What did you hone today?

Love this combination.

Hart Steel BG custom Shorty
Super Hard La Verte
Super Hard La Dressante slurry stone
Photo taken with a Canon 70D & Canon 85mm f1.8 lens

Nice photo Noel. That hart is sweet

Dcaddo111 said:

Nice photo Noel. That hart is sweet

Click to expand...

Thanks David!

Found this Tuckmar thumbnotch and could not resist.

I have been a bit frustrated with my wild search for exotic natural stones, so I went back to my roots for a bit and used more my synthetic stones.
Yet, for the finish, I have found that the agate is really what works best for me. Plus the feedback I got on the stone is great.
If the blade does not just glide like a force field, then there are more scratches to remove.

For bevel, this time I tried one of these really coarse knife stone (One I mistakenly bought in Europe thinking it was a coticule). it turns out it saved me a lot of time. Bevel setting was a breeze.

And so was the rest. DMT 600, King 1K, Norton 4K, Norton 8K, King 6K, Naniwa 10K, Jade, orange Agate and a touch of brown Agate.

The mysterious stone from Santa Fe, seems very smooth and very hard. It works great to lap other stones, but when I tried it on the blade it seems it created some micro-dents, so I stopped using it. I need to map it further and try on a gold dollar or something like that.

One of the Le grelot I only seldom get: a model 357.

Honed it like the Tuckmar, but after the orange Agate I got it back on the Shapton 16K but very lightly. Even with a super light touch it still left wider scratch marks than the Naniwa 10K seems to leave. Finished on the brown Agate.

Honed up a 5/8 Kropp . I used this very small la verte along with the la drassante slurry stone, you can see size comparison against the razor and slurry stone. Seriously I dilucot my razors on the la verte with half strokes and then finished with 50 x strokes water then stropped 60 linen 60 Norwegian leather, the strop is a scruple works made by torolf.

the edge of the la verte is as keen and smooth as you will get from a coticule.. The la verte does,nt a
eal to many by its bland looks but they sure work well

Old memories, Gaz.

Amidst all of the auction excitement, I took a break and rehoned my Wapi on a Norton 4/8k.

Got this Wester Brother's No.22 honed today prior to an evening shave. Worked it on a Tamago 4k, welsh purple slate, then Welsh grey.

Wapi on a Norton 4/8k

Yesterday afternoon my family drove to Rancho Mirage about 2 1/2 hours from San Diego. This gave me a free Friday evening and Saturday to visit my good friend Wayne and his wife Shelly who lives around 30 miles south of me. About a year ago he told me about a razor he got from his Aunt who told him it belonged to his great great grandfather. Wayne told me to drive down for dinner so I decided that I would bring my new Shobu Asagi and other stones and hone it up for him. Wayne had another family coming and a couple of young nephews staying with him for the weekend so it ended up being a nice dinner party.

It took him some time to find the razor but eventually he walked in with an 1800's Wade and Butcher 8/8 with wooden scales. He also brought out some pictures of the man he thinks owned the razor. It is in fantastic condition. Very little hone wear, but some pitting on the edge. The wooden scales we dry and too tight but my only concern for the evening was getting a shave ready edge on it so he could shave this morning with the razor his great great grandfather and grandfather used. I brougiht a Shun 1/6 and the new Shobu, Botan, Meijiro and Tomo. Wayne had just put a beautiful piece of salmon on his pellet smoker so I had at least an hour to get some work done.

I decided to build a Botan slurry on the 1k which eliminates swarf clogging and seems to speed thing up. It took about 45 minutes to get the pits out of the toe and even everything up. I spent another 15 minutes on the 6k with Botan slurry and it was starting to look pretty good when dinner was server. I put down the razor for a while and enjoyed Wayne's homemade Chardonnay, salmon, grass fed skirt steak, and a great salad. Wayne's friend Bob and his wife and two kids 14 and 16 were very interested in Wayne's razor, the stones and the process in general and so the dinner conversation revolved around the history of the razor and Japanese stones from the mountains of Kyoto. After dinner I got back to work. I spent more time on the 6k with a fresh Botan slurry. The result was an effective elimination of the 1k scratches coupled with a typical Japanese slurry hazy bevel. I then pulled out the new Shobu. It is a great stone from AFrames. It is rated by Takeshi as 89 hardness and 92 fineness. It proved to be fast with great feedback. I really worked the Botan slurry before going to Meijiro. I don't have a Tenjou yet so I did two slurry's on the Meijiro. I probably could have stopped there and it would have been a nice shave but I went on to my Tomo Kiita, probably a piece of Nakayama. After a full dilution with the Tomo Kiita, I took my Shuobudani Type 100 and used it to build another slurry. It was a very different color than the Tomo Kiita so I figured it was worth doing. The end result was a beautiful hazy edge that come off the stone HHT. I stropped it on my Kanoyama suede and Cordovan and handing it over to Wayne.

I had to leave early this morning so I didn't have a chance to wait for him to try it out but I look forward to hearing about his shave. He has never used a straight razor before so I told him to stay with his cheeks. Here are some pictures of the original family that immigrated from Europe and some written history he got from his aunt.

Well, after playing with the Apache stones for the past week or two, I took a break from them and rolled a razor down the line of my coticules, comparing how they felt and seeing if I could draw any parallels between various vintage ones. I identified what seems to be four distinct types. The Old rock, very hard and smooth. Another type that reminds me of modern LV's, slightly softer with a bit more drag. Another that represents the majority of vintage stones I've had; more drag, beginning to get some subtle abrasion/grit, reminds me of the yellow side of my Les Lats. And a final type that is extremely hard and has an almost rasp-like sensation under the razor. Then there were my modern stones, The LL, LVerte and Possible LaGrise (though I suspect LNV). Each has their own character, but man, it made it supremely clear that I prefer the qualities of the vintage stones I've got to the modern ones.

Was at a friends who told me the sad story of his favourite kitchen knife falling to floor, asked if I could attempt a repair as it was heading for the bin. I've not given him it back yet but I'm pretty happy with the outcome. I repaired a rather small chip to the tip of one my own knifes last year but this was first my attempt at addressing a huge chunk of missing steel. I've been a bored husband in Ikea for a good many hours over the years and spent a good bit of time looking at thier knives, but never bit the bullet. Been using this knife for the past two days for general family food prep and it seems decent enough, nothing to write home about but a huge step up from the basic supermarket knives my wife uses which move between the drawer & dishwasher.

DMT D8C
Shapton Pro 1500
Chromium oxide on leather
Plain Leather

Frameback C.V. Heljestrand on a Coti

Wostenholm Superb pipe on green vintage paddle coti of unknown vein for full series of dilutions followed by Pierre la lune. It may be the lovely, compliant Sheffield steel, but this is the sharpest I have ever gotten a razor. The hht is crazy.... The Frenchie is an incredible hone...

I found this LeGrelot in the pile and figured its day had come.
Identifying it took a while, has it does not have any visible number nor etching on the blade.
But based on the shape of the shoulder and shank, I am pretty sure this is a round point version of the 6/8 Roi Soleil (Model #68)

Honing was done on DMT 600 and no-name cheapo 1000 (I was too lazy to go get the King).
Followed by Norton 4K, Ruby, Jade and Orange Agate.
I had brought the Shapton 12K, but I did not bother. Just finished on the Brown Agate.

Kamisoris are just plain cool...

TI Basic Black on a Nakayama kan koppa.

Cheers, Steve