If Santa brought you a 30,000 Shapton for Christmas, would you sharpen your tools that high regularly or at all. I have 16,000 and love it, I’m just curious if y’all would use it if it magically appeared in a stocking. Thanks for the input.
Todd
[OP]
Contributor
If Santa brought you a 30,000 Shapton for Christmas, would you sharpen your tools that high regularly or at all. I have 16,000 and love it, I’m just curious if y’all would use it if it magically appeared in a stocking. Thanks for the input.
Todd
Contributor
At times my sharpening has been an obsession. A 30.000 grit water stone would get used, but not likely every time.
It seems my water stones can get to a finer edge than my oilstones. Because of the ease and convenience most of my sharpening is now done on my oilstones. A few quick swipes on a strop and they are about equal to being sharpened on water stones.
Currently my finest water stone is a Norton 8000. Not even close to being in the same league as a 30,000. Norton 8000 is 3µ, Shapton 30,000 is 0.3µ.
This is according to > https://www.gritomatic.com/pages/grit-chart < This chart seems to move around the web as pages get updated. It might be a good idea to copy and put a date to the page.
jtk
"A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty."
- Sir Winston Churchill (1874-1965)
Member
The highest I ever go to is 16K and only for plane irons.
To each his own, I don't see much advantage in going to 30K. I know Cosman does it.
Contributor
Why not?! What would it take, 5-6 strokes? 1 minute tops. Seems enjoyable to know you’ve gone that much farther than the rest of the crowd.
Contributor
I don't use my 16k for much either other than plane irons either. Sharpening isn't my hobby, I just want to get back to work.Originally Posted by chuck van dyck
Last edited by mike stenson; 12-16-2021 at 12:00 PM.
~mike
happy in my mud hut
[OP]
Contributor
I was listening to a podcast recently and one of the most admired plane sharpeners talked about how hard he works to get the back of the iron/chisel as flat and polished as possible. I looked at my tools and said “I can get that better.” I have messed with two planes in the last two days and truly it is substantial. So, thinking 16k gets this, which is awesome - what does the intersection of 30k produce? I have messed with lapping film to .5 micron, but you can’t work the blade as extensively/efficiently as you can on a stone. I’m just going through the mental exercise before I spend money on it.
Contributor
¯\_(ツ)_/¯ I reckon it is one of my hobbies and I really enjoy it. Perhaps the OP does as well. The other night I spent several hours refurbishing a Japanese plane iron and loved every second of it. I work full time as a woodworker, which means using lots of dominos and lots of sand paper. So I guess traditional woodworking is a hobby, and I think part of that is getting as keen an edge as you can achieve.
To each his own my friend! Personally I think any extra sharpening is always worth the effort.
And it really is very little effort.
If you decide to ditch the 16k let me know
Last edited by chuck van dyck; 12-16-2021 at 12:09 PM.
Contributor
16k is my finest stone, but right there on the sharpening sink drainboard is a granite surface plate with .1, and .5 micron Diamond Lapping Film. What's an extra 10 seconds? If I had to drag stuff out every sharpening session, I'd minimize too, but when it's right there, the extra time is negligible. I'm not sure how fine the 30k stone is, but I doubt finer than what I finish on, so yeah, I'd use it.
Contributor
¯\_(ツ)_/¯ I reckon it is one of my hobbies and I really enjoy it. Perhaps the OP does as well. The other night I spent several hours refurbishing a Japanese plane iron and loved every second of it. I work full time as a woodworker, which means using lots of dominos and lots of sand paper. So I guess traditional woodworking is a hobby, and I think part of that is getting as keen an edge as you can achieve.
To each his own my friend! Personally I think any extra sharpening is always worth the effort.
And it really is very little effort.
If you decide to ditch the 16k let me know
Exactly! Which is why I mentioned why it matters less to me
I still use it on plane irons, as the durability it adds is a bonus. Chisels, etc, not so much since I'm touching them up often anyway (let's face it, it's easy to touch up a chisel).
edit: I think context is often missed in threads regarding methods of work, and I think that the context is ultimately more important than the how's anyway.
~mike
happy in my mud hut
Contributor
I have a 16K Shapton and love it. I don't know if I could rationalize the $300+ cost of the 30K considering I have some .3 micron 3M lapping film as well as a nice selection of strops. Following a few swipes on the 16K I usually strop both sides of whatever it is I'm sharpening and get excellent results.
Sharp solves all manner of problems.
Contributor
Just dont breath on the blade or you'll knock it back down to 10k
[OP]
Contributor
I have seen Cosman have the 30,000 stone but can’t recall when I saw him use it. I think I am going to go ahead and put it on the list to Santa and see if I have been a good boy this year. It could be fun to try.
Contributor
Why not indeed! I'm interested to hear how it goes.
~mike
happy in my mud hut
Contributor
I'm partial to natural stones, one of the large 10x3x1 translucent or black Arkansas from Dan's would be in my list.
Contributor
Save your money it’s nothing special. Stropping with get into same sharpness.
I bought mine from Hap when he was doing shows. The only time I think it’s benefited me was sharpening scissors expensive hair cutting scissors ones that cost over 250.00.
It will get a keen edge on o1 for A2 it’s nothing spectacular.
Good Luck
Aj
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