Thread: Bare Essential Hones

Say someone only wants to buy shave ready straights, doesn't get into restorations, doesn't damage his blades, and only wants the bare minimum hones he needs for general touch ups. Aside from the pasted strop, would the Chinese 12K barber hone coupled with the Norton 8K be sufficient for all his honing needs? Would he also need a Norton 4K?

Why not get the Norton 4/8 K combo? Given the 'someone' will only be touching up this will last forever.

Stay away from the Chinese 12k... they're hit-and-miss for both grit and useability. It's only a bargain if you get what you expect. With the C12k you actually only get what you pay for. The Naniwa 12k is a very popular hone here. Easy to lap, easy to use, very fast cutter for as fine as it is. The C12ks are very difficult to lap and can be excruciatingly slow cutters.

Many of us use the N12k, so can answer your questions about them from first-hand experience. Since the C12ks are natural, nobody can assume that the hone you're experiencing is the same as the one they've experienced.

The Norton 4k/8k is another very effective, plain-vanilla hone with lots of users and experience you can draw upon. Conventional wisdom is that you shouldn't buy anything finer than the 8k anyway, not until you're getting consistently good shaves from the 8k. Then, grasshopper, you are ready to polish at higher grit.

You'll also want to get a lapping solution to flatten and clean your hones. Most of us use a DMT plate with 325 grit. Your lapping plate can be smaller than your hone--I lap my 8 x 3 Norton with a ~2x6 DMT plate. Search this site for lapping and honing videos.

A new Norton will need a bunch of lapping before it settles down and hones nicely. It won't be razor-honing flat out of the box, and the outermost skin of the hone is a little funky for some reason--contact with the mold, different heat while baking, I dunno. Some manufacturing weirdity. Your new DMT plate will also need some breaking in to knock off the high spots. Some folks do this with a screwdriver shank--just run it over the DMT for five minutes, back and forth, to bust off the tallest diamonds.

Best wishes

To maintain your shave ready edge a Naniwa 12k will work nicely. That followed by a chromium oxide stropping, should keep your edge sharp for a long time.

If you want a multifunctional stone that could hone out those small accidental dings that might occur, then a naniwa 3k/8k or norton 4k/8k would be perfect.

I highly recommend you get a dmt coarse plate, to make lapping easier.

Toucan,

Good stuff above!!

Here's a good article on What Do I Need....... What hone(s), paste(s), or spray(s) do I need? - Straight Razor Place Wiki



Howard

3 and 1 micron film. Pasted crox strop. And a granite or marble tile to place it on.I have used several types and find Thor lab film to be excellent. A Norton 4/8 is great but you need a lapping plate or stone or lap it on a flat surface with some 220 grit wet dry. Film works great as do hones. I learned to hone with Norton's. They are inexpensive( relatively) and are consistent.

Norton 4k/8k combo hands down. It is an all in one stone that can get you from bevel set to finish. Use some Cro Ox on your strap for quick touch ups and polish. That is all you NEED. Anything more than that it for restoration or just fun and collecting. You probably will want to get some more stones down the road as you can catch the fever quickly and want some to play around with. Another great thing about the Norton is that there are more how to videos out there about honing on the Norton than all other stones combined.

You stated that you want a stone for general touch ups. I would go with the Naniwa 12K. The Norton 4/8 is a good general honing stone but if your objective is to maintain and not start from the ground up, the 12k should be sufficient. But if you find yourself needing to reset a bevel or fix and chips in the edge, the 12k won't be good for that.

If all you're doing is touching up the razor, all you need is a good barber's hone. And if you need more, with time and patience(alot of time and patience), you can even set a bevel on a barber's hone. I know this from experience.

Two questions;
What's the difference between touching up, refreshing, maintaining, and finishing the blade?
Also, if I opt for the Naniwa 12K for touching up/refreshing/etc., will I ever need another hone or strop paste in my lifetime - using a single razor?