Originally Posted by
Laurent Marshall
Hi John, as a another relative newbie using Arkansas stones I'll chime in, although I think what I have to say won't be as useful as all the previous replies!
I started out using a double-sided synthetic waterstone because I didn't know what else to get, and most of the knife sharpeners I was trying to learn from on youtube used waterstones. While it was great for kitchen knives, I quickly found it it was way too soft and hard to keep flat for woodworking tools. Having seen a lot of Paul Sellers stuff, I decided to try a diamond plate (DMT), but as noted here in other posts, after some use I realized it was losing its grit. I got by with the a the synthetic waterstone and the diamond stone for awhile, did a lot of research on other sharpening stones, and settled on oil stones because:
- They're (mostly) inexpensive, cost was a factor for me
- They stay flat longer
- They work well for vintage steels
Right now I use the following:
- 8"x3" Norton Medium India stone (when necessary, which these days is rare, I used it a lot at first)
- 8"x3" Norton Fine India stone (a good starting stone when an edge is very dull or has light damage)
- 8"x3" Dan's Soft Arkansas (my go-to first stone these days, as long as the edge isn't too dull)
- 8"x2" Dan's Soft Arksansas (I got this one specifically for touching up chisels before going to the hard Arkansas)
- 8"x2" Dan's Hard Arkansas (finishing the edge)
- Leather strop
I find that the Hard Arkansas stone makes for a good edge, but may be eventually acquire a translucent Arkansas, or maybe just a larger Hard Arkansas. I've heard that the difference between the hard stones and the translucents is not that significant after some use, but don't know on first hand experience!
The India stones cut really fast with O1 steels or vintage plane irons, so no gripes there as rough stones. I prefer the wider stones for plane irons, but the 2" wide stones do work just fine. Eventually I'd like to have a set of 2" stones dedicated for chisels. I find that with the work I do, I end up sharpening my chisels much more often than plane irons, so having a set of smaller, cheaper stones might be nice to save wear on the wider stones.
Edit: I've yet to lap any of my oil stones (either the synthetic India stones or the natural Arkansas stones), and have not noticed them getting out of flat over ~2yrs of use. I have noticed my Norton stones soaking up more honing oil over time though, and treated them with petroleum jelly in the oven, which helped but did not solve the problem entirely.