Hello thebigspendur,

your experience with honing the japanes razor is like mine. After honing with the soft arkansas hone it was possible to shave the hair of my forearm.
So I started with my blue belgian hone. I think I need a lot of patience but more and more surface looks polished. But a couple of peaces aren't polished.
How did I hone? 25 times at the convex side, 2 times at the concave side. So it doesn't disturb the symmetrie. Wenn it looks polished, then about 12 times each side with turning over the spine. I learned this from someone from the german forum.
So far my experience. I will go on. The steel takes a lot of my faith because of its hardness.

With kind regards, Paysbas