Thread: How to find good razors to practice honing?

I would say you are further ahead with a plate rather than the stone. The plate will stay true, the stone will not, and will need to be trued up. As for the plate a 325 is likely your best choice because, although it is not great for really rough flattening and true lapping, it works very well to clean your hone between razors and keep them flat. To grid lap them, you should use some coarse wet dry for the first time and then the 325 for the second and you should be able to maintain them that way. I am a rock hound and use a lapping plate which is quite coarse and works very fast ion the Norton, but will be overkill for you unless you develop a really bad case of HAD.

no lapping stone, use 220 sandpaper, so much cheaper, and does not require to be lapped itself before use

I'd say you're pretty much set to go with what you have. If one of those slates is a Dragon's Tongue, then I'd go from 1K straight to that. With thick slurry at first, of course... You would benefit from a few slurry stones in the "coarse" range. This means a Botan, or a Tsushima nagura. Even those aren't necessary, but they will speed up the process to get you from 1K to 5K (roughly where slurried DT should be). This will save you a pile of money.. like, a good size Tsushima nagura is $35 + shipping. Botan might be slightly more expensive, but probably no more than +$10 US.

Lapping plate is a nice little accessory, but I seem to be coping just fine without it. Would still like one though... Fiddling with sandpaper is no fun

Originally Posted by Drygulch

Right now I have a Naniwa 1k, and a set of three Welsh Natural stones with slurry stones. I will be looking to pick up a Norton 4/8k, and a lapping stone to get a basic set to start with. Then I need to figure out how to use them.

just fold to size

Originally Posted by Srdjan

I'd say you're pretty much set to go with what you have. If one of those slates is a Dragon's Tongue, then I'd go from 1K straight to that. With thick slurry at first, of course... You would benefit from a few slurry stones in the "coarse" range. This means a Botan, or a Tsushima nagura. Even those aren't necessary, but they will speed up the process to get you from 1K to 5K (roughly where slurried DT should be). This will save you a pile of money.. like, a good size Tsushima nagura is $35 + shipping. Botan might be slightly more expensive, but probably no more than +$10 US.

Lapping plate is a nice little accessory, but I seem to be coping just fine without it. Would still like one though... Fiddling with sandpaper is no fun

Yes Mr. Whoever, that's the way to go!

To the OP... This is off-topic, but perhaps worth mentioning, as you are interested in learning. Another approach, again using naguras: An Aoto-type nagura (medium hardness), grit around 2k on average and getting finer as you go, can probably get you up to 3k. Follow that with a medium-grit, moderately hard nagura (Mejiro, or even DT slurry itself) to get to 5-6-7k. [I need to note that I don't really trust the advertised grit of those slates, neverteless, they are very useful and I've been using them with a lot of success. I assume that the DT can get you to 8-9K with minimal effort, on water.]

So, there you go, at this stage you are ready for a finisher. I actually find this part to be tricky and where the steel and the stone really, either come together, or fall apart. Example: My 6/8 Bengall Sheffield, full hollow, shaves like a dream off of the Welsh slate (Yellow Lake). On the other hand, a Solingen-made EKS loves a harder stone (an unknown Jnat, very hard) and simply isn't as keen on the slate...

Another useful tool to have in the arsenal: a cheapo jeweler's loupe. Can be had for less than $5 and highly recommended for examining the scratch marks on your edges.

Hope this o/t babble didn't bother you too much... I'll shut up now.