Thread: Lapping Methods

D8XX and D8C, kept wet.

I like Carbide powders directly on glass. Papers allow more play than I like. Also I can use a big a$$ piece of glass. Its all over pretty quick

I've gone from sandpaper on glass to a Atoma 400 grit diamond plate, which was a big improvement and a it creates a lot less of a mess.

For 28 years, I had a Swaty barber hone and didn't know it needed to be lapped. When I found the Internet shaving forums last year, I bought a Norton 4K/8K and lapped it with wet/dry abrasive paper on the kitchen counter. I immediately got grit embedded in the 8K side and bought a Norton flattening stone.

Since then, I've picked up three coticules and a Chinese 12K, which I lap on abrasive paper. I recently realized that the kitchen counter wasn't flat (wasn't even stone, I guess I'm not the brightest bulb in the chandelier) so I switched to a plate glass coffee table. By chance, I found out that the Norton flattening stone wasn't flat anymore (if it ever was). I flattened a coticule on it (I had a lot to remove) and then went back to the glass table to smooth it and found that the coticule was higher in the middle than the sides (flattening stone was dished). Is it possible that the coticule dished the Norton flattening stone? In any case, I also brought the flattening stone to the glass table so I think it's reasonably flat now.

So that's my story. Does anybody care?

In that case, yes.

Don't flatten one hone with another.
We did that with 60 x 80 cm lithos in school and ended up with all dished ones. Great joy, LOL

I use wet/dry sand paper at the moment.

I'm starting to think it's a false economy though, sand paper wears out FAST on stone.

I'm not sure what I would get if I got something more 'proper'

Yep, sand paper wears off fast and it works only slowly.
The worst thing in my opinion though, is that the last bits of a dish are always the most difficult ones to work out, cause the amount of stone you want to remove increases significantly towards the end.

I'm very satisfied with the glass plate and 220 grit silicon carbide.
Thanks to Smythe and to my bro, who both recommended that.
Its cheap and efficient.

Originally Posted by Chimensch

For 28 years, I had a Swaty barber hone and didn't know it needed to be lapped. Is it possible that the coticule dished the Norton flattening stone? In any case, I also brought the flattening stone to the glass table so I think it's reasonably flat now. So that's my story. Does anybody care?

I find your having the Swaty for all of those years without lapping it interesting. Did you use it during those years to refresh your edges and was it effective? Once you found the forums and lapped the Swaty was there a perceptible improvement in performance ? I have long been fascinated by the fact that the old barbers I knew never lapped any of their hones (to my knowledge). Some of them that were sold to me by old barbers or their progeny were dished when I got them yet they had still been using them. I think that because the barber hones length necessitates the use of the X pattern just as that method will be effective on a warped blade it will also be effective on a stone that isn't consistently flat.

I think the DMT D8C 325 is a worthwhile investment for lapping coticules and other stones although the XX is better for those tough old barber hones. I have a machinest's straight edge that I check my hones with every now and again. Referring to the naturals that I don't lap every session where with my Shaptons I lap them before every honing session. My Nortons don't need it as often either since they apparently don't have a polymer binder. AFAIC the Norton flattening stone is not that best choice for a dependable flattening stone. The diamond plates will of course be much better though they should be checked for flatness when purchased as they ain't always flat.

Originally Posted by 0livia

I'm very satisfied with the glass plate and 220 grit silicon carbide.
Thanks to Smythe and to my bro, who both recommended that.
Its cheap and efficient.

So this is a plate of glass from somewhere and silicon carbide powder?

Interesting.

Howdy. I use a DMT D8C for everything up to 10,000 grit. The D8C has grooves milled in the surface similar to the Shapton DGLP. These help break the surface tension/suction. I had a DGLP. It was great until I wore it out...

I lap the hones with the D8C almost every razor. Looking at things at 1250x really messes you up. But, the coarse hones do really leave a better edge when they're fresh.

Above a 10,000 hone, I finish lap with 2000 grit silicon carbide paper on a granite surface plate. This removes the scratches from the D8C or DGLP.

I don't refresh the fine hones as often. The issue seems to be more of refreshing the abrasive surface, rather than keeping things flat and not glazed over or clogged.

Tim Z.