Welsh slate vs Coticule

**ADRSPACH** · 07-31-2012, 12:42 PM

I have just returned from wales where apart from other things I was picking up few original DTs in Inigo Jones for friends abroad.Funny thing was when I asked Mr. Davies who is taking larger numbers of DTs not one offs it was not the ebay seller who likes to used DT name to sell his slate. Please be carefull when you use names of welsh hones as that is the way how to confuse things and spoil knowledge bound to those hones.

**SliceOfLife** · 07-31-2012, 01:14 PM

People are counterfeiting Dragons tongue? DT is cheap. I paid like $20 for one of the boxed commercial ones (INigo Jones & Co). Hell it's probably the least valuable slate I own. I'd have expected people to try and pass DT off as Llyn Melynllyn... but now that seems to be getting mined like crazy and it's as cheap as DT... Hell maybe people will start trying to pass both off as black arky or Thuri with blurry pics?

**ADRSPACH** · 08-01-2012, 11:57 PM

It is already being done as we speak at least for Thuri. And Llyn Melynllyn fakes are being olso sold since long time ago. The best one is Cuttlers Green which nobody have seen one confirmed in flesh. I have noticed that recently there was even seller in US doing it.
As for price. If you are bored, have access to water cutter and backyard full of slate slagheap which is often full of rejects which are already flat why not to make a quick buck? Imagine few hundred of hones sold by $20 with only your time investment.
BTW if you want you can have your DT engraved with Wlesh Dragon. However you have to order it as special order, it costs a little bit more than plain hone and you will partialy loose one sede of the hone. On the other hand you have DT which is positively marked, no hustle with labels and not so simple to fake.

**BakerAndBadger** · 08-02-2012, 02:06 AM

Gonna see if my welsh slates are real welsh slates (don't know if they'll call me boyo but they might make my razor sing like Tom Jones) this weekend when I finally get em from my folks.
I'm planning to try and hone a new razor from my bro unicot style. I'll have my coti with me just in case it doesn't work. Will let you all know the results positive or negative.
Oh and just to make the test even more fun I'm going to turn the "DT" into the incredible hulk with CROX to see if I can get a grrrrrreat edge of it on CROX slurry.

**SliceOfLife** · 08-02-2012, 07:33 AM

I sold a vintage cutlers green on Ebay a couple years ago.

There's was a site with a picture of one too. It was a depository of natural stones from some guys collection. Don't remember it being a razor guy. I believe it was a woodworker of some sort. I'll try and find it again. And no, The green slates sold now look NOTHING like a real cutlers green.

Originally Posted by ADRSPACH

It is already being done as we speak at least for Thuri. And Llyn Melynllyn fakes are being olso sold since long time ago. The best one is Cuttlers Green which nobody have seen one confirmed in flesh. I have noticed that recently there was even seller in US doing it.
As for price. If you are bored, have access to water cutter and backyard full of slate slagheap which is often full of rejects which are already flat why not to make a quick buck? Imagine few hundred of hones sold by $20 with only your time investment.
BTW if you want you can have your DT engraved with Wlesh Dragon. However you have to order it as special order, it costs a little bit more than plain hone and you will partialy loose one sede of the hone. On the other hand you have DT which is positively marked, no hustle with labels and not so simple to fake.

**SliceOfLife** · 08-02-2012, 08:05 AM

Ok I can't find the site now. It was a museum of the guys cutting stones (starting to think it was a knifemaker now maybe). Had about 40+ vintage stones. One was a cutlers green. Labeled in the picture... but there's so many bullshit ebay ones now that either it's flooded out of existence by those results or the site is gone.

I did find this though.

http://straightrazorplace.com/hones/...een-stone.html

That stone (the more square one (top 3 pics in post 6), the longer one is irrelevant) I believe is a cutlers green. Looks very similar to both the stone I sold and the one I recall from the site. And just like he says it's hard as damn bullet and pretty much doesn't do anything without pressure and patience. Mine was about the same cut. Maybe an inch shorter and a hair darker, but same pattern. Came out of a mid 20th century barbers toolbag along with several other stones.

**ADRSPACH** · 08-02-2012, 01:26 PM

How was it IDed? Have seen one pisture of supposed to be CG which did not have any marking and origin was from a watchmaker who supposed to have another one. Apart from that no more info.

**SliceOfLife** · 08-02-2012, 02:54 PM

The site simply marked it as such. It may have mentioned its origin, though I don't recall. I didn't actually realize what mine was until I happened across the site a few weeks after I had sold it (listed it as mystery stone on eBay, expected $20 or so, sold for $100+). Outside of that stone, the site I mentioned, and that thread there, I've never seen the stone elsewhere. It's described in a few vintage texts, and matches descriptions perfectly, as well as being very distinct from any other stones described in these texts. Not a certain ID of course, but as good as we're likely to get since there don't seem to exist any examples of vintage labeled Cutlers greens.

What is not only certain but obvious is that Llyn idwal and Green Welsh slates are not cutlers greens. A number of vintage texts ID Welsh slates, Llyn Idwals, and Cutlers greens and descriptions are nothing alike.
Two that are in the front page of google results for Cutlers Green Whetstone are the annual report of Geological survey of Arkansas Vol 3. and Turning and Mechanical Manipulation.

Edit: I dug up a later post by the guy with that stone. Seems someone has told him it's a CG already, he refers to it as such.

"It was I who put one such stone for sale a long time ago, still posses it and still get ok shaves from it. The clock maker was a friend of my dads....

He used the cutlers green to polish really small tools used to screw and arrange really tiny clock work stuff. ."

-Memoreal

**BakerAndBadger** · 08-06-2012, 11:38 AM

OK, as mentioned I took the plunge and ordered myself a three hone set of so called DT, LM and the W"T".
Got hold of them yesterday when I arrived at my parents.
Initial impressions were so-so. The stones were not very well lapped, not 100% flat and still marks from the sandpaper. Still looks aside I decided to give em a go.
Took a newly acquired Camel solingen and killed the edge on a glass. Worked up some slurry on the LM and set the bevel - looks to be more than a finisher, took it on to water and then on to the welsh "turingian" on plain water. All in all did probably about 90 laps single legged both ways on slurry and about 150 on water finishing with x's. Managed to get a good HhT3 with chest hair and shaved with it afterwards. The edge seems nice and sharp but less forgiving than my coti, that may be my poor prep as after having stropped again this morning the shave was a lot more comfortable. Overall I think that they seem to be pretty good value for money.
After the first try i decided to blunt my GD mod and try that on the "DT". No matter how hard I tried I couldn't get it poppig hairs, I tried the LM and again after a good while it didnt quite get there. This afternoon I reset the bevel on my coti and finished on the WT, this time a borderline HHT3-4 after stropping.

My final impression after a little bit of playing is that the two harder stones seem capable finishers and I managed to get a good edge off them in less time that on my coti but they aren't capable of setting a broad bevel like the one on my GD. The coarsest stone seems to be a waste of time so I may have to use it as a paperweight however I will try again and see if I can get it to work as a finisher or in as an intermediary polishing step before the others.. In any case two finishers for this price seems a bargain and they aren't Chinese!

**trick420** · 08-06-2012, 11:52 AM

Similar results Baker... I never use the DT stone. It's redundant in my rotation, and I normally go from Dilucont on the Coti to finish with water only on the LM and the WT, then I use oil on the WT. I get fantastic edges that way. I found that slurry on these stones seems to back down the edge, so I only use them clean with water or oil. I will occasionally play with a light slurry, but the best edges are from a slurry free hone. I was never able to set a bevel with any of the stones, slurry or no...

I know Tomjr has spent a ton of time with his LM, and he can set bevels etc with it. I had a razor from him with a LM finished edge and it was awesome.

Jeff

**BakerAndBadger** · 08-06-2012, 12:57 PM

Originally Posted by trick420

I was never able to set a bevel with any of the stones, slurry or no...

I know Tomjr has spent a ton of time with his LM, and he can set bevels etc with it. I had a razor from him with a LM finished edge and it was awesome.

Jeff

I think my LM may be able to handle small bevels for setting but nothing like an eBay special. The coti still remains a lot more versatile but I think that the finished edgr may be sacrificed for the versatility, at least for me and for the moment. Looking forward to more tests in the coming weeks.

**SliceOfLife** · 08-06-2012, 01:15 PM

LM = Yellow lake, right?

Funny to see people setting bevels with these. I've owned maybe 10-15 vintages. They were used exclusively as oilstones back in the day.

**BakerAndBadger** · 08-06-2012, 01:19 PM

Originally Posted by SliceOfLife

LM = Yellow lake, right?

Funny to see people setting bevels with these. I've owned maybe 10-15 vintages. They were used exclusively as oilstones back in the day.

Well they call it a Llyn Melynlynn or something similar in welsh. I decided I wanted to see the limits of the stone and see if it was comparable to a coti which is why I set the bevel with it, plus I was too lazy to go upstairs and get my coti out of my suitcase!
I like the fact that I can set a smallish bevel, would never try a wedge though.

**SliceOfLife** · 08-06-2012, 04:16 PM

Yeah that translates to Yellow Lake. They're not too hard to find in vintage. 200x50x10 and 20x50x25, in paper boxes. Marketed by a couple different. I believe Salmans was the most common. Sold as "Yellow Lake", "Welsh Razor", "Everkeen", and "Britain-Made", no doubt other names are to be found. Must have been a pretty affordable and easy to mine rock back in the day. Interesting to see them revived as whetstones. I tried a few clean ones that way and was unimpressed. Reminded me of China Nats or the Meuller Rock. Generally slower and less consistent particle size than other stones available. (Thuringian)

The W "T" is, unless I'm misreading the listings, a Lynn Idwal... which I've found a couple 100+ year old texts recording it as a harder, slower version of Charnley Forest, that was getting mined as a replacement for CF's when they couldn't keep up with demand. I haven't gotten to use one, so it intrigues me... and there are some really handsome looking examples out there, but a Slower CF isn't a big tease for me. Assuming the grit is all that people make it out to be (Thuri equivelent) when used as a whetstone... and the price stays reasonable (when bought from the right vendor... some are trying to get $150+ for those)... could be a nice option.