Thread: Norton 4000/8000 alternatives?

First of all - hello straight razor place users!
I've been a lurker for some time now and decided I'd better get an actual account made

Now - the actual problem I'm facing at the moment is deciding what gear to start off with. The razor itself is already in the bag (An old Enkels from my grandfather), it was in decent shape already - however I decided to get a local barber to do the initial honing and stropping for me to see if all this straight-razor-business was something I'd like at all. And lets just leave it at that - I'm hooked :P

However, in the future I'd like to be able to do my own honing and overall maintenance of the gear - and this is where I start entering seriously shaky grounds. I've gone through these forums, seen video's and whatnot - and I see the Norton 4k/8k being recommended to starters, problem is that it's not really that easy to get my hands on where I live (Denmark) - its not impossible of course, however I would really like to hear if any of the following is sufficient for getting the job done.

Suehiro 6000, 8000 grit stone
Arkansas stones (hard white and black, cant find the translucent ultra fine)

Well, there are several other stones available - however these are the only I can find in Denmark with high enough grit-size.

Now - the question is kinda simple. Will any of these stones be enough to keep my blade good-to-go? I was thinking of a arkansas hard black and suehiro 8000 grit combo - should that be sufficient? Or maybe the 8000 suehiro only, would be enough to keep me going for a while? (they're kinda expensive, the 8000 suehiro alone is ~130$).

Or - should I go for international shops and look for a norton 4000/8000?


Sorry for any typos and grammatical errors, my English isn't that good :]

Thanks in advance!

Why not ask the barber if he has any he might sell you or recommend?

ahh these things always come up when i'm not ready...i'm playing with the idea of selling my norton.

just curious...how expensive is it to get a norton that would make it prohibitively expensive? or is it just a matter of no one selling them?