I feel the need for speed! (how do I make a coticule "fastest")

I am honing a razor that was blunted by bread knifing. The flat was probably a couple thousandths wide. I went as deep as the obvious microchiping as I did not want to create a slanted blade or a smiling blade. (I am debating my intelligence level with myself for bread knifing in the first place.) I am also amazed at how much harder the steel is now that I am out of the apparently rotten steel.

I am into this three 1 hour sessions. I have the beginnings of setting the bevel finally. I am sure that in 1-2 more sessions I will be done the way I am honing now.

I have been honing on a milky slurry and letting it get slightly dry before adding water. The slurry is jet black by the second set of half laps. (I am counting to 10, but making laps much faster, so it is about 20-30 half laps) It feels like it is cutting fastest when there is no clear water visible on the slurry, but I wonder if I am fooling myself.

The top of the stone has a black cast to it after the razor passes. The surface is shiny, and I am adding water when the shininess where the razor passes is not lasting. The drag on the razor goes down significantly for a few half laps.

Is there a faster way? Am I doing it wrong? I am not buying a new stone this month or next. I need to lap my course stones, but ran out of sand paper, so I am waiting for a warm day to use sidewalk.

Phil

I've found that the work required to set the bevel gets slower and slower the closer you are to completing the bevel set. After breadknifing a blade on a DMT 325, it took me 1/3 of the total time to set 2/3 of the bevel. And that took hours on a coarse DMT, I can't imagine how long it'd take to do it on a coticule w/ slurry.

That said, you're not gonna wear out your stone by even heavy bevel setting work on it. But even a somewhat un-flat coarse stone would be preferable to me, followed by coticule with slurry to make sure the bevel is flat and even.

Pkrankow said:

Is there a faster way? ... I need to lap my course stones, but ran out of sand paper, so I am waiting for a warm day to use sidewalk.

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Yes... a DMT. A 220/600 combo DMT will make your bevel work a breeze and you can use it for lapping... all in one stone for 40 something bucks.

I just picked one up... I love it.

Drybonz said:

Yes... a DMT. A 220/600 combo DMT will make your bevel work a breeze and you can use it for lapping... all in one stone for 40 something bucks.

I just picked one up... I love it.

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Gigantic +1

If you can't get another stone soon (you mentioned needing to save up for a strop), use very thick slurry and pressure. I find that taping spine helps. You could also use 600 or 1000 grit wet/dry sandpaper on a flat surface for some of the harder work and go back to your coticule after that.

danjared said:

If you can't get another stone soon (you mentioned needing to save up for a strop), use very thick slurry and pressure. I find that taping spine helps. You could also use 600 or 1000 grit wet/dry sandpaper on a flat surface for some of the harder work and go back to your coticule after that.

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Yes, sandpaper is a lifesaver in a pinch!

danjared said:

If you can't get another stone soon (you mentioned needing to save up for a strop), use very thick slurry and pressure. I find that taping spine helps. You could also use 600 or 1000 grit wet/dry sandpaper on a flat surface for some of the harder work and go back to your coticule after that.

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I need to save money for the other hobbies. This one is getting too much love I got a fishing trip coming up.

I will see what sandpaper I have left. I tried working the spine taped for a bit and did not find a lot of advantage...but maybe switching from not taped to taped to not taped again will make the effective pressure higher? I will tape and try sandpaper tomorrow.

So at least I am not on a crazy kinda slurry. Funny thing is I looked with my loupe at a pocket knife I haven't sharpened in a while and the worn, blunted edge looks worse than the razor I am working on.

I am honestly surprised how fast my coticule is on heavy slurry.

Phil

In the old days, coticules were what were widely used for heavy bevel correction work. If a razor needed more, it was sent to a razor grinder.

I have no doubt that my coticule can do it if I stuck with it.

Another part that is killing me is the smell! that "wet swarf" smell is aweful and reminds me of when someone would forget to dump the dip cup on the grinder after using it...

Phil

Pkrankow said:

I have no doubt that my coticule can do it if I stuck with it.

Another part that is killing me is the smell! that "wet swarf" smell is aweful and reminds me of when someone would forget to dump the dip cup on the grinder after using it...

Phil

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What are you talking about, that smell is wonderful!

My wife says she can taste that smell in her mouth when I'm honing. It tastes like a bloody nose, she says.

For the kind of work you describe (restoring a bevel with a missing tip), I would use a DMT-600 grit.

But in a pinch and with patience, a Coticule can do the job. Yours sounds like one of decent speed.
The fastest you can make it not recommended for anything else than this kind of job. I always tell people not to make a slurry thicker than milk-like consistency, but we're going to make an exception here.

Start with a dry Coticule and add only one drop of water, that you smear out to make the surface damp. It's important that there is no coat of water on the stone.
Make the slurry stone damp as well and start rubbing. The idea is to raise slurry with the consistency of a somewhat grainy textured paste. If you start with too much water on the stone, you'll have to rub for ages and end up with way too much slurry than you need.

Once the paste is on the stone, start working with diagonal strokes, moving back and forth without lifting the razor. (I would protest the spine with a layer of tape if I were you)
Keep working and only add an occasional drop of water when the paste becomes dry. You might occasionally want to lift the razor an put it on top of the slurry at the end of the stone, to smear it out again. The idea is to keep slurry under the bevel.

The downside of this approach, is that it won't allow the kind of keenness that makes the razor shave arm hair or pass a TNT. The thick slurry moves a lot of steel, but it limits the sharpness as well. You can however feel the edge with the TPT and when the edge starts to feel remotely sharp, you must add water to the slurry for milk-like consistency, and further work the blade till you can shave arm hair.
At that point, I would remove the tape, and complete the bevel with some further work to undo the angle increase from the tape.
The razor will now hone up like any serviceable razor would.

You could achieve the same faster with 600 grit sandpaper, but do make sure that the sandpaper doesn't bead up in front of the edge, because that kills all chance on success.

Kind regards,
Bart.

Jarrod at The Superio Shave said this was one of the faster bouts on slurry he had in my price range. He says it is rather slow on water, but I think it is a nice speed, but lack experience with anything other than synthetic stones.

Yes, I find the smell to have a similar quality as a bloody nose, but not the same.

I think I will give this a try for an hour and see where I end up.

Phil

The smell comes from the iron in the steel smelling like the iron in blood.

45 minutes from where I was to vibrating on HHT. I can't seem to get past vibrating on any blade.

Bart, that is some uber slurry! It is like working with yogurt. It turned jet black very quickly.

Phil

Can you shave arm hair with it yet?

Wid said:

Can you shave arm hair with it yet?

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I could shave arm hair off the yogurt slurry! I got so much arm hair I had to wash my stone off to get rid of it!

It is a HHT1 (violin) right now at all points of the edge. I put it away and plan to shave with it tomorrow. I know this is a shave worth edge.

I need to learn about finishing on a coticule now.

Phil

johnmrson said:

The smell comes from the iron in the steel smelling like the iron in blood.

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All this bloody nose stuff is giving me flashbacks to breaking my nose as a kid. I would share my childhood trauma, but this post would probably be removed.

Thank you.

I can't bring myself to fingernail or thumb pad test a razor. It just gives me the willies.

Phil

Pkrankow said:

I could shave arm hair off the yogurt slurry! I got so much arm hair I had to wash my stone off to get rid of it!

It is a HHT1 (violin) right now at all points of the edge. I put it away and plan to shave with it tomorrow. I know this is a shave worth edge.

I need to learn about finishing on a coticule now.

Phil

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You're done with dilucot. The rest is finishing. You just need the confidence and determination to know that you'll get there. Don't forget the light x-strokes at the end to get the last bit of keenness. The finishing is probably the part that people struggle with most, but you'll get there.

How about a coarse dmt for heavy bevel work, and then going to 1,2k dmt? Does it take too long to get out the coarse scratches with the 1,2k dmt before the coti?

jeness said:

How about a coarse dmt for heavy bevel work, and then going to 1,2k dmt? Does it take too long to get out the coarse scratches with the 1,2k dmt before the coti?

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I asked a similar question not too long ago. You can actually go from a 600 DMT straight to the coticule with slurry. This was my question, and I have since picked up a 220/600 DMT and it works great. I have gone from brief microchip repair on the 220 to basic bevelling on the 600 to coticule with slurry... you could do the same with with a 1200, it would just take a bit longer, I assume... although you probably save some time going from 1200 to coticule vs. 600 to coticule, so it's probably about the same in the long run.