Thread: Spill the beans, Jimmy!

Originally Posted by JimmyHAD

Thanks Stefan, reading So's stuff on his website I have the impression that he thinks it is advantageous to use the diamond plate for generating the slurry. For now I'm going to keep it simple and stick with that. I've noted various posts describing the naguras but I've never really studied the differences or which nagura might be suited to which hone. Something to look forward to in the future.

Jimmy,
I have experimented a lot with diamond plate and nagura and they are not mutually exclusive when we are talking about very hard and fine stones.
The naguras pretty much are used as a progression after bevel set to bring the edge to the last polishing step done on the polishing stone.

I was pretty skeptical of naguras initially but ever since I tried them I find them very very useful.

Originally Posted by mainaman

Jimmy,
I have experimented a lot with diamond plate and nagura and they are not mutually exclusive when we are talking about very hard and fine stones.
The naguras pretty much are used as a progression after bevel set to bring the edge to the last polishing step done on the polishing stone.

I was pretty skeptical of naguras initially but ever since I tried them I find them very very useful.

Thanks Stefan. I expect that I will eventually dip my foot in that water. For now I'm taking baby steps with this J-nat stuff. If the economy ever bounces back in my lifetime and 'happy days are here again' I may broaden my horizons in the seemingly endless well of Japanese stones. For now I have to make do with what I've got.

JUST MY OPINION

If you're using slurry, I think it should always be a powdered version of the exact stone you're using, which means the nagura stone is either

1. a piece broken off from your larger stone, or
2. diamond

There are dozens of different kinds of stones out there being sold as slurry or nagura stones. Unless you've been polishing Japanese swords for 20 years, I don't see how you could intelligently pick one to use with your particular finisher, much less a progression.

JUST MY OPINION

Originally Posted by JimmyHAD

Thanks Stefan. I expect that I will eventually dip my foot in that water. For now I'm taking baby steps with this J-nat stuff. If the economy ever bounces back in my lifetime and 'happy days are here again' I may broaden my horizons in the seemingly endless well of Japanese stones. For now I have to make do with what I've got.

Jimmy, if you hone with a progression of synthetics up to 8 k or even a bit higher, one good J-nat polisher is all you need... or maybe 2... or 3

Originally Posted by wsfarrell

JUST MY OPINION

If you're using slurry, I think it should always be a powdered version of the exact stone you're using, which means the nagura stone is either

1. a piece broken off from your larger stone, or
2. diamond

There are dozens of different kinds of stones out there being sold as slurry or nagura stones. Unless you've been polishing Japanese swords for 20 years, I don't see how you could intelligently pick one to use with your particular finisher, much less a progression.

Not just your opinion. I don't know if that is correct or not but I have read that So Yamashita (Japan Tool) prefers the diamond plate to create the slurry to avoid grit contamination. So says,

"Secret MUST item for using hard natural stones. Nagura stones cannot be used for harder natural stones, nor on various Suita stones.

The polishing parcticles of Nagura is larger than the particles of super fine finishing stones, and when the stone is hard, the Nagura's particle will scratch the bevel before they are ground to smaller size. Using diamond stone to create the initial slurry, you are getting the slurry that is made of the finishing stone itself. You'd be surprised how much better result you get by this technique.

Also, when you use a Nagura on Suita stones, the coarse Nagura particles will get stuck in the Su (the holes in Suita stones) and will keep scratching the bevel, because these particles won't get ground to smaller sizes."

Originally Posted by onimaru55

Jimmy, if you hone with a progression of synthetics up to 8 k or even a bit higher, one good J-nat polisher is all you need... or maybe 2... or 3

Thanks Oz, that is exactly my routine. Right on about maybe 2 or 3 more .... or even more than that.

Originally Posted by JimmyHAD

Thanks Oz, that is exactly my routine. Right on about maybe 2 or 3 more .... or even more than that.

I understand Jimmy. Each razor can be different so you need different stones

Nice Jimmy. I hope you have a great time with that beauty! Kindly keep us posted and add to my learning curve.

Jimmy
Looks like you got a winner there, you sure deliberated long enough and I admire your focus.

Using a diamond plate (diamond nagura-DN or hon-nagura-HN) to raise a slurry is the fool proof method. A nagura stone is the more traditional approach in Japan although that is changing slowly. Using a DN will wear off grit faster and in my opinion this is the only drawback. Alx

Originally Posted by onimaru55

You know they're hard when they challenge a diamond plate

Fwiw, I have a Nakayama kiita that chewed up my credit card dmt 325 and wouldn't make slurry no matter how much I tried with it, just ended up with swarf on the stone.

Originally Posted by Disburden

Fwiw, I have a Nakayama kiita that chewed up my credit card dmt 325 and wouldn't make slurry no matter how much I tried with it, just ended up with swarf on the stone.

I guess that's possible but how many strokes were you doing to slurry up ? I only ever use about 5-10 light strokes to create an almost invisible slurry with my Atoma 1200 for finishing.