Thread: Resistant chipping

Greetings,

A fairly new shaver sent a couple blades for honing. He mentioned a few micro-chips in the edges, but not really much about the shaves from them. One is a custom damascus blade from a well known maker.

I looked at the damascus & ran it around on a med speed coti w/ very light slurry to see how it affected the chips. It either had little affect or old chips were replaced w/ new ones. 'So I tried a thuringian - same result. Asagi - pretty much the same. 'Wondering if there's anything specific to damascus blades that either make them prone to chips, or if there's a way to address them I've not thought of yet.

'Do appreciate your help.

My Very Good Friend,

I'm of no help but as you well know I have a thirst for knowledge especially about honing. While SRP's System should keep me informed via email about the responses to your thread, please keep me up to date if I miss something. :

Count on it, my friend.

Makes me wonder ...... since it is from a well known maker I assume the spine is plenty thick enough for the width of the blade to give proper geometry for honing ..... what is it 17 degrees or somewhere in that neighborhood ? Is it a wide bevel without a lot of meat ? Assume it is a wedge, 1/2 hollow, being a custom ? I'd probably put the coticule back in the drawer and maybe get the trusty old 1k chosera out and do light circles until the chips are gone and progress from there ...... but not being on the spot, or seeing the razor firsthand, I really don't know for sure. Someone will be along who knows for sure.

Just searched my Pics Library, I have some shots of a Damascus (Pattern Welded) that had come in for honing that had intermittent chipping issues, what I mean was one of the layers of steel was fine and the other was chippy.. You could see the difference under magnification..If I can find them I will post them..

I finally solved the issue with a complete bevel re-set then went Shapton 1-2-4-6-8 then added a second layer of tape and did a micro bevel on the 16-30 that did the trick on that razor..

Something to ponder on Rob, is if the chips are only in one layer or are they showing in both types of steel...

A temper/heat-treatment issue ?
Not from my razor honing skill set (very limited) but from my exposure to tool steels, high pressure pipe/welding.

Jimmy & Glen, Thank You both so much.

I was hesitant to go to the lower grit stones, 'cause it was really sharp to begin with.

I couldn't help but wonder if the spacing of the chips corresponded to the change in layers as it came into the bevel.

Jimmy, it looks 1/4 hollow - a bit more hollow than say, a Williams 1/4 grind. I Started with one layer of tape, and added a layer to see if it helped. I seem to talk myself out of what I should know better - which is when it fights me, go to bevel. I still remember thinking Glen was being immodest when answering the question - how do you know if a bevel needs a reset. He said - if I didn't set it. Its been a while since I concluded that was *not* immodest.

Gents, I'll post again after a reset. Again, Thank You both for your kind help.

Chosera, then Norton 4k. Clean Steel - whatta concept. As usual, gents - you nailed it again. No chips, thin, even bevel - occupies about 1/3 the area of the former bevel. 'Should be sweet, when done.

Thank You again!

Final result after Norton 8k > Gokumyo 20k > Few strokes on Asagi - lopped hair w/ authority 1.25"+ from point of hold. The tiniest of chips reappeared at 8k, but polished out. 'Makes me wonder if a few shaves will see them again. Either way, this one'll shave.

Would this be the Ockham's razor answer for a Razor honing question?

I honed a very hard razor today, displaying the same problem. When I come across this I do not go to the 1K but the 4K, Norton in my case, to re-set the bevel after lightly jointing on the corner of the stone. I do this 2-3 times, it does not take that long or remove that much metal, the bevel is already flat. You will get a straight edge stress free edge.

The goal is to get to good steel, you could just re hone, but jointing get the edge straight and the 4k re-sets the edge with a finer stria.

I suspect many of these problems come from aggressive honing on low grit stones or diamond plates on hard steel or makers grinding belts.

In this case it may be the steel and the bands of wootz steel, but it may be from the hardness of the steel.

This and an extra layer of tape, has work well for me on hard chippy blades.