveway,and stropping on a piece of bacon.:):):):):)

Me,I'll stay with my black and white ceramics,and a diamond stone.

[Tony Zaffuto]

Funny David, that without the challenge some of us have settled into this method! To restate what I have posted already, I start with a concave grind, go to the Washita and mostly to a charged strop. Sometimes I'll take a few licks on a hard Arkansas before the strop, but that is usually without rhyme or reason (maybe I'm a bit lazy and don't want to get back into the work at hand?).

As I've already said, I mostly use O1, though by accident there may be some A2 in the mix, but quite frankly I would be hard pressed to remember what tools are A2! I've settled into this method maybe 3 or 4 years ago when I got my prized Washita (not the first one though). Easy-peasy!

I kind of wish George would weigh in here with some historical perspectives or Warren Mickley, though
I don't think he hangs around SMC much.

I see George posted while I was writing this one! Like David I have many stones, but they are mainly vintage and bought cheap! For anyone looking for vintage, first look at the stone's case, if elaborate, that's usually an indication it was prized by the owner and probably costly.

[Dave Beauchesne]

David: good post - lots of info.

George: The iron rod comment; When I was in Japan visiting our DIL's family, grandma would take her knives to a stone in the neighbours retaining wall two doors down, and sharpen them. Had done so since 1960.
I didn't get a chance to go look ( whirlwind trip ) but it HAD to be that stone! I have kicked myself since for not getting her to show me.
Personally, a 1000 and 8000 Shapton get it done for me, but you never know.

[Graham Haydon]

Thanks David,

I have now looked up NBSS, It'd be nice to think they were just using some fine India. Nothing wrong with Gentleman woodworking in whatever way you want to do it. I find just doing what I want feels so good when most of my time is spent satisfying clients. Thanks for the info on the steel to, I must confess a lot of my edges are chrome van and to be quite honest I don't find them too bad really.

[Derek Cohen]

... I predict that in the future,you might end up sharpening a piece of iron ore on a rock from your driveway,and stropping on a piece of bacon.:):):):):).

Don't give David more ideas, George! You know how easily influenced he is. :D

I think that David is secretly attempting to corner the market on sharpening stones. This one-stone thread is just his way of convincing others not to purchase more! :)

Regards from Perth

Derek (staying with Shapton Pro 1000, and Sigmas 6000 and 13000).

[george wilson]

NOT iron ROD,iron ORE!!

But what of the poor stone venders should this method become universal? Moans and sobs would emanate from their portals."Oh,Woe is me ! I am undone!! Oh,unhappy carbide scribing knife,find your home in my heaving breast!! Oh! Argh! Thou woundest me not deep enough! And,thou broke off,leaving me sorely distressed!! Such is thy unreliance!! Come then,faithful awl. Do thy worst! AAGH!! I die!!"

Say it isn't so,David,I liked the old,prolifigate David better. How else will we continue to plumb the mysteries of a myriad of Japanese,European,and American stones?:):):) You have created a great following,a mob of stone lovers. Do not abandon them,but continue to regale them with tales and the lore of the Shapton,the Thuringan,the Arkansas,and all those mysterious and wonderful stones that are in this Earth!!

[Steve Friedman]

I think that David is secretly attempting to corner the market on sharpening stones. This one-stone thread is just his way of convincing others not to purchase more! :)

Derek (staying with Shapton Pro 1000, and Sigmas 6000 and 13000).
That explains it!

David's much brighter than we give him credit for.

Derek, as an aside, I started using my Shapton Pro 1000 instead of the Sigma 1200 and like it much better. A bit more aggressive as a starting stone.

Steve (who still refuses to relegate my Sigma 6000 or 13000 to spectator status)

[David Weaver]

I think that David is secretly attempting to corner the market on sharpening stones.

I've done a poor job of convincing people not to buy the stones that I like the best, though!!

Maybe I should make a "Washitas are bad, jack of all trades, master of none" thread!

[Matthew N. Masail]

I just opened this thread up since my last response... I am afraid I might be to blame as I have recently encouraged David and thanks him for rediscovering
the one stone method, as he has led me to a path of enlightenment, yes enlightenment, and freedom from a pile of "pesky" stones... it is me you want, do not harm
the leader as he still has promise of great lessons to bare, and is one that tells only truth!


Sean asked "Matthew, did you let the 3,000 clog so you could burnish with it. Maybe i do not understand the concept of burnishing. Could you explain that? I think of it as more rubbing than abrading."


I don't think about letting any stone clog on purpose at the moment because that would mean having to think about that. the 3000 new cerax is rather hard compared to the rest of them so it doesn't cut as aggressively. the way I understand burnishing is that the abrasive particles fracture and become duller and smaller, yet are still hold in place by the strong bond in the stone. this makes them cut more shallow and finer. with some stones (like the sigma 1.2k) this happens normally without the need for clogging, but some clogging naturally follows.


it depends of much metal you need to remove if you can go straight to a 3k stone or not. David hollow grinds real close so it's always fine. I use the Paul sellers method at the moment so never grind, sometimes a coarser stone is better to get a burr quickly. the edge from a sigma power 1.2k and a strop seems as good an anything so far, but I'm still looking into it, I started last week and only have limited shop hours.

[David Weaver]

In an effort to find something more affordable, I'm going to switch to this for a while (stone on the left), it's a "hard" arkansas from natural whetstone. I haven't checked its density, but it's not similar to what norton calls "hard", it's more like a good vintage soft and it has a lot of bite. it'll be a few days before this one is cutting finely, but once it does, i'll leave it there. Lilywhite on the right for size comparison (I think that lilywhite is 7x2). NW must have a lot of these stones, because they aren't afraid to cut them big and for cheap. I bought this one in combination with a soft of the same size, and the guy gave me a deal of $29 each. I think the going rate for the hard by itself is somewhere around $40 for 8x3. I only mention price, because he's cheap, and this stone is probably better than the vintage (non washita) soft stones I've seen, because it's a little finer, comes flat and freshly cut and it's as big as you want. He doesn't seem to have an 8x2 size, which I'd generally prefer, though.

284155

Anyway, the last I was using it, I had conditioned it heavily with a diamond plate, so it's cutting coarsely, almost as much as it was when it was new, so I'm going to cheat and use the jasper to chase the burr until it settles in. Bits of jasper are nice to have, they're cheap, and they double as a strop when you chase the burr (there's no reason to strop following them).

They are a bit hard to find in big pieces, though, all of the slabs are small and thin because people make craft show jewelry out of it. This is my most expensive piece - $10, but it's large. I've gotten pieces of biggs on ebay for as little as a dollar. They are the hardest stones I've found.

284156

[Jonas Baker]

Well David, I think your interest in sharpening is great, and to me this thread could be looked at as a way of simplifying the sharpening process (which is good goal) and also about finding which stones work best for ones purposes (which can be a fun goal if you are a sharpening nerd). I will say this, I still find oil stones to be far less messy than water stones, and if I could, I would give up water stones all together! I just splash an oilstone with Norton oil which is thin enough to work well but not so thin that it runs everywhere, while with a water stone I get water and slurry everywhere!! So my eternal goal is to sharpen without using water stones. That being said, nothing cuts as fast as a good synthetic japanese water stone (aside from a grinder). They just eat steel.

I think you could definitely use a Fine India as a one stone purpose (and I believe that's what they recommend at North Bennett Street School), but I do find that the new Fine India stones leave quite a burr that needs refining, but once broken in, they become finer (and slower cutting of course). Medium Indias are too rough to use as a one stone solution IMO, as they are very coarse.

I find Washita stones to cut as quick as a fine or medium india, but they leave a finer edge. The caveat to this is they are all a bit different (as any natural stone is). I have two Washita stones, one Pike 6X2 Lily White Washita, which I find doesn't leave such a fine edge and leaves too much of a burr. The other one is a later (70's era?) Norton that is just marked Washita Oilstone and Norton in blue ink on the side of the stone, it looks to be the same as a Lily White Washita stone. That stone leaves a finer edge than my Pike Lily White Washita, and a fine enough burr that just stropping on leather can make the steel sharp enough to work well in wood.

So my question for you David, which type of Washita Stones do you prefer. You mention the pike stones to be your favorite, and then you mention the turkey stone (which is just a Washita stone with a mottled turkey skin type of appearance?). Anything to look out for when trying to find a Washita stone? Or is it just a crap shoot? Your favorite stone, is it a pike Lily White Washita? Or something else? Also, can you elaborate on what qualities you prefer in the stone? More coarse, more fine? Do you find that they leave a tiny wire edge, or is there a technique you use to getting a smaller wire edge on a coarser Washita stone? Sorry for all the questions.

Best,

Jonas Baker

[David Weaver]

I like the pike labeled washitas (lilywhites and no 1s) the best, but probably because I've used them more. They're more coarse than my unlabeled stones, but they will settle in to fine cutting if you let them go - and still just be able to retain a wire edge.

I hone with them lifting off the primary about 5 degrees until I've gotten a wire edge that seems suitable for the condition of the edge prior to sharpening, then I lap the back for about 10-15 seconds. Then alternate back and forth five times, one light stroke each front and back - that removes most of the wire edge and allows me to not have to strop the stone hard (stropping a stone hard on a leather strop is a sure way to find any grit or dirt that's in the strop, and each heavy pass nicks the edge with tiny nicks - i hate that).

I used the woodworker's delight washita for a while, it was also nice, and I could probably get along with any of them. Preference for the lilywhite may be based just on what it cost. I sold chris griggs a no 1 washita a while ago that was a good one, I should've kept it, too. It was mottled a little on the surface but had a very similar feel to the lilywhite, both of them slightly different than the woodworker's delight - a little more bite. The ww delight is a very good stone, though, too. And at least it can be had sometimes for a decent price, despite turning up seldom in good shape. I'd call 50 bucks a good price, though I got mine for about a third of that last year because the entire subscribership to ebay was asleep.

If any of them seem to be cutting too slow (like the ww delight can settle in very fine), then there are two things I do to wake them up - either hone something that's got wrought iron laminated - that seems to pull some grit loose and freshen the surface, or rub two washitas together just a little bit. That freshens them up a little without making them too coarse.

I use WD 40 on them exclusively, but never out of aerosol (because most of the aerosol ends up elsewhere). I use one of the white plastic wd40 bottles instead.

I don't look for anything particular when I'm trying to find a hidden washita - I have what I want now, so the rest of the stuff, if I find one inexpensively, I'll just buy it. If it's very fine like the scarred up stone I showed earlier here, that's OK.

[Tom M King]

David: good post - lots of info.

George: The iron rod comment; When I was in Japan visiting our DIL's family, grandma would take her knives to a stone in the neighbours retaining wall two doors down, and sharpen them. Had done so since 1960.
I didn't get a chance to go look ( whirlwind trip ) but it HAD to be that stone! I have kicked myself since for not getting her to show me.
Personally, a 1000 and 8000 Shapton get it done for me, but you never know.

Stradivarius sharpened his tools on a stone around the town well. Last week, I was working up on a roof with a chisel, didn't want to come down unless I had to, and sharpened a beater chisel enough to use it on a brick on the side of the house.

[Graham Haydon]

Boom! Can't beat a brick, now what brick was it. I here facing bricks are heaps better than commons :-).

[Mel Fulks]

David, interested in this and looked up the ebay photos , afraid I don't see any difference between them . What should I see?

[David Weaver]

Not much, i think. And there's no guarantee I'm right...except the second one, I bought. So I know what it is. The softs like like uniform grained sandy stones. The washitas look less like grainy sand and more like coral. Sometimes it helps to look at a corner (which is what I usually hope for). I think I could get a 90% guess rate, but sometimes it's hard to tell depending on what the stone has on the surface, even when it's mostly clean.

[Mel Fulks]

Thanks, David. So much better than "only fools can't see it".

[Dave Beauchesne]

NOT iron ROD,iron ORE!!
Apologies George, my mistake.
Dave B

[Tom Vanzant]

Kitchen knives in ski area condos are notoriously dull, as in butter knife dull. A river rock in the fireplace served to sharpen the butcher knife enough to slice BBQ brisket. Next trip I took a good slicer and steel.

[Gary Kman]

I think I'd get one of those mill stones from a grist mill,
Balance it on my head,
have a 350 pound eunic hold my sharpening project on it
while whipping me with a cat-o-nine to maintain a constant
78 rpm.

If the object is to do something the hard way
why not pull out all the stops?

[David Weaver]

sharpening with a single stone isn't doing things the hard way. It does replace equipment with skill to some extent, but I'd say spending several minutes on 4 or 5 different stones is a lot closer to doing things the hard way.

[James Taglienti]

I think I'd get one of those mill stones from a grist mill,
Balance it on my head,
have a 350 pound eunic hold my sharpening project on it
while whipping me with a cat-o-nine to maintain a constant
78 rpm.

If the object is to do something the hard way
why not pull out all the stops?

"There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which is proof against all arguments, and which cannot fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance - that principle is contempt prior to investigation."
William Paley


The only people who would have your reaction are those who haven't tried it. I gave it a shot yesterday, some older berg chisels -grinder to a single stone. I tried a soft ark and then a lily white, both performed well - didn't even strop, just whacked the burr with the chisel on the flat. Mortised 8 butt hinges in hard maple, touch ups were a breeze, just as fast as any other stone, finished product was great. Edge held just as long as off an 8k water stone.

[Darren Brewster]

I like the premise of this thread, but how would it work with a hodge-podge of different types of steels? Not that I am dissatisfied with my current setup in any way, just curious. A grinder and two stones still seems like the best bet in this situation.

[David Weaver]

If your hodge podge is vintage and modern O1, it's fine. If your hodge podge is 01 and A2, then you should stick with modern stones due to the A2 - a grinder and two stones being ideal.

[Tony Zaffuto]

If your hodge podge is vintage and modern O1, it's fine. If your hodge podge is 01 and A2, then you should stick with modern stones due to the A2 - a grinder and two stones being ideal.

I have mainly O1 but also some A2 tossed in. I really don't know anymore which is which and use the same sharpening methods for all. To me, a repeatable methodology will give consistent results. to gain repeatable methodology means learning your sharpening stones, your tools and same body motions whether free-handing or using a jig.

[Darren Brewster]

If your hodge podge is vintage and modern O1, it's fine. If your hodge podge is 01 and A2, then you should stick with modern stones due to the A2 - a grinder and two stones being ideal.

Yeah, I figured as much. I have vintage and modern O1 and A2. I still like this system though.

[Matt ONeill]

Does anyone just freehand to a convex bevel? I use a black Arkansas stone and a strop for 95% of my sharpening. And I've got almost all A2 steel as well. I switched over to that method maybe a year ago and won't be switching back, it's faster than anything else I can imagine. Maybe I'm not getting my blades as sharp, but I sure can't tell (they seem to shave hair off my arm as well as I was able to do when I was using shaptons). Since I've switched over to convex bevels, my grinder has been largely collecting dust as well.

I'm sure convex vs hollow grind vs micro bevel is a whole different holy war. I found hollow grinding to be exponentially faster than using a jig to get a micro bevel, and have found freehanding to a convex bevel even faster than bothering with a hollow grind.

I'll tell you what though, I don't really give sharpening much thought anymore. I leave my stone and my stop out on my bench all the time, and when a tool needs sharpened, it gets sharpened.

- Matt

[David Weaver]

I think there are lots of people who do. I've never favored it over hollow grinding, but it takes me about 30 seconds to grind a plane iron or a chisel to refresh the hollow. If I still had a tormek, which is a fair amount of fiddling, I could be convinced.

[David Weaver]

Spent the better part of the weekend using the hard ark pictured earlier, but it doesn't seem like it's got the washita potential. I guess that's not a surprise, but it does work *very well* if it's followed by the jasper. Just not without that assistance. Maybe another week or two.

[Darren Brewster]

I got really good results with water stones with a convex bevel. Very sharp, very fast. I don't have a very coarse starting stone so I found my bevel angle would creep up on me. I liked it a lot though. I started hollow-grinding afterwards to give it an honest try and like that too, plus it is nice to have a grinder in the shop. I don't collect stones like David, but I sure have tried all sorts of different methods, that is for sure.

[Kees Heiden]

Maybe it was allready thouroughly treated somewhere in this thread, but how about Belgium coticule as a one hone stone? They are quite readilly available overhere, but very expensive.

[David Weaver]

They would work. Coticules work best with light pressure, though, because the particles are big. The ones that are not purely razor stones (some of the real fine softer ones would make crappy tool stones) and that had a strong slurry would work, though.

For some reason, I always have trouble getting much out of coticules with tools, compared what one will do with a razor. I guess I don't have the patience.

Their price has become totally irrational given their performance, though. There are lots of people buying stones based on the reputation of the best older coticules and not getting what they think they're getting.

There are, however, sometimes that you can get a rough one used for cheap at a flea market, but not many of the vintage stones were very big.

[bill tindall]

Extra fine fixed diamond plate would meet the challenge for any practical woodworking task. And, it is what May May uses for carving. And for turning you can just skip the stone altogether, just grind and strop.

[David Weaver]

Bill, extra fine being the plate that eze lap markets as 1200 grit (but that seems much finer once broken in?)

[Kees Heiden]

Thanks for the info about the coticule. I'll patiently wait for a cheaper vintage one. 140 euro for a new coticule is a bit steep indeed.

[David Weaver]

BTDT - no longer have the stone (a large lagrise combo that was about 140 euro). I still do have some coticules, I just don't think any of the new ones look comparable to the *good* vintage ones (there are definitely coarse vintage coticules, too). Ardennes sells some selected coticules directly, but IIRC they are a lot more expensive than the average regular or select grade that are sold by retailers. They are also selling stones with visual flaws now as being rare types, which you can decide about on your own. I think they are a reputable operation and they are just selling at what the market will pay, but as the buyer, that usually indicates you're paying more for something the folks a hundred years ago didn't see as being valuable.

A 140 euro coticule would leave you feeling not that great about your purchase within 5 minutes. Very pretty stone, but not good for woodwork compared to a lot of other less expensive stones.

[Sean Hughto]

So, David, I blame you. You sparked my curiosity to pursue some fun with vintage Arkansas stones. Ebay prices are a bit nuts for the bigger and nicer ones, but I popped for the $14 for this smaller one. It looked grimy and hollowed in the pics, so I don't think anyone was too attracted. Not to mention that I guess it's not that old with its plastic case and all. Delivered quick, came today, and I cleaned it up on the diamond plate. Sharpened up a couple old chisels like a champ. She may be small, but she's a sweetheart. I love her colors too - talk about looking like a northern pike!
http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7371/13114480553_743631814c_b.jpg
So thanks, I guess, you no good stoner .. err, pusher. ;-)

Now to find some harder ones to play with a lily, hard, or surgical black maybe?

[David Weaver]

Sean, there is a guy who goes by the name "night train" selling hard arks on ebay right now for prices that don't occur often. Half of norton prices, more or less.

How is the case stone? I've always been wary of other branded stones - did it create a good edge?

The cheap treat is the other cherts (jasper, etc, that are really hard and REALLY cheap). I've not seen jaspers actually sold as sharpening stones, but they are useful as a polisher for a skilled sharpener.

[Sean Hughto]

Thanks for the tip. I'll check out the train.

The case stone seems great so far. I sharpened a couple smaller (1/4 and 1/2) vintage chisels in a minute or so. The stone cuts nice and fast. Just a handful of strokes to a burr.

I assumed it was maybe mined by pike or norton or whatever and sold to case to market under its name for sale with case knives and stuff?

[Darren Brewster]

Extra fine fixed diamond plate would meet the challenge for any practical woodworking task. And, it is what May May uses for carving. And for turning you can just skip the stone altogether, just grind and strop.

I've gone from a DMT Extra Fine to a piece of MDF with green crayon on it and gotten good results, but with a honing guide, not freehand. Though my DMT has crapped out on me. I can barely get it to scratch a chisel except for a couple tiny areas. I think it was a lemon from the start, but didn't know enough when I got it to return it too Lee Valley. I would be interested in trying the eze lap, as David Barnett on Woodcentral speaks so highly of them.

[David Weaver]

Thanks for the tip. I'll check out the train.

The case stone seems great so far. I sharpened a couple smaller (1/4 and 1/2) vintage chisels in a minute or so. The stone cuts nice and fast. Just a handful of strokes to a burr.

I assumed it was maybe mined by pike or norton or whatever and sold to case to market under its name for sale with case knives and stuff?

I'm not sure what it is. The surface of the stone (the pores) looks a bit different than a pike washita, but the case with oilstones is always proof by use. If it's good in use, the story is pretty much fully written at that point.

[James Taglienti]

I tried to follow the grinder with a coarser coticule the other day, it worked, semi quickly , but the amount of slurry I kicked up was very wasteful. I bet it was almost $1 worth! The stone wouldn't last a year at that rate.


I bought a gigantic "surgical black" from night train, like 3x8x2 or something, still breaking it in but it's nice, not translucent density but pretty close, a lot of stone for the money, I'd suggest one to anybody, don't be afraid of the multicolored ones either!

[Sean Hughto]

When I first started woodworking. I tried some common oil stones and just had no luck at all. I think they were too hard and too quickly glazed. My technique was probably lacking too, but the bottom line was that I couldn't understand how anyone used them successfully. I suppose it was in essence like trying to dimension rough lumber with a finely set smoother - it might be doable, but it would take forever and be unpleasant. Raising a burr is the most important part of sharpening successfully - cleanly separating that wire edge and polishing is really all that's left after that. So happy sharpening, on woodworking tools at least (I know nothing about razors), it seems to me, comes from raising a burr as fast as possible and then choosing a nice hard stone or strop to polish it up. So I'm loving the softer oil stones lately, and am satisfied with my charged strop, but I'm curious what stones you favor when you are not doing a single stone challenge. Do you love the hard, black, translucent, just leather, or what?

Oh and what's with the nomenclatures of "No 1" and "Queer Creek" if you know?

Also, flipping the 1 stone challenge, if you were in a contest to be judged by electron microscopy that evaluated the number of steel atoms at the intersection of the edge planes when complete, what would your process be? Then, in the same contest but with a time limit of 2 minutes for sharpening a 3/8ths inch O1 chisel - or 2 minutes to sharpen a 2" O1 plane blade?

[george wilson]

Speaking of surgical black Arkansas stones,they used one in the Gunsmith Shop back in the 70's (maybe still do). One day I was over there,and saw one of them trying to flatten the stone with a 600 grit Wet or Dry paper wrapped around a file!!

Told him that would take 100 years. I took their big sandstone grinding wheel out of the water trough,and laid it horizontal. I slopped water on it,and in about 5 minutes of rubbing,had the stone flat for him. He was surprised that the softish sandstone wheel would cut the black stone,but it did. Probably the stone had gotten a bit worn from them sharpening tiny pointed hardened steel engraving chisels on it. May have made tracks,I can't recall. Surprising it wore enough to worry about. This was about 1971.

[David Weaver]

Welcome to the club. When I first got oilstones, I wanted huge big stones, so I got two 10x3 softer stones and a 12x3 black stone. Back then you could actually get a halls black of that size for $90 shipped. Anyway, I tried to use them like I was using waterstones. That was a problem. I eventually sold all but the big stone earlier in this thread - I WISH I could have the black stone back, but it couldn't be touched for anywhere close to what you could get them for back then - too many people getting turned back on to oilstones, and the merchants don't have to dump them. I was also into wondersteel at the time, and had a bunch of stuff it didn't cut very well, and if you agitate a black oilstone, they're fairly coarse. A shapton 1 micron stone barely raises a burr - there's no real need for a strop - I thought it was pointless to screw around with the oilstones.

Now, I like a fine natural stone that doesn't raise much wire edge, and if it does, one where the edge after a quick light strop is very sharp. A good black, translucent, piece of jasper, ...something like that. Good japanese natural stones also fit the bill, but they are expensive and a lot more variable - the vendors who used to sell good hard known-mine stones cheap (stones with a flaw or two that made no difference in sharpening) have gone up market and there are a lot of mediocre $400 stones being sold now.

I don't ever condition my fine stones, they are far better broken in. I see there's a thread over on WN right now about "how fine is an oilstone", or something like that, and the equivalence of 2000-4000 grit (or less) is being given for the finest stones. Only someone who has never used an oilstone properly would think that's accurate. I can't touch the quality/sharpness of the edge my settled in finishers (mostly various trans hones I've piled up, but the cheap jasper, too) provide with a king 8000 stone. The king 8000 will remove material a lot faster, but that's not what I'm after with that. If I scuffed them up really hard, they might cut like a lower grit stone, but i have no clue why anyone would do that.

No. 1 was just norton's branding. Lilywhite and rosyred were expensive very uniform stones, and no 1 was a grade of stone that was cheaper, something they didn't think should be stickered with a lilywhite sticker. The quality of them is so much better than any of the softs being offered now that you can ignore any cosmetic issues with a no 1, some of them don't even appear to have any (maybe norton/pike at the time didn't have any subgrade stones to market at that price level and stickered Lilywhite with no 1 stones to fill orders). I personally wouldn't pay as much for a no 1 just because if the craze blows over, the lilywhites will still be the higher price stones. No 2 are something I haven't seen. Maybe they were slips or odd sizes.

Norton never offered separate grades in their hard stones that I've seen, that line of numbers and names was for washita only. A hard ark finisher was either a black or translucent in old stones. I haven't seen a whole lot of really old stones that are the same as what's marketed now as "hard". They are either fine finishers or washitas, or coarser yet soft arks that are similar in use to a washita.

So, anyway, I guess the cherts (novaculites and jasper) are my favorites right now because I don't need those stones to cut much fast, and they're interesting because you're getting much more out of them than the particle size would suggest when you use them correctly.

[Chris Griggs]

When I first started woodworking. I tried some common oil stones and just had no luck at all. I think they were too hard and too quickly glazed. My technique was probably lacking too, but the bottom line was that I couldn't understand how anyone used them successfully. I suppose it was in essence like trying to dimension rough lumber with a finely set smoother - it might be doable, but it would take forever and be unpleasant. Raising a burr is the most important part of sharpening successfully - cleanly separating that wire edge and polishing is really all that's left after that. So happy sharpening, on woodworking tools at least (I know nothing about razors), it seems to me, comes from raising a burr as fast as possible and then choosing a nice hard stone or strop to polish it up. So I'm loving the softer oil stones lately, and am satisfied with my charged strop, but I'm curious what stones you favor when you are not doing a single stone challenge. Do you love the hard, black, translucent, just leather, or what?

Oh and what's with the nomenclatures of "No 1" and "Queer Creek" if you know?

Also, flipping the 1 stone challenge, if you were in a contest to be judged by electron microscopy that evaluated the number of steel atoms at the intersection of the edge planes when complete, what would your process be? Then, in the same contest but with a time limit of 2 minutes for sharpening a 3/8ths inch O1 chisel - or 2 minutes to sharpen a 2" O1 plane blade?

I had a real hard time with my arks when I first got them for the same reason. I was used to Norton water stones, and I got a Halls soft and Halls surgical black to play with, and just couldn't get the results I was getting with my Nortons. I realized later that this was becasue the soft wasn't adequately bringing up a fresh burr/fresh steel. A lot of the new softs (Halls and also Dans I'm told) are pretty hard stones...they are soft by density...but are fine cutting and not much more friable then a hard (Dave says the Natural Whetstone ones good and fast though).

The halls soft I was attempting to use as a first step was just too weak unless I was really REALLY minimizing the amount of steal I work. It will raise a burr but once its been worn in even a little you need to work a secondary micro bevel to pull a burr easily. Now that I know how to use that soft its actually a decent stone for bridging between something like a Med India and an HTA or Black, and it works pretty well as a "one stone" solution once I learned to really minimize the amount of steal being worked, but since I got a Washita which is as fine or finer and much MUCH faster cutting I don't ever use my "new" halls soft.

Personally, for a multi stone oils stone setup I like a med india, a washita or soft ark, and a true hard ark of some type (Surgical or HTA). With the washita and a bench grinder I rarely need the medium india but it is nice for bringing backs up from coarse sandpaper during initial blade setup, and also good when the washita isn't raising a burr fast enough (which is usually in A2 and/or once the bevel grows a little)

[David Weaver]

Queer creek, btw, has nothing to do with novaculite. I think they are probably silica stones that haven't undergone a metamorphosis (or whatever happens) to novaculite, and they are a second-line stone from norton. I haven't used one enough yet to know what their potential is.

If I had to win a peeing contest for finest edge under a scope in a time limit, I'd probably use a shapton 1000, 15000 and then follow with a very clean hard balsa strop that has either 0.3 micron chromium oxide on it or quarter micron diamond. (there are finer, but they are for razors more or less).

You could get an almost invisible edge in less than two minutes with that. The trouble is that such a strop to finish with has to stay perfectly clean. If anything hard gets on it (just like if any stray hard particles get onto the surface of an oilstone - but even wood dust or something in this case), you go backwards when you strop on it. It's a great low-skill and very high sharpness finisher for a straight razor because you can keep strops for a straight razor in a shop where nothing gets on them. The yield over a 1 micron edge is fiddling in a wood shop, though.

Bill tindall's advocated combination of an ezelap 600 followed by 1 micron loose diamonds is another nice superfast combination, not quite as fine, but way high on the fineness for speed - and a little more forgiving to people who want to sharpen everything like they're using a waterstone (e.g., put a hollow grind on a stone and rub, rub, rub blindly until they get what they want). It also will sharpen stuff like high hardness m4 powder metal like it's nothing - that kind of stuff just gets shiny on natural stones and never seems to abrade off. I like those diamonds on MDF, bill likes them on cast iron. Cast is definitely more economical with the diamonds.

I am in love with the old steel, the cap iron and the chert finishers, though. Just as fast, very easy on the grinder, and in a world of extremes, it just seems right.

[David Weaver]

I had a real hard time with my arks when I first got them for the same reason. I was used to Norton water stones, and I got a Halls soft and Halls surgical black to play with, and just couldn't get the results I was getting with my Nortons. I realized later that this was becasue the soft wasn't adequately bringing up a fresh burr/fresh steel. A lot of the new softs (Halls and also Dans I'm told) are pretty hard stones...they are soft by density...but are fine cutting and not much more friable then a hard (Dave says the Natural Whetstone ones good and fast though).

The halls soft I was attempting to use as a first step was just too weak unless I was really REALLY minimizing the amount of steal I work. It will raise a burr but once its been worn in even a little you need to work a secondary micro bevel to pull a burr easily. Now that I know how to use that soft its actually a decent stone for bridging between something like a Med India and an HTA or Black, and it works pretty well as a "one stone" solution once I learned to really minimize the amount of steal being worked, but since I got a Washita which is as fine or finer and much MUCH faster cutting I don't ever use my "new" halls soft.

Personally, for a multi stone oils stone setup I like a med india, a washita or soft ark, and a true hard ark of some type (Surgical or HTA). With the washita and a bench grinder I rarely need the medium india but it is nice for bringing backs up from coarse sandpaper during initial blade setup, and also good when the washita isn't raising a burr fast enough (which is usually in A2 and/or once the bevel grows a little)

There are a couple of stones I sold that I wish I never did!
* that no 1 washita, though it would make 9 washitas instead of 8, which is totally irrational
* the 12x3 halls black I had, because I know what I'd do to flatten it now
* a half thickness 8x2 dans hard

My brain dump of good stones, that I know are good (not that anyone asked this, but in case newbies are reading and thinking of taking the plunge)
* vintage translucents and bone colored near-translucent hards (no porous look on surface) - all are good
* truly vintage black stones - you won't find one for a reasonable price, though - vintage norton hard black stones sell for a lot, watch out for slates that look like black arkansas stones if there's no label
* the natural whetstone black translucent (it's just a gray translucent stone from what I can tell - comes with a fairly coarse surface finish that belies its fineness, but after breaking it in, it's fine)
* Dan's translucents and black stones (they are fine right out of the box, and if you raise a slurry with them, they are finer stone for stone than norton trans (i.e., a freshly dressed norton will be coarser than a freshly dressed dans - I guess it's just the luck of what comes out of each mine)
* halls black and translucents (be prepared to flatten, though - and sandpaper or diamond hones aren't going to do it if you get a wonky one - you'll need a lap and silicon carbide grit)
* a fairly large flat lapped slab of true jasper (cheap, but a little harder to use than an oilstone - usually thin or irregular shape and need to be mounted to or in something)

And for soft stones:
* the soft or hard from natural whetstone - they will cut right along with a washita, most things offered as softs won't
* vintage pike washitas
* vintage softs - like really vintage, not like something in the last few decades

India and crystolon stones should be bought new. Nortons trans is an OK stone, but I don't love it. It doesn't match the fine stones mentioned above. I've had three of them now and they're all like that. The norton black is a more interesting stone than the trans, but I like the dans black better - it's finer.

The guy "night train" on ebay is selling some reasonably nice stones, but I only have three (that all came as a pack, one trans and two less valuable stones he threw in for free). The trans he sold has the density to be a very good stone, but looks like the surface finsh off his lap or saw is coarse, and the initial use (where even the trans raises a big wire edge) is not indicative of where it will end up. It needs to be used for a while before deciding - unfortunately, if the guy is telling the truth, he won't be selling stuff that long, anyway.

One thing that bugs me some about a lot of the stone sellers is that they will only sell first quality (in terms of cosmetic) and very specific sizes of stones, which drives up the price. Not that I want a norton 2x8, but I'm sure that norton throws away a lot of stuff that could be turned into inexpensive stones for people on a budget. A mounted translucent stone with a big inclusion is less pretty, but it's no problem at all for actual use.

Dan's (who does sell a lot of their seconds) told me the volume of stone used for trans finished stones is about 10 or 11% of the original stock (can't remember the exact amount).

[David Weaver]

Speaking of surgical black Arkansas stones,they used one in the Gunsmith Shop back in the 70's (maybe still do). One day I was over there,and saw one of them trying to flatten the stone with a 600 grit Wet or Dry paper wrapped around a file!!

Told him that would take 100 years. I took their big sandstone grinding wheel out of the water trough,and laid it horizontal. I slopped water on it,and in about 5 minutes of rubbing,had the stone flat for him. He was surprised that the softish sandstone wheel would cut the black stone,but it did. Probably the stone had gotten a bit worn from them sharpening tiny pointed hardened steel engraving chisels on it. May have made tracks,I can't recall. Surprising it wore enough to worry about. This was about 1971.

I think most of the dealers use a similar type lapping sand or something on a flat lap to prepare their stones. The sandstone wheel is like an entire chunk of lapping material instead of just a bit of loose powder on a lap. They used to use sand slurry on a wire to cut granite, too, didn't they?

[Noah Wagener]

f there is a magic trick where you have to use them with slurry a certain way to get the slurry to "break down" into little particles, i've yet to see it or a picture of the particles before or after crushing. They cut faster on slurry and that might lead people to think they're cutting finer - simply because they can finish the job on slurry due to their cutting speed.


To me the Washita seems more magical. From what i can ascertain from what you are positing, the suitability of the Washita as a one stone "system" is becasue of 1) its large particles that can cut fast and 2)that it retains those particles so that they can become rounded and therefore not scratch as deep. I would think once worn in the stone would lose the speed and it seems magical to me that it can retain both properties of speed as an initial stone and fineness. In Leonard Lee's book he says that a well worn black Arkansas is impossibly slow.And you said that scuffing a translucent to make it faster ruins its polishing ability. It must be one quality or the other. The Washita must lose some speed? How fast is a lapped Lily WHite and a broken in one?Say, at removing grinding scratches compared to a 1,000 grit synthetic.

I have used 90x silicon carbide and almost immediately it seems to work like a 2,000 grit stone. And reading so many people who write that slurry acts in the a similar manner so if you can just hone on the slurry towards the end, you can make your stone finer. Lee also has microscope pictures of Arkansas stones and a Japanese natural and the particles of an Arkansas look like little diamonds while the one from the Japanese stone look like fragile flakes. You would not want a slurry of those Novaculite particles floating around for finishing but the Japanese ones look like they would become finer pretty quick. Maybe it takes too long
Here is a quote from Lee: "If you are using a water stone, you can save yourself some time if you stop flushing your stone and let the crushed particles accumulate as you are approaching a satisfactorily lapped face on a coarse stone. This will slow the sharpening process by reducing the depth of the scratch that the stone puts in the chisel, but the lost time will be more than made up when you move on to the fine stone. It will take you less time to refine the surface, because the scratches left by the preceding stone are shallower than they would have been from a flushed stone.This technique, which is used frequently with water stones, is a way of changing the effective grit size of a stone to your advantage."

This makes theoretical sense to me but i have seen the pictures you posted of the coticule and Gung-xi stones with and without slurry on a razor. You must have paid a mint for Japanese stones; maybe you could experiment with one that leans to the coarser side as a one stone process? Is the Washita effective on white steel?

I tried this one that just came in the mail.


285171

That whiteness on the end is the slurry from lapping it, i do not believe it is a Lily White. Is this a soft Ark? I could not get any kind of polish with it. I tried using a light touch towards the end as you describe but it came out matte. It did shave arm hair and pare end grain. It is slow even after being lapped.

[David Weaver]

Oh yeah, the loss of speed is still there. the difference is that you can get a translucent hone to cut fast, but it will nearly stop cutting if you leave it settled in forever. There are pores on a washita that never disappear, so it doesn't ever completely lose its cutting power, it just loses most of it. If you limit how much metal you're working, you can still use that limited cutting power to raise a wire edge, and still get a fine edge.

The reason I dug up the natural whetstone hard is because it has that serious great cutting power when it's freshly lapped on the surface, and I thought maybe I could break it in to cut finely like the washita does when it's settled, but so far it's not able to go as fine. I'm not a big fan of making a big deal about stones that are overpriced, and right now labeled washitas cost sometimes as much as it would cost to get a soft and hard arkansas, and the ultimate conclusion is that they do not do a better job than a soft and hard arkansas do if you have two stones to use.

It's just very convenient to use the one washita because you never get stuck thinking as a freehander "am I raising the secondary angle here a little too high with the translucent/black". There is no secondary angle. Just keep a sliver of metal with prudent grinding and hone it. Done. The only thing you do to improve it is alternate front and back 5 strokes or so when you're finishing the edge to thin the wire edge some.

You're right, over the years, I've paid a mint for japanese stones. If I had to guess off the top of my head, I've spent probably $3,000-$4,000 just on natural japanese stones, though I have turned over a fair amount. Natural japanese stones are a risky thing to get, because a lot of the branded good-mine stones just aren't satisfying to use when you've used a better one. You can get a $400 stone (and by that, I mean a smart bought $400 stone - one that could've easily cost $800 if not bought smart) and think "eh...it's ok, I guess" when you get the skin off of the surface and get into it. You really have to learn them, but the really good ones speak to you a lot sooner. Total rabbit hole. I am enamored with the ones that really just do what you expect, especially on the shaving side of thing, but the reality is that you can get a sharper shaving edge easier with a woodworking stone followed by chromium oxide and esp. if you follow a grade finer than that. It's the properties of the natural stone's edge that cause you to go down the rabbit hole, and i think it's one to be avoided unless you're an absolute nut like me. There is absolutely no practical purpose in my stone hogging.

I just don't get into the slurry break down thing that people talk about, I think it's more important to dilute slurry on something where fineness is important and slurry is too coarse. What lee says is true, but it works better at the lower grits than it does at the fine. The only way that would work on a fine stone is if you let the slurry dry out. What works better on a fine stone is allowing the surface to dull and then suspending an edge with water.

And you're right about the slurry dulling, too - at term razor honers use - novaculite is bad for slurry dulling. Some coticules are less bad (meaning the feel of sharpness of the edge on slurry is a lot closer to an edge without slurry). On an oilstone, slurry dulling is drastic and it's very easy to tell that an edge was honed with slurry just by looking at it and using it. Oilstones can go way up the ladder on sharpness if you let them settle in and present the right steel to them, but it's not a skill most people will develop, or a limitation (with the steel types) that people want to be bothered with.

Anyway, as far as the one stone process goes with japanese stones, they don't cut the same way as oilstones do - their edge is a little more toothy, and I just don't love the way any of them work "one stone". The closest thing I have is an okudo suita, which does nice things on hard japanese steel (it's not the sharpest of stones that I have, but it's very fast). It's still a finisher, though, and it does not have the ability to raise a quick wire edge - which means that it would struggle if I brought a spent plane iron to it. You can, however, use them with japanese chisels because the chisels don't get the wear that a plane iron does - and literally still have a fresh chisel at the end of a project just with a single finishing stone. Side comment about their applicability - they are small particles that are aggressive, and I never feel like the vintage american steel gets any better on them than it does on anything else natural - they really are optimal for the harder japanese steel where the particles don't cut as deep and the wire edge and wire edge particles don't hang on as much.

That's true in general for all natural abrasives. If you bring a 58 hardness american iron to a stone, it will get cut deeper than a 64 hardness japanese tool, and I think that lack of groove depth is one of the reasons japanese tools seem sharper on the same stones. On pure white steel tools that aren't too overly hard, you can get a fantastic edge off of an oilstone. My iyoroi chisels (which are probably only 61/62 hardness - which is where we actually tested one of the lower grade iyorois about 6 years ago) love the washita - they take a nice edge off of it and it cuts them fine. The washita doesn't love the white steel mosaku iron that I sent off yesterday, nor does it love the ouchi chisels, both of which are harder than the iyoroi chisels by a noticable amount.

[Noah Wagener]

Paganini played the Kreutzer sonata on one string during intermissions. When his driver asked him for a raise he said; when you can drive me on one wheel.

I can not get a handle on what makes a stone a Washita. Must it come from the Pike mine? Woodcraft makes a distinction between a soft white and a white Washita.

I see synthetics made by Pike at a starting bid of eighty dollars.

[David Weaver]

Synthetics by pike at 80 dollars is ridiculous. Ignore that kind of stuff. Synthetic stones should be purchased new, and when you look around at norton retailers, they are cheap.

Woodcraft doesn't sell any true washitas, neither does anyone else at this point who is selling new stones, so you can ignore their commentary about it. They are just selling low density soft arkansas stones, and those stones are not similar to older stones labeled washita.

If you see a stone around 100 years old and it's called washita, it's going to be a pike mine washita, even if it doesn't say pike. If it says washita in the last few decades and it has behr-manning or norton on it (I don't know when the BM name stopped being put on stones), then it will be a washita. If it says anything else and it's sold new in the last few decades, it won't be washita in anything other than name.

The trouble is right now it's difficult to get a genuine washita stone for a decent price. This has turned into the washita thread because I haven't found anything else yet inexpensive that can do the same thing as one stone, but I hope that nobody confuses that for me endorsing purchasing a stone that's $150, that doesn't do as well as a soft/hard setup that costs $150.

I believe that looking at your stone, it's probably a true washita type stone. You won't get a polish with a washita, only with a hard arkansas stone. It will give quite a sharp edge once it's settled in despite not making a bright polish. If you see distinct lines from grit digging and they are more than very faint, then it's probably something else other than a pike washita. Give it a little time and see what you come up with for sharpness. Develop your technique with the stone, heavy handedness to raise a wire edge, and then lighter pressure to work it off of the edge and then strop on bare leather or something else *lightly*. If the edge is finely done, you don't need (nor do you want) a lot of stropping pressure.

[David Weaver]

So, this week in wasting your money on stones, I got three stones from Dan's, a sandstone and a piece of travertine rock.

What I really wanted from dan's was a black arkansas. I already have a little one, but pretty much like dan's finishers better than any other new finishers. Wanted the travertine just to use the same as a jasper, and bought the hard ark and what dan's calls a washita out of curiosity (neither as expensive as a finisher).

The washita is a low density stone that's not similar to a pike washita, but it has potential when it's used with a jasper to chase the burr off. I don't think Dan's markets much of it, and probably the soft arkansas stone from naturalwhetstone is better.

However, the stone that they marketed as a hard (it is exactly 2.5 specific gravity, on the line where if it was a little more dense, it would be a much more expensive stone) has just enough bite so far that it could be used as a one stone. it's as fine as the washita, but at this point cuts a little faster than the settled-in washita, and it's got a very strong but smooth bite - it's like using a very sharp saw with a high tooth count - same kind of feel. Convincing, but not rough. It's got just a tiny bit of porousness on the surface, so it should never completely lose its cutting ability.

Really like jasper, though - the Owyhee and Biggs jaspers both perform as well as any oilstone finisher I've ever used and I've gotten some pieces of biggs for as little as a dollar, and because they are slabbed for jewelry, they are already flat and the surface is lapped. If someone was in a bind budget-wise, a cheap soft arkansas and a jasper will equal much more expensive setups, and no flattening. The jasper is fine enough to chase the burr off of anything, a2 or whatever. The travertine isn't quite as convincing.

When I lose fascination with using a single stone, I'll probably use some kind of natural arkansas stone (probably the washita) and chase the burr with biggs or owyhee jasper. It works really well and no flattening, no long process, and not really any need for a strop after the jasper. I can't see using synthetic stones with any frequency again at this point.

[Noah Wagener]

What did you get the sandstone for and where? I was looking for a hunk at a patio paver landscaping type place.to use as a coarse stone. They had a lot of slate that looked identical to twenty thousand dollar Japanese stones. who buys those things?
does this look like a hard black?

http://www.ebay.com/itm/VINTAGE-BLADE-SHARPENING-STONE-IN-DOVE-TAIL-WOODEN-CASE-/111301852677?_trksid=p2047675.l2557&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEWNX%3AIT&nma=true&si=EfoLzXQc5PBGXxrh8GTQWhuQF5c%253D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc

[James Taglienti]

What did you get the sandstone for and where? I was looking for a hunk at a patio paver landscaping type place.to use as a coarse stone. They had a lot of slate that looked identical to twenty thousand dollar

does this look like a hard black?

http://www.ebay.com/itm/VINTAGE-BLADE-SHARPENING-STONE-IN-DOVE-TAIL-WOODEN-CASE-/111301852677?_trksid=p2047675.l2557&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEWNX%3AIT&nma=true&si=EfoLzXQc5PBGXxrh8GTQWhuQF5c%253D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc


No thats a coarse synthetic stone. I think that any time you see a stone in a case like that, with that blue/black/grey crud all over the inside, its a coarse india or crystolon type. Reason being, it would take a finer stone forever to make a fraction of that stuff- its a combinationof steel and whatever those stones are made of. A finer stone would load up and stop cutting before creating such a big mess. The really loaded naturals can turn dark brown/black too, but they dont deposit that gray stuff everywhere.

[Noah Wagener]

i should have known as I was the only bidder. that front edge looked translucent to me.

[David Weaver]

What did you get the sandstone for and where? I was looking for a hunk at a patio paver landscaping type place.to use as a coarse stone. They had a lot of slate that looked identical to twenty thousand dollar Japanese stones. who buys those things?
does this look like a hard black?

http://www.ebay.com/itm/VINTAGE-BLADE-SHARPENING-STONE-IN-DOVE-TAIL-WOODEN-CASE-/111301852677?_trksid=p2047675.l2557&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEWNX%3AIT&nma=true&si=EfoLzXQc5PBGXxrh8GTQWhuQF5c%253D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc

Well, I was hoping it was an arkansas of some type (the sandstone), but it turned out not to be. It might be useful, anyway, as it cuts fairly deep and is pretty aggressive - more so than I would've expected.

For a coarse stone, you want a new crystolon stone, medium or coarse (i've never used a new coarse, medium works fast).

As far as the landscape stones, it really depends - anything outside of the norm of commonly used stones might still work, but you have to try it. The stones that come from China are landscape or architectural, and I believe I read somewhere that the ardennes mine (the last operating coticule mine) is or was primarily kept open for architectural or landscaping blue stone. If you're looking at something more like a concrete block, then I'd stick to the hones that have more closely graded materials in them - they'll cut faster and finer and not leave random really deep scratches.

[Noah Wagener]

If Crystolon stones look like those ubiquitous hardware store grey stones, i would be afraid to use one.They look nasty. Anyways, I have kind of got the natural stone bug and would like to do everything with one. George mentioned flattening a black Arkansas with sandstone and Warren said it was used as a bench stone at one time. Lee said it could not keep up with advances in steel in the nineteenth century but if it can flatten a hard Arkansas, it must be able to handle steel. I just killed a diamond hone trying to flatten a tiny little flower bed ground cover rock. Does this look like novaculite?:

285640285641285642

Do black Arks make a red slurry like that?

I shaved my dry face with a 32 degree chisel from the Klingons off that pebble. Best edge I have ever gotten though that isn't saying much. I wish they would not dismiss Arkansas stones in the woodworking books i read as coarse and slow.

I can not imagine that rock came from Arkansas. I am starting to think that this idea that sharpening stones only come from Ouchita and Kyoto is a persistent legend. I guess I'll still pay 60 for an Arkansas to not have to hunt a bigger one down and flatten it but it is fun to find something useable in the wild.

[David Weaver]

Looks like something sedimentary, like some kind of slate. Everything on arks matches pretty much what the stone is when you abrade them. Slates can present a lot of different colors, and japanese stones do some odd things sometimes (japense stones are sedimentary, and I guess slates probably are, too).

Novaculite has a different look. Slurry comes off a little too slowly to build up like that, and it's black, anyway.

Most of the woodworking books that you're looking at were probably written about the time that king stones got popular. It was the middle of chrome vanadium steel era, too, and CV does OK on oilstones, but it doesn't sharpen to the biting edge that vintage carbon steel does.

There's probably another aspect now that didn't exist at least in spades several years ago, and that's cheap flat diamond hones. I don't know who 30 or 40 years ago was mining good quality new arkansas stones - they still present a host of problems for a beginner who really just wants to put a tool in a guide and pull it some number of strokes on a surface. But for a person willing to use steel that is intended to be sharpened on the stones and to learn the stones, slow and coarse are not two things that come to mind.

[David Weaver]

By the way, the new norton crystolons are not like the chipped up gray aluminum oxide stones you see at a hardware store for $6. They are nicely made and they work very very well for bevel work, or pretty much any edge where you need to take a good bit off fast.

I wouldn't buy a combination stone, the fine crystolon doesn't make a lot of sense to me, just one that's medium crystolon all the way through (which I can't seem to find in 8x2).

[Chris Griggs]

I wouldn't buy a combination stone, the fine crystolon doesn't make a lot of sense to me, just one that's medium crystolon all the way through (which I can't seem to find in 8x2).

Here: http://www.sharpeningsupplies.com/Norton-Crystolon-Bench-Stone-8-x-2-P176C5.aspx

[David Weaver]

There you go - $20. Worth adding on to an order for anyone who has designs on grinding their irons by hand. It's quite quick with irons designed for fast grinding (vintage irons, etc).

[Tony Zaffuto]

Just got in from a quick run to the Brown Tool sale (auction is tomorrow). Picked up two stones: a transparent hard arkansas in a box, with the stone about 3-1/2 X 5 and what appears to be a washita (no box), with the stone about 2" X 8" X 1". Clean up needed on the washita. Also got a Simonds DT saw, small anvil, and a Buck Rodgers jack that is easily 98% if not 99%. It will sit on the shelf with my Buck Rodgers smoother that is in the same condition.

Curious to test out the stones (and David, I was given the location of another "honey hole". I'll PM/post where it is on April 11th after my first visit).


I forgot to add the two stones cost me a total of $20 for the pair! Good, vintage stones are still out there! What was missing in the dealer sales were infills, wooden dado's, good mortise gages. Many, many Stanley planes of all types & vintages. Lots of chisels. Fewer saws. Fairly decent number of complex molders & ploughs. Point of my trip was for a few user quality wooden dado's and I only found a couple that were not serviceable or salvageable.

[David Weaver]

Even the single vintage hard ark for $20 is a great deal. To get a possible washita along with it is great, even if it turns out not to be a washita. Look forward to finding a new space, especially if it's anywhere close to the fayetteville to york corridor, as my tires contact those roads with some regularity.

It seems that saws are fairly popular right now, and finding good vintage ones is a bit more difficult than it was 6 or 7 years ago.

Wooden dados in good shape can be tough to find when you're looking for them, too.

[Tony Zaffuto]

Not Fayetteville, closer to Adamstown, about 45 minutes north of Gettysburg. I'll be in that area in two weeks and give a report, comparing it to our "knowns" at Fayetteville.

[David Weaver]

Yeah, i've been through adamstown, even George *used* to go up there before ebay vacuumed everything up. I'll still be glad to hear where it is in adamstown, I get over that way once every couple of years.

[Noah Wagener]

(japense stones are sedimentary, and I guess slates probably are, too).


From what i've read, slate is metamorphosed shale. I have seen Japanese stones called both shale and slate. I do not think there is a clear demarcation line between being a metamorphic slate or a sedimentary shale. I think all stones need a little pressure to form. Except for your travertine. I bet you could make a plaster ball out of the slurry. I think you have definitely tried every stone on earth. What works best on powdered metal, stuff from the Kuiper belt or Oort cloud?

On geology.com they wrote this about shale and slate:

"This confusion of terms partially arises from the fact that shale is progressively converted into slate. Imagine driving your car eastwards in Pennsylvania (underline is by me) through areas of increasing metamorphism, starting where the rock is definitely "shale" and stopping to examine rock at each outcrop. You will have a difficult time deciding where on that route "shale" has been converted into "slate". It can be difficult to pick up a rock and apply the proper name where the rocks have been lightly metamorphosed."

That Pennsylvania was inserted apropos of nothing. I think you were meant to read that and find and the holy of holies, and turn dross into gold. Is Adamstown east of you?

I think i have a crystolon that i thought was a black Ark. I really have no eye for this (Donny, you are out of your element). It is fast but not real rough and it holds together infinitely better than the one coarse water stone i tried. That thing did not last a month.

[Tony Zaffuto]

Definitely another washita and I already knew the other was a transparent hard arkansas ($20 for both, just had to say it again!).

The washita is the most interesting. Cleaned it up last night and it was already pretty flat. In this morning's light, the entire stone (not just the edges) has an opaque look to it and the mottling is very fine. I also took a bit of "Goop" cleaner to it and the stone doesn't have the more typical orangish look to it, closer to a dirty cream color. Got too many things to do today to try the stone but possibly before the weekend is over.

I forgot to mention that at another dealer's bench, there was a very long, single stone in an aluminum housing, with a Norton label on the case. Price was $80 and I was interested until I looked at the stone inside, which was a 3" X about 11 or 12" crystalon, badly dished on both sides. I seen the dealer before and he is the kind of guy that overprices and won't budge. If the stone would have been a natural, I would have paid the price. If the stone would have been flat enough to flatten, I would have made an offer, but the stone was beyond fixing, as far as my needs.

[rod termaat]

Ok. I am still somewhat confused. I really like the idea of a 1 stone set up and I read the recommendation for newbies. If I want to buy 1 stone are there any recommendations for good performer at a decent price. I do know how to sharpen and use primarily an Oregon stone set up with 2 sides of unknown origin. They work ok, but I know there are better options. What can I buy today that will keep my tools sharp and me working without dragging out a multistone set up. Thanks. I am pretty excited about this thread. rod

[bridger berdel]

Coarse stones only for that DMT, obviously. It'll scratch up the surface of any nice hard black or translucent stones.


I use my old worn smooth dmt 600 to dress my surgical black and translucent white stones. the surface it leaves is just about right.

[David Weaver]

Ok. I am still somewhat confused. I really like the idea of a 1 stone set up and I read the recommendation for newbies. If I want to buy 1 stone are there any recommendations for good performer at a decent price. I do know how to sharpen and use primarily an Oregon stone set up with 2 sides of unknown origin. They work ok, but I know there are better options. What can I buy today that will keep my tools sharp and me working without dragging out a multistone set up. Thanks. I am pretty excited about this thread. rod

If you were a beginner here, I could set you up with a washita and show you what I do with it and that's all you'd need to do for everything with the exception of setting up new tools. But the subtleties of using one if you're a beginner and you just want sharp tools and you want them in a reasonable amount of time, synthetics are awfully good. Even the ones that everyone claims aren't good anymore (like a king, though you don't want to buy a king new as there are other stones for the same money that are better) are still very easy to use and make very sharp tools.

I thought when I put this thread together that if I shuffled around my stones, I'd find a few others that would be suitable one stones. Some of them are, but with the caveat that the strop is loaded instead. The dans hard (the inexpensive one and not the true hard) seems like a decent candidate, but the washita is just a bit different.

However, if the strop is loaded with green chromium or pretty much any kind of fine modern compound, all of the stones that are pretty mediocre are plenty good. I am still breaking in the dans hard (which again, is a fairly inexpensive hone).

I can't make the suggestion to people that they buy a washita stone for $150, there just isn't enough there to justify what they cost. I think it's a shame, especially when there is gobs more of it in the ground.

I would *love* it if some of the more experienced folks on here restricted themselves to a single stone and a grinder and bare strop to see if there would be other suitable and less expensive alternatives.

So far, I've ruled out the natural whetstone "hard" stone, it never gets fine enough (though it would be suitable followed by green chorme on leather, and that would certainly be a very cheap route). The dan's hard might be OK, but as much as a new user may find freehand honing off of the flat provided by the hollow ground to be a bit tricky, the dans stone is not as fast as the washita, and maybe not quite as fine with the same technique. It's the best lower cost option I've seen so far, but someone who hones with a guide will find the resulting edge unsatsifactory (plus the stone won't stay flat using a guide).

[rod termaat]

Thanks for the reply David. I guess I should add some qualifications. I do not consider myself a beginner. I have been woodcarving for many years and sell my treen locally. I am not artist or even craftsman's, but I do aspire. Lately I have been building chairs and using a pole lathe learning to turn bowls and such. I am trying to put together a small tool kit for traveling, and thinking about sharpening with the minimal effort and maximum efficiency. I am a serious stropper and feel that I am a better then average hand sharpener. That being said, I know I have much to learn and lurk here daily since 2008. Of course my post count does not reflect this, but....

If someone gave you 100 dollars today and said go buy a sharpening stone, what would you buy? I sharpen carving knives, chisels, spokeshave blades, and the list continues. I would like to buy 1 stone that is low maintenance and gets me to sharp. I do not need scary sharp, just good and sharp. My website is www.rodtermaat.com and needs to be updated, but does document my carving and chair building thus far. Thanks for your insight. rod

[Noah Wagener]

Rod, what is an Oregon stone?

[David Weaver]

Thanks for the reply David. I guess I should add some qualifications. I do not consider myself a beginner. I have been woodcarving for many years and sell my treen locally. I am not artist or even craftsman's, but I do aspire. Lately I have been building chairs and using a pole lathe learning to turn bowls and such. I am trying to put together a small tool kit for traveling, and thinking about sharpening with the minimal effort and maximum efficiency. I am a serious stropper and feel that I am a better then average hand sharpener. That being said, I know I have much to learn and lurk here daily since 2008. Of course my post count does not reflect this, but....

If someone gave you 100 dollars today and said go buy a sharpening stone, what would you buy? I sharpen carving knives, chisels, spokeshave blades, and the list continues. I would like to buy 1 stone that is low maintenance and gets me to sharp. I do not need scary sharp, just good and sharp. My website is www.rodtermaat.com (http://www.rodtermaat.com) and needs to be updated, but does document my carving and chair building thus far. Thanks for your insight. rod

Yeah, you'll have no trouble with a washita. I guess if I was to buy one stone, if:

* synthetic - I'd buy a chosera 3000 and put compound on MDF to step it up when needed
* natural - definitely washita, and I'd try to save ten bucks to buy a jasper (I'm sure you already have compound)

The washita I use in general, I haven't done anything to it in 6 months or whatever, except early on I let stray diamonds get on it (not on purpose) and had to lap the surface off to get rid of them. Otherwise, it's very fine cutting at this point but it still cuts. with light pressure on final strokes, it's similar to a hard arkansas finisher, the only thing it's lacked on a little bit so far is pocket knives (a translucent will get them sharper, but even a trans will cut a lot deeper on pocket knives than it does on a larger surface (a jasper or compound in the instance it's needed would solve that easily, though).

Nice chairs, btw.

[rod termaat]

Noah, The Oregon Stone is what is says on the wooden box. I bought it many years ago. I find a few similar pictures when I google it, but nothing worth sharing. At one point I remember the stone having fine and super fine on the side, but that has long since disappeared. It is a combination stone with 1 charcoal and 1 light tan stone. No idea on what they are. It works fine as I never let my tools get dull, but it is huge at 3" by 12" and I want something smaller. For some obsessive reason I am focused on the exact perfect tool and nothing more. Trying to build the ultimate light weight travel kit. It is actually rather silly, but a mans got to have something to fuss over.

David. Thanks for the advice. I will set out looking for one of these stones vert soon. And thanks for the compliment. I have a few more chairs to post and a long ways to go before I reach craftsman status.

Back to lurking..... rod

[David Weaver]

If I recall, the oregon stones looked to me like a standard line of synthetic stones, but after a little bit of googling and reading a knife forum, it appears they had at least something like an india/mid grit novaculte combo. The knife forum's term for it was "hard arkansas", but that term is thrown around willy nilly these days, I'd guess it's something similar to a higher density soft stone if that's what you have.

Or you might just have an india stone that's coarse and fine. Either way, a fine india that's broken in nicely makes a nice stone to use.

Not really any point to my comment other than that if you have a combination of any type that's broken in nicely, the washita might really not offer you much. I guess that's a universal truth for all sharpening stones - if you have one that's decent, one that's great only gets you a little more.

[george wilson]

I am very sedimentary these days,and my duff is turning to stone. Unfortunately I can't position tools on it properly to see if it would work out for the "One stone" theory. What do you think?

[David Weaver]

Stanley covington shared a line with me the other day (that I really enjoyed), but I won't share it here. Your post reminded me of it. The only thing I can suggest is to put an iron on a stone, and then sit on them and do a shuffle :)

[David Weaver]

Dare I post this rambling video about sharpening? In response to the suggestions that the edge might not be very good using a single stone.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0MiSQd-2iWE

[Matthew N. Masail]

Nice David! I was nice to see your micro-bevel technique. I've noticed getting a sharp-edge isn't too much of an issue, but getting one that last can be. but I Imagine the edge off of the Washita is far finer and thus longer lasting than the edge off of a 1.2sigma (which is all I have left now).

[David Weaver]

At this point, this stone is finer than a 1200 synthetic stone by a large amount, and the edge is different. It's a durable edge, more durable than I remember it being when using a synthetic stone with vintage stock irons.

I don't know how much that perception would stand up (the durability) in a test where you count strokes and really find out, but it's a nice edge to use.

The same method is fine for everything (jack planes, or whatever), and you can do it faster if you're not talking and not fearing that the edge might not be perfect right away. Maybe a minute and a half on a fully worn plane instead of 2 1/2.

If the stone gets too slow, I like to rub two of the same type of settled in stones together (then there are no deep scratches), but I haven't done that with this one for a long time.

[Matthew N. Masail]

At this point, this stone is finer than a 1200 synthetic stone by a large amount, and the edge is different. It's a durable edge, more durable than I remember it being when using a synthetic stone with vintage stock irons.

I don't know how much that perception would stand up (the durability) in a test where you count strokes and really find out, but it's a nice edge to use.

The same method is fine for everything (jack planes, or whatever), and you can do it faster if you're not talking and not fearing that the edge might not be perfect right away. Maybe a minute and a half on a fully worn plane instead of 2 1/2.

If the stone gets too slow, I like to rub two of the same type of settled in stones together (then there are no deep scratches), but I haven't done that with this one for a long time.

That's really a good point lapping it with a similar or same stone when needed. maybe lapping with 15micron 3M lapping film would work on a stone like that?


how does it work with modern carbon steels? like Hock blades which are harder than the old steels from what I gather.


I don't have much hopes on getting a Washita at 150$ on the bay.... but new hard arks are not too pricey. I have a soft ark and black ark waiting for me in the US (per your recommendation), I don't mind using 2 stones either, but I am wondering how the arks will do with the more modern steel.

[David Weaver]

Hard ark and owyhee jasper makes a great combination, is cheap, and makes a better edge than the washita does.

The price for the washitas right now is filthy, they're not that good based on their utility. They're an interesting stone for a marked one at less than a hundred bucks, or $50 or so for one that's not marked, but above that, they are only a collector novelty.

[Matthew N. Masail]

I've been looking for a a owyhee jasper on the bay... they are mostly very small or highly irregular looking... how would you choose one?

when you say hard ark, do you mean a hard (hard select) based on Dan's grading? where 'true hard' and black would be finer

[David Weaver]

I've been looking for a a owyhee jasper on the bay... they are mostly very small or highly irregular looking... how would you choose one?

when you say hard ark, do you mean a hard (hard select) based on Dan's grading? where 'true hard' and black would be finer

Yeah, hard select, or hard from natural whetstone might actually be a little better with a jasper. I can see the hard select from dans being a bit fine as a first stone in a combination.

[Matthew N. Masail]

I bought a 'soft' from natural whetstone and a 6x2 black from Dan's... I'm guessing this is a good combo too, but what would the differance be, if I follow that with a Jasper too?

[David Weaver]

The jasper will be finer, but maybe not a necessary step after a black arkansas. I don't know which one is technically harder, but the jasper feels sort of like porcelain tile.

[Tony Zaffuto]

Not applicable to this thread, but I was in David's neck of the woods yesterday (hockey game last night and SWMBO wanted to shop first). I had my opportunity to go into my first woodworking store ever, which was the Rockler near Ross Park Mall. They only had one stone, so someone in that store must be reading this thread (although that stone was a two side, fine/coarse manmade thing).

In all fairness, it was nice spending time in a store catering to woodworkers and I enjoyed looking at the wide array of turning stock and other items on display.

[David Weaver]

Tony, that's more or less my local hardware store, I'm about 3 miles down the road from there (wasn't home most of yesterday, though). The contents of the store have changed a lot over the last 7 or 8 years, pretty much away from anything hand tool related (as have most other similar stores). It's still a good place to get screws or the emergency 2x4 foot ply panel - I don't know of anywhere else within 15 miles that you could get good ply in small quantities.

Tough loss in the hockey game, huh?

[Tony Zaffuto]

Was at the first game and last night's game. The first game, the Pens approached the game as if Columbus was going to be a push-over. Fluery also wasn't quite on his game, but the Pens still won. Last night, Columbus was by far the better team and the only reason the score wasn't worse for the Pens was that Fluery was really on.

The guys that worked in that store seemed pretty knowledgable and not pushy at all for the few questions I asked. If you do any amount of turning, it would be a great local resource. Also, lots of clamps. But as I said, just a single stone and I couldn't locate the hand planes, though they did have a few Japanese saws. Lots of Flexcut knives, too.

[David Weaver]

Yeah, lots of clamps and from time to time they have a special that makes it worth picking some up.

The guys in there are definitely helpful, I'd much rather have the store there than not. We're dying for a decent local lumber supplier here, though. The stuff in the wall racks there is usually good quality, but the stuff you'd use a lot (cherry, etc) isn't on sale from the racks. They do bring in pallets of shorts and narrows for cheap that is on sale, but there's often a reason its there (color, etc).

They used to have hock irons and more hand tools, but I'll admit, that's probably not something they sold that much of. I'm sure they do better with plastic gadgetry and consumables and such. I've gotten some decent deals on freud bit sets there, too (like door sets) because you can use their coupons on them. They'll try new hand tools once in a while in small displays, but they usually don't last too long.

[David Weaver]

One last one. I thought I was done buying washitas (and I guess there's an outside chance I could end up with one more), but I saw this stone on ebay last week, and I knew looking at it that it had absolutely zero chance of not being a washita.

I also saw that it had a ton of sway (dip) in it and figured that I'd just turn it over in a stone box and set it in plaster of paris. I didn't, however, notice that the bottom wasn't full width. In reading the auction description, the middle of the stone was still thicker than most stones, so I put a bid of 60 bucks on it and went to bed.

To my surprise, I got it.

It looked like this:
287929

The only thing I have that can deal with stones like this is one of those 4x36 belt sanders that is marked ryobi from home depot. It's pretty gutless, but if you stand the belt straight up and put a fresh belt on it and work the stone against the *drum* at the end of the belt, it will actually hog an arkansas stone pretty fast, leaving you something you can manage to finish off with a diamond hone. The key is having a hard-backed contact point on the drum, because putting the stone itself on a belt with platen is very slow, and this sander doesn't have enough in its pants to really let you bear down like that, anyway, it'll just stall.

About 10 minutes on the belt sander and 10 minutes with a diamond hone, and I still have this (which is about 30mm thick - thicker than any of my other washitas). Strange smell when grinding it, though - like fire, or like a match being struck.

287932

Strange looking. The lilywhite stones have no mottling on them at all, they just look like a uniform porous surface. The far end of this stone is halfway like that. The end toward the camera is entirely mottled, or uniformly dense with no pores. It still cuts like a washita, but it is heavier and denser than any of the other ones I have, we'll see if it settles in fine because of it. The bottom is better than I thought width wise and close to 2" at its narrowest part, so I could still use it. And the bottom is similar to a lilywhite with little mottling, so the stone itself is like a 2 for 1. Norton never would've sold this as a no 1 or a lilywhite, but they did have combo hones that had more mottling in (and were probably less expensive) and they might've slabbed a stone like this in two to make one of those hones, or they may have just discarded it.

Nice stone, though, and it was over 1 1/2" thick at the ends - so someone must've really loved it to put that much sway in it from use. Whatever they were doing wasn't gouging it willy nilly, because it was mirror smooth despite the sway. Maybe a butcher or something.

[Noah Wagener]

287932

Strange looking. The lilywhite stones have no mottling on them at all, they just look like a uniform porous surface. The far end of this stone is halfway like that. The end toward the camera is entirely mottled, or uniformly dense with no pores.
Did you reverse that or is that what you meant? To me it appears more mottled on the far end. The end near the camera appears homogenous in color.

As a 2 stone challenge, is a Washita the best initial stone or should one be looking for a vintage soft Arkansas. I suppose a Washita can make the edge finer so you save time on the finisher but I am just talking the fastest at re-establishing a bezel. If a Washita is quicker than soft, what end of that stone you pictured would be what i would want to look for in a stone? (again, as a prelim stone, something you'd use like a 1,000 grit artificial)

I think i have one of those combo hones you were referring to and it seems to give a finer edge that a white Ark slipstone i have. That white really is a lot more agressive than I was expecting. I did not think a Hard Arkansas would make much if any swarf but it was not too dissimilar from a artificial waterstone.

288125288126

Is that type of case what you were referring to as a combo hone? I have seen an identical one but with green felt sold as a Norton Washita/India combo. Mine has no markings to indicate that.

288127


These thinner stones tend to be inferior? I was going to sell it here but will put it on the bay if it is not a good representation of a Washita.

And Pike had the best Washitas, did they also have the best hard Arkansasseses? That slipstone and another hard white Arkansas i have are labeled Pike, Norton, and Behr-Manning; all on the same label.

288128

Are stones with this label a good vintage? Incidentally, The one to the left was owned by a R.H. Weaver.

Is the plaster of Paris so that you can bear down on the stone without fear of cracking it? The case of the above Washita only supports the stone about an eighth of an inch around the perimeter. That is one thing i like about these stones is that you can use extreme pressure with no fear of gouging them if you make a mistake.

[Darren Brewster]

I don't know if it has been discussed in this thread yet David, but what about if it was a two stone challenge? What oil stones would you use then? Any of the easily commercially accessible synthetic or natural stones any good?

[David Weaver]

Soft ark - hard/black/traslucent ark
washita - hard/black/trans ark (there'd be no need to let the washita get to slow cutting them, you could keep it fresh and fast cutting)
washita - biggs or owyhee jasper (jasper is a bit harder and slower than black or trans ark, but it's finer, and it seems to work OK on HSS, not as fast cutting, but to remove the burr from the washita)

If fast is desired, fine india and settled in washita would be a nice combination.

I'd rather go to the grinder more often and leave the stones slower and finer cutting, though. I use the india from time to time if I'm getting lazy, or sharpening something I don't put on the grinder (like a japanese plane blade ground into a jack profile)

[David Weaver]

Did you reverse that or is that what you meant? To me it appears more mottled on the far end. The end near the camera appears homogenous in color.

As a 2 stone challenge, is a Washita the best initial stone or should one be looking for a vintage soft Arkansas. I suppose a Washita can make the edge finer so you save time on the finisher but I am just talking the fastest at re-establishing a bezel. If a Washita is quicker than soft, what end of that stone you pictured would be what i would want to look for in a stone? (again, as a prelim stone, something you'd use like a 1,000 grit artificial)

I think i have one of those combo hones you were referring to and it seems to give a finer edge that a white Ark slipstone i have. That white really is a lot more agressive than I was expecting. I did not think a Hard Arkansas would make much if any swarf but it was not too dissimilar from a artificial waterstone.

288125288126

Is that type of case what you were referring to as a combo hone? I have seen an identical one but with green felt sold as a Norton Washita/India combo. Mine has no markings to indicate that.

288127


These thinner stones tend to be inferior? I was going to sell it here but will put it on the bay if it is not a good representation of a Washita.

And Pike had the best Washitas, did they also have the best hard Arkansasseses? That slipstone and another hard white Arkansas i have are labeled Pike, Norton, and Behr-Manning; all on the same label.

288128

Are stones with this label a good vintage? Incidentally, The one to the left was owned by a R.H. Weaver.

Is the plaster of Paris so that you can bear down on the stone without fear of cracking it? The case of the above Washita only supports the stone about an eighth of an inch around the perimeter. That is one thing i like about these stones is that you can use extreme pressure with no fear of gouging them if you make a mistake.

Noah, I didn't notice your post. Those cases with the combination stone are an exception to the less good stones on combos. Every one of those that I've seen has a good uniform high quality stone in it, better than the combo that I have (which is just a stone with no case - a much less expensive version. I would consider the stones in the combo case to be top quality, as good as the full thickness marked stones and better than new stones now for the most part.

I have never gotten my fingers on a vintage norton hard ark, because I have a lot of hard arks and they end up going too high for me. That said, they look better than the current stones, and the very old ones that have only the pike mark (with no norton or behr manning) look the best of all of them. It's possible that the old arks that I have could've come from pike, but they've long since shed their labels.

As far as the washitas vs. the non-washita softs, there is a huge range in how coarse the softs are, even the old ones. Some of them are very coarse, and some of them not so much. I like a washita better, it can do the fast cutting if you want to keep it that way, and it has a better feel and makes a better edge when it's still activated. If a hard ark is following either of them, it doesn't really make a lot of practical difference.

WRT to the stone that I have, the whole thing is mottled to some extent, you're right. What I'm used to seeing on a lilywhite washita is the whitish porous part that's on a lilywhite or a woodworker's delight stone, and this stone only has that on the far end. On the near end, it's a very dense and solid material. It still performs like any other washita, though, I've been using it the last week or two, and it's settling in. It raises a wire edge and does decent, but the appearance will pose a problem if I ever sell it. I paid $52 or something for it, and I wouldn't get more than that back out of it despite doing a lot of work on it. That's OK, though.

[Darren Brewster]

Soft ark - hard/black/traslucent ark
washita - hard/black/trans ark (there'd be no need to let the washita get to slow cutting them, you could keep it fresh and fast cutting)
washita - biggs or owyhee jasper (jasper is a bit harder and slower than black or trans ark, but it's finer, and it seems to work OK on HSS, not as fast cutting, but to remove the burr from the washita)

If fast is desired, fine india and settled in washita would be a nice combination.

I'd rather go to the grinder more often and leave the stones slower and finer cutting, though. I use the india from time to time if I'm getting lazy, or sharpening something I don't put on the grinder (like a japanese plane blade ground into a jack profile)

Very interesting, thanks for that.