Thread: Shaptoneers, please confirm something for me...

Newbie here, worked on a Sta Sharp and couldn't get it to pass the HHT. It was okay on the TPT and popped hair off of my forearm so I shaved with it. I got an okay shave but I would'nt call it a comfortable shave. I have to work on it some more obviously.

I think what matters is that all of our blades are shaving quite well. Tests like the HHT are so subjective that someone else's info is essentially useless to anyone other than the tester.

I would like to know the outcome of the experiment, but it's not likely to change my honing methods.

Thanks for all the replies so far, gentlemen.

It seems this has boiled down a bit to a discussion about the HHT, which was not really my intention. My original goal for starting this thread is to find out if and where striations, or thoothiness -if you wish- come into play when sharpening a razor. The HHT tests how well an edge severs a hair, which seems at least of some relevance to me, but for this experiment that all does not matter.
If a person progresses trough a series of grits, and he performs the HHT at each grit level, then it's safe to suppose he 'd do so in the same fashion, with the same hair, on the same razor. The only variable would be the grit size of the hone. IF THE HHT JUST KEEPS IMPROVING TILL IT MAXES OUT, THEN THAT MEANS "TOOTHINESS" IS NOT AFFECTING THE WAY HAIR SHAFTS ARE PENETRATED BY AN EDGE.
IF, HOWEVER, THE HHT DISSIPATES, AFTER A CERTAIN GRIT LEVEL, TO IMPROVE AGAIN AT A MUCH HIGHER GRIT LEVEL, THEN THAT MEANS THAT TWO DIFFERENT TYPES OF EDGES ARE CAPABLE OF POSSIBLE SHAVE-WORTHINESS.
It would be a starting point for further investigation.
Like I said, I have no means to do this experiment myself. I understand that Shaptons all have the same type of abrasive medium, so I really think that would be the hones to perform such experiment. Doing it on different types of hones would be ambiguous, because of the difference in abrasive media. So I humbly beg to you Shapton owners out there, to perform such a progression, perform a HHT at each level, and report your findings in this thread. I would be most grateful.

Thanks,

Bart.

I actually use a modified version of the HHT when I hone my razors. I still own the hair when I do the test, as in the hair is still attached to either my scalp or most often my mustache which always needs a bit of trimming anyway. For me, the finer I go in grit for polishing, the quicker the razor grabs a hair. Secondary is the amount of tugging to actually cut the hair, the more polished the edge is the smoother it cuts the hair and the less tugging I feel.

The serrations or grooves left from the grit used to sharpen the edge do have an effect on the cutting but as we are not sawing our beard off, the serrations will hinder, rather than help the cutting of hair unless the razor is so dull that the only hope of severing the hair is by catching and breaking it off in which case coarser serrations should help. The smoother the surface of the bevel providing our edge is intact, the lower the cutting resistance.

My prediction is that the finer the hone, the more effortless the HHT will become provided of course that the honer does his job correctly. Using slurry type stones is an entirely different matter, my coticule honed razors rarely pass the HHT until I polish with a CrO2 pasted bench strop.


Regards

Christian

Originally Posted by Bart

IF THE HHT JUST KEEPS IMPROVING TILL IT MAXES OUT, THEN THAT MEANS "TOOTHINESS" IS NOT AFFECTING THE WAY HAIR SHAFTS ARE PENETRATED BY AN EDGE.
IF, HOWEVER, THE HHT DISSIPATES, AFTER A CERTAIN GRIT LEVEL, TO IMPROVE AGAIN AT A MUCH HIGHER GRIT LEVEL, THEN THAT MEANS THAT TWO DIFFERENT TYPES OF EDGES ARE CAPABLE OF POSSIBLE SHAVE-WORTHINESS.

Bart.

My normal full on progression is DMT 1200, Norton 4K, Belgian Blue, Belgian Yellow, Escher, Nakayama. With my hair, which is thick, the HHT starts to work at the DMT/Norton level and then quickly improves at every step. I get the same results with different types of badger and boar hairs from brushes. With my girlfriend's hair, which is very thin and long, only good razors at least at the Belgian Yellow stage and above will perform well (or at all). In my experience with the hair that I have used, the performance of the HHT does not deteriorate as I move up in grits; rather it improves. Stropping the razor will also generally improve the performance of the HHT. Therefore, in my experience using the different types of hair that I have used a sharper more polished edge will perform better in the HHT than a more toothy less polished edge. I agree that the HHT is just a test, and passing it well will not guarantee that you will be happy with the way that the shave that the edge provides. On the other hand I have never had a razor that I thought shaved really well that did not pass the HHT really well. Every time I have ignored bad HHT’s (and/or TPT's) and test shaved a razor anyway have not been good experiences. Therefore, the test does provide me with useful information so I will continue to use it. I'm not sure if this helps you or not but at least it's another data point.

David

Bart,

I like the way you're thinking here, but there's a problem. I have a hard time getting an edge to pass the HHT off the coticule, but the same edge will shave very well.

I do think that the toothy-ness of the edge has a big impact on the HHT. For me, test works best off my Belgian blue, medium barber hones, or the 8K Norton. It doesn't work well off the coticule, although these edges give me the smoothest shaves.

Maybe the very toothy-ness that makes a hair catch and cut cleanly also causes the razor to drag a bit when it's hitting hundreds of hairs at once. I'm not sure...

Also, I've tried the HHT with Feather AC blades, and they perform like a low-grit edge: the hair pops rather than slicing cleanly. Regular DE blades seem to cut the hair more smoothly.

Josh

The Coticule's enigmatic behavior is part of my reason for creating this thread.

My own experience is this: If I raise slurry on a coticule, any coticule so far, I'm almost certain to loose HHT-ability. Doing light pressure laps on a coticule with only water, restores the HHT, again. In fact, I can also feel the difference while doing the TPT. The DMT edge and the Coticule/water edge, feeling more sticky than the coticule/slurry edge. Some have stated the coticule/water is higher grit than the coticule/slurry, but I have done an experiment, and found no evidence for that claim. In my experiment, I did 100 laps on an already perfectly honed razor, using a coticule/water. Then I did 30 laps on a coticule/slurry, on the toe half of the blade (from the toe to the middle). Then 10 laps on the DMT, on the toe quarter of the blade. Inspection at 40X magnification with a high end stereo microscope showed no difference between the Coticule/water and the Coticule/slurry scratch marks. The DMT-marks were very distinct, as expected. The HHT worked on the DMT part and on the Coticlue/water part, but NOT on the Coticule/slurry part. Stropping did improve the HHT-results on the Coticule/water part from "popping" to "slicing". The DMT results and the Cotiule/slurry inability to pass HHT, were not altered by the stropping.

I think the use of slurry on a Coticule might abrade the very tip of the cutting bevel a bit. Not to such an extent that it can't be restored by laps on a Coticule with only water, but still.
That kind of contra-intuitive behavior makes it hard to use the Coticules for experiments about the raw physics of edge formation, and the way "toothiness" plays a key role with that, or not. Hence, my question about the development of HHT-results on a consistent set of synthetic hones.

My interest in "toothines" aka striations, comes from Lynn's pyramids. I know the main idea is to prevent overhoning (seemingly to be an issue with the Norton, but never found on a Coticule, perhaps because of the "tip-of-bevel-abbrasion"- that I postulated about above). But I also wonder about the prescribed ratios between the 4K and the 8K. That has to leave some 4K scratches under the 8K-polishing, right? Bottom line: are there two kind of shaveready edges? The first being a "polished toothy" one, the second being a more elaborate, evened-out smooth one. The former being less comfortable but more durable and the latter smoother, but less durable. My initial analogy with slicing tomatoes, not being as stupid as it sounds?

The experiment with the HHT is a first step to find out. It's such fun... reïnventing the wheel, that I just can't resist.

Bart.

To address your issues with the coticule, it's surprising to me that you don't see any difference between edges honed on a coticule with slurry as compared to those without slurry. I notice a difference with no magnification at all. The slurry produces a hazy, dull bevel, and no slurry (just water) makes polished linear scratch lines. Distinctly different with no need to magnify.

And yes, the coticule is said to cut like a 6k to 8k hone with a slurry and like an 8k to 10k hone without slurry. The grit size is not changing, just the speed at which it abrades the steel, which is comparable to stones/hones in lower grit ranges.

Raise a slurry and see how fast it turns black when honing, then try to get the same amount of blackness on the coticule without a slurry. It'll take a lot longer because the slurry is abrading much faster than the plain stone's surface. (don't do this on a good blade, use one in need of a resto or a junker).

Also, the slurry does abrade the cutting edge, which is why it isn't recommended to use the coticule with slurry as a finishing step. It is a "rough cutting" step before polishing with the coticule and water.

Originally Posted by Russel Baldridge

To address your issues with the coticule, it's surprising to me that you don't see any difference between edges honed on a coticule with slurry as compared to those without slurry. I notice a difference with no magnification at all. The slurry produces a hazy, dull bevel, and no slurry (just water) makes polished linear scratch lines. Distinctly different with no need to magnify.

And yes, the coticule is said to cut like a 6k to 8k hone with a slurry and like an 8k to 10k hone without slurry. The grit size is not changing, just the speed at which it abrades the steel, which is comparable to stones/hones in lower grit ranges.

Raise a slurry and see how fast it turns black when honing, then try to get the same amount of blackness on the coticule without a slurry. It'll take a lot longer because the slurry is abrading much faster than the plain stone's surface. (don't do this on a good blade, use one in need of a resto or a junker).

Also, the slurry does abrade the cutting edge, which is why it isn't recommended to use the coticule with slurry as a finishing step. It is a "rough cutting" step before polishing with the coticule and water.

Russel,

For your convenience, I repeated my experiment and took pictures. The razor was a Pearson&co. I hope that will be satisfactory. I picked my vintage coticule to do the laps. In my first experiment, I used one I recently bought from Ardennnes Coticules. But it seemed fair to use another specimen to repeat the experiment, and the vintage one happens to be -by far- the fastest cutter(with slurry) and it does produce practically zero slurry out of its own (it's a hard bugger). I did 100 laps with water, renewing the water every 20 laps, on the entire edge of the razor. Then I put a marker line halfway the edge, taped the heel half of the edge (just to make sure) and did 50 laps with heavy slurry on the tip half of the blade. Then I made a mark at the quarter part of the blade, and did 30 laps on the DMT1200. I cannot see any difference between the coticule parts. Let's suppose there's something wrong with my eyes. Then I placed the razor under the scope and took pictures at 40X magnification. My scope does not have a picture tube, so I shot the pictures through one of the oculars. The pictures are far less quality than what one can see in that microscope. I inspected the entire parts and if I didn't knew which part I was looking at, I sure as hell would not be able to tell the difference between both coticule honed parts. The DMT is obvious enough. I included the pictures. Maybe you can tell the difference. (actually, from the pictures it may look like the coticule with water is -unexpectedly- slightly coarser, but that's just a pure coincidence. If I showed you a whole bunch of pictures from both parts, they would show that kind of variation on either part)

Rating the coticule with slurry 6K to 8K is pure nonsense. There is too much speed variance between coticules to make a grit assumption based on speed, and even then, the question remains what you would be the unity hone, to which all others would be compared. I you rate the grit size of a hone, you need to talk about scratch pattern. The only written source I read about the coticule's scratch pattern mentioned 3 micron and smaller. That supposes to correspond with 8000 grit. Of course the form of the scratches play their part in the game too. So much for comparing grits of different hones.

I love coticules. I hope that being a Belgian entitles me to some affinity with them. And, much unlike what you seem to implying, I don't have "issues" with them. I just like to explore them and come to a better understanding of those hones and of razor's edges in general. They are much more than a "polisher with water". I 've seen a honemeister in Antwerp at work, that uses a coticule in a completely different fashion (Bruno even consideres the guy ignorant to honing because of that), and yet his edges are wicked sharp and lasting. I intend to get to the bottom of all this.

Hi Bart (and everyone else),

I have been in the hospital from the 30th until yesterday so I'm a little late chiming in but I still want to chime. I am going to give you my opinion. Somehow someone may disagree but it's my opinion and I'm sticking with it. Here are my sharpening stones:

I was hoping the last three Shaptons would have been waiting for me when I got home but no, I am still awaiting them. You can see I also have my Belgian stones. I love them, they love me and the love my cutlery:

I have Henkel's Four Star but as I've said, Henkels, Wusthoff, Sabatier, whatever, good cutlery is good cutlery. The tomato is an inconsistant test media as is a human hair so trying to develope a comparative test of sharpness between the two is impractiical. My knives and my razors are all in great shape but not one of them will reliably, repeatably cut one of the very thin, stretchy hairs from my head. Therfore, my hair is useless as a test media. What I usually do is run the blade along my arm with the edge an eighth inch or so above my skin. As a result I usually have random bald spots on my left arm. However, the serrated utility knife (Bottom strip, center knife) will not cut my arm hair but it is the most reliable for slicing a soft tomato. My favorite knife, the santoku (second from the left on the bottom strip) is always shaving sharp but some soft tomatoes will collapse if placed on the cutting board skin side up. I can get them all to cut if the tomato is cut first in half and then I attack the fruit from the freshly cut edge. Okay, here's my theory( and now I expose my soft, newly operated on underbelly for evisceration).

A material is never truly "cut" but rather it is torn at molecular bond lines. Every material has a bond strength that is measurable in pounds per square inch (PSI). The sharpness of a cutting tool employs two separate mechanisms which facilitate that tool's "cutting ability"

1. The finer the edge of a cutting tool, the more readily it will fit between and cleave or separate the molecules of a material.
2. The concentration force applied to the cutting edge of a tool is inversely proportional to the siize of the edge. As the area of a cutting edge approaches zero, the force applied approaches infinity.

I have read that serrated kniife stays sharp because the valley edges (between the points) doesn't touch the cutting board. While there may be some truth to this, I believe the serrated knife will cut a tomato because of the high force concentration at the points will always tear through the tomato skin.

Have I stopped making sense?