Arkansas shaving.

Pressure question...

SliceOfLife said:

2. They're fast. People call them slow because they only learned the internet method of razor honing... I call it the "hoverhand" technique. You know what I mean. Sharpening requires pressure... controlled, balanced, PURPOSEFUL pressure; but pressure. I'm sure a lot of guys polish the hell out of their Arkansas, then run razors around on them with the weight of the razor and boggle at how slow the stone cuts. They are PENETRATIVE cutters. You have to PUSH the metal and the stone together to get it to cut. On a well-worn arkansas there are not big old honking chunks of abrasive sticking up (or rolling around) and banging up your razor. YOU are the mechanism of the metal removal... not slurry and not the stone surface. Your force directly translates into metal being removed from the tool.
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4. They are easy to use. Managing pressure isn't hard. Every time you sharpen anything, you get better at it. You find it challenging or don't feel confident at it? Do it more. Keep a nobrainer stone around (like a Thuri or a Jsynth) for comparison. The ark edge isn't as sharp as the thuri/synth edge? You need more practice.
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Being new to razor honing, but with a lot of knife honing experience, I find a couple of my biggest challenges are figuring how much pressure to apply, and when to switch stones.
Anyway someone might be able describe these two items? I mean the weight of the razor, or "hoverhand" (love that description BTW) is a good descriptor, so for pressure, would it be pencil eraser, or scratch off ticket, or...?
Likewise on the switching stones...

I suppose I should find me one of those nobrainer stones as well, suggestions?

Thanks.

Awesome label, too.

I did a video of "uniark" where I went from 1.2k DMT to shave ready on a hard Arkansas... I remember estimating pressure during that process a few times. Crazy work week for me, but when things calm down I'll try and give a detailed answer. Short version... You learn to understand the grind, steel and edge condition of what you are honing and can feel out the right pressure, just like you can feel out the right angle when you hone or sharpen knives.

For just finishing a hollow ground razor after a mid-high grit synthetic, I'd say to start with the pressure you would use on a small knife and ease off until you can't feel the stone "bite" anymore... Then add just a touch back to get that consistent bite.

The Black Arkansas Stone been the Standard for years and I use mine for my pocket knifes and kitchen knifes.

SliceOfLife said:

I did a video of "uniark" where I went from 1.2k DMT to shave ready on a hard Arkansas... I remember estimating pressure during that process a few times. Crazy work week for me, but when things calm down I'll try and give a detailed answer. Short version... You learn to understand the grind, steel and edge condition of what you are honing and can feel out the right pressure, just like you can feel out the right angle when you hone or sharpen knives.

For just finishing a hollow ground razor after a mid-high grit synthetic, I'd say to start with the pressure you would use on a small knife and ease off until you can't feel the stone "bite" anymore... Then add just a touch back to get that consistent bite.

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Thank you very much, the description relating it to the knife really helps the light come on for me. I have been applying too much pressure.

I've found that my old, small soft Arkansas stone, even with the fissure, seems to do a lot better than the soft side of my newly quarried combo stone. The feel of the older stone seems to be a little softer and it seems to give a lot more feedback, so I can tell more where I am in regards to the edge. Could that just be the age of the stone, or when it was quarried, in comparison to the new one? Surely the wood base of the old one doesn't affect it?

In a side note, is there a way to dissolve or remove the epoxy or adhesive that is used to attach the stones to the wood base or to each other without damaging the stones? I'd like to see if the side attached to the base doesn't have a fissure on the honing surface.

I think it's partly a natural selection and partly that the choicest reserves were likely exploited in the past (though maybe more are underground and waiting still). I don't expect that absolutely every vintage was prime rock, though the ones I've owned suggest this... rather I expect the lesser hones or hones with flaws were likely found out by the users and were the ones used for rougher jobs, less cared for, etc... basically they were the ones that would get tossed, broken and then tossed, given to the wife to use as fancy garden stones, etc.


But we do see this across both the big hone varieties I think of for razors that are currently mined: these and coti's. I've had far more success finding easy to use, "high quality" razor coticules with vintages than moderns... even including others stones when they asked me to try them for them. Moderns are usually perfectly good; but several of them (particularly when you stray outside of the popular veins) are definitely less easy to use, often have a gritty or gravelly feel under the razor, etc. Whereas difficult vintages are maybe 1-2% of what I've encountered and are exclusively cut or set in ways that make it obvious they were marketed for Non-razor use. Most vintages are smooth as butter and work as effectively as any barbers synthetic, often approaching Thuri levels of ease.

I think there's definitely the aspect of demand being insufficient to degrade quality (Can't keep up), but sufficient to DEMAND quality. I doubt all, or even most of Ardennes demand right now is for straight razor hones... surely we're a sizable portion, but not all. So why would they be keen on mining for "razor" grade material? 150 years ago... coticules were sometimes CALLED "Razor stones", they were that exclusive. And while arkansas weren't thought of in the same way; Hard arkansas were similarly associated with dental tools, scalpels, and other things that demanded similar levels of polish to our razors and were similarly fine... most larger scale sharpening applications simply didn't call for such a fine hone... so they were mined for that purpose, and lesser rock was sold as pocket hones and toys for children, or maybe knapping material... we just really don't encounter it much under the hard label. The way modern Arks dealt with this change I suppose, was introducing the higher "No really, hard ark" grades like SB and Trans and True Hard. So now they offer a generic hard stone... which we don't really see any similar examples of in vintage rock; and put what would have been sold as simply "Hard" in the past in these new premium grades. I'm guessing this allows them to sell lower grade "Hard" ark to hardware stores and sporting good stores to sell for cheap to guys who just want an old school (and inefficient) way to sharpen pocket knives and don't know any better. It's a stone that I imagine gets sold more often than it gets used... but hey if it helps keep the costs down on the stones I'm interested in even a cent, I'm all for it.


I doubt there's any way to do it. The surrounding stone when they break away always feels so brittle; I expect the glue permeates the stone so fully that it structurally compromises it so much it can't be undone; but if anyone finds a way, I'd love to know for curiosities sake. Personally I'd never take one out of its box anyway.

My rule is (and this is just from my own experience) if the ark is glued to cedar you have a pretty good chance of breaking it free without damage or worries about the glue eating into the stone. I took a black off a cedar block last week and the glue almost looked like hot glue. If it's glued in an oak box like most of the old Nortons and many other different branded Arks from that time, good luck. You can get it out but the glue almost always penetrates the stone giving it a fissured look, even on trans and black arks. I think when companies like Smith started selling arks they switched from oak to cedar and used a different glue. It's redneck science so take with a grain of salt.

Excellent, and very informative post [MENTION=25419]SliceOfLife[/MENTION] thanks. I suppose I need to find a decent jsynth for general honing and keep my black as finisher.

Yeah, I do find the most efficient way to deal with razors is synthetic all the way up then switch to nats for a finisher. It's certainly not the only way; but if you do as much razor honing as I tend to, you'll appreciate the time and effort it saves.

I try, a small 14 x3,5 sm , or a 5x1.5 ich ,ark transelucent .It came , from a frend , along with a 14x7 La Loraine .
I get a shave ready , rusian , very hard steel razor , and i refresh it . Veeery nice shave ,after 60 - 70 laps with watter and soap mix .
I absolutely love , this little guy .
Amazing stone indeed . It gave outstanding edge enhancement , at the very end of finishing process .
I looooove it .I will get a bigger bench size , ark for me - just for touch ups he he eh .
It is a completely diferent edge - sharper , but i love it .very smooth shave tonight .

Well i made some stupid mistake .I think now is better . This is a polished surface in the trans ark I polish it today on a buffing weel .
I use fine AlOx buffing compound for making the surface like that
I believe that now will gave much better edge

Yes, the more mirrored the better

Try more laps especially at that size.

A friend of mine ran across this stone in his aunts house while cleaning. It was his late uncle's and he passed it along to me. It's a 1x4, and even though it's a challenging size, I'm excited to have it and continue it's life of use.
Just thought I'd post a picture and see if anyone had any tips for utilizing a stone of this size.

For a razor? I don't even know how many laps it would take to finish a blade. My ark is huge and it takes 2-300

[MENTION=51068]KW Driver[/MENTION] uses a 1x4 trans like that for touch ups IIRC

Dcaddo111 said:

[MENTION=51068]KW Driver[/MENTION] uses a 1x4 trans like that for touch ups IIRC

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That's what I had in mind. I have a 2x4 Smith's black. A best guess, which would you say would be finer?

Well i see arks for second finishing process .
I have to finish first the edge well , and after i go on the ark . Usualy first with water , last with dish washing soap
Small hones are a bit akward .

MichaelRB88 said:

That's what I had in mind. I have a 2x4 Smith's black. A best guess, which would you say would be finer?

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I'd say the Norton, but I just like vintage Norton. Lol. The only way to know for sure is to try them out and compare. You never know..