Thread: RE: The Potential of Black Arkansas & Translucent as a Razor Finisher

MODINE, The coloration on that old stone is interesting. It would take an unbelievable amount of time imo, for oil to change the color of a stone that hard. The Translucents don't drink oil like the Soft stones do. It just floats on the surface for the most part.

With continued use, these stones get a glassy surface which makes them a polishing stone, with almost no metal removal. I have to frequently re-condition the surfaces on my stones so I can use them with Knives.

Hi 1KnifeGuy4U; this particular stone was acquired out antiquing around Coffeyville Kansas. The stone was so severely dished I lapped the opposite side. Cleaning was difficult, the stone was completely saturated with what I believe was blood. Probably used in the slaughter houses, buffalo skinning, unknown etc.
Mike

Originally Posted by zib

Mark,

Thanks for starting a new thread. Looking at the stones here, I can see it varies greatly by the Arks the person uses, like any other natural.
It looks like you guys didn't buy your stones off some Arkansas vendor online. When I think Jnats as a final finisher, I'm thinking in the 40k range. I use Nakayama, either Maruka or Maruichi Asagi. They're great finishers. I've never gone to an Arkie after that. I don't see how the edge could get better, but I'm always willing to listen to someone's findings. I think in your case, it has a lot to do with the stones you have. If someone were to go buy an SB, say off Hall's Arkansas stones, I don't think they could get the same results you did, or could they? I'm no Arkie expert, that's for sure.

I'm assuming the SB has to be well used? or well worn. You said thousands of laps? How much work do you need to do on the SB under normal circumstances to surpass the Jnat the edge? I know it varies, so just ballpark?

What would a person need to do to get the edges you speak of. As I said, is it possible with normal SB's bought from an online vendor to surpass Jnat edges or even the Suehiro Gokumyo 20k, etc.....

Very nice stones btw, I really like the Translucent.

The question about vintage vs modern stones is, I suspect, ultimately unanswerable. It's certainly unanswerable by me without another 10 years of honing. There's no obvious reason (i.e. obvious to me) that a recently mined stone of +99% silica should perform less well than a vintage mined stone that will also be of +99% silica (assuming identical Specific Gravity). When graded properly, the stones should be indistinguishable one from the other. Perhaps the difference is in the grading practices among the different mines and between the old mines and the modern ones. Of course I could be wildly wrong here and there might be variables beyond the conditioning of the stone by steel over time of which I'm unaware. Ask me again in 10 years and I might actually have a real answer. So far, I can't really tell the difference in the output from my different arkies based on age or color and I have them from ivory white to that old vintage yellow to gray/black to jet black and their estimated ages of original mining are from 100 years to 40 years old. The big difference I can tell is how finished the surface is relates directly to the comfort of the edge. At least, I "think" it does.

The notion of "improving" an edge is the right way to think of it, imo. I don't know that the arkie gives a finished jnat edge more keenness. To my face, it feels smoother. By the way, it doesn't always do it. I took a bunch of razors in rotation but not freshly honed and gave them all about 200 laps on the arkie on oil one evening and some got better and some didn't. I don't know why. On a freshly honed razor, it always seems to improve the edge, but not on one in rotation. For this reason, I don't use it as a touch up razor. The results have been inconsistent there.

I don't know what it would do after the Suehiro 20k but sure would like to know. Do you have a Trans arkie? If so, put a fresh edge on a razor, from bevel on up to finishing on the SG and let us know. I'd be really curious. I lent one of my SB's to a friend in Asia who uses only synthetics and I believe he finishes on either a Shapton 15k or a Naniwa SS 12k and he believes unambiguously that he is getting better edges.

As you can see, I have more questions than answers, but chasing those answers down is the fun of this whole endeavor. And thank you for the compliment on the stone. I particularly love that old beast.

Originally Posted by 1KnifeGuy4U

MODINE, The coloration on that old stone is interesting. It would take an unbelievable amount of time imo, for oil to change the color of a stone that hard. The Translucents don't drink oil like the Soft stones do. It just floats on the surface for the most part.

With continued use, these stones get a glassy surface which makes them a polishing stone, with almost no metal removal. I have to frequently re-condition the surfaces on my stones so I can use them with Knives.

This past summer my son and I stayed with one of my oldest and closest friends at his beach house in Rhodey. He also rents the one next door to his and that week a friend of his who is a professor of geology stayed there with his wife and grown kids. We had dinner with them every night. I asked him about arkies changing color and while he caveated his answer telling me that wasn't really his field of expertise, he did say that he didn't think the trans arkies changed color because of oil absorption, but rather because of exposure to light. I know this is also true of vintage glass bottles. It's called light irradiation. Bottles and Arkies are made of much the same thing: silica. The softer ones clearly are more absorbent, but I think the trans arkies just change as a result of exposure to light.

It could be that high density Arkansas stones are able to polish what is an already excellent edge, by smoothing out the more defined scratches left by other stones.

Originally Posted by 1KnifeGuy4U

It could be that high density Arkansas stones are able to polish what is an already excellent edge, by smoothing out the more defined scratches left by other stones.

I'm not against your theory as I can sometimes improve the comfort of an edge by doing 4 strokes ,dry, on my Jnat finisher. Doing 200 laps seems a lot to me tho. Have you tried less ?

I am purely interested in the potential of the Arkansas stones. I lived in north Arkansas for 3 years, and I really enjoyed my time there. It was the best 3 years of my life.

Because there are people on both sides of the fence; some who claim the Arks aren't capable of adding anything, and others who claim they can, I find this topic most interesting. Also, because these natural stones aren't rare in the U.S., but in fact there are several sources for them; they aren't at all like the Japanese naturals or the rare European stones in that anyone here can own one.

The U.S. doesn't have Thuringians, Eschers, Coticules, BBWs, or the Japanese naturals coming out of the ground. However there is something similar to the Charnley Forest stones coming out of the ground in some quantity. I'd like to think that some stone gurus somewhere could learn how to maximize the potential of a high grade Ark stone. It's America's sharpening stone.

I own a 8"x2"x.5" BBW, and even with slurry it's slowwww. Arks aren't the only slow cutting stones.

Originally Posted by onimaru55

I'm not against your theory as I can sometimes improve the comfort of an edge by doing 4 strokes ,dry, on my Jnat finisher. Doing 200 laps seems a lot to me tho. Have you tried less ?

I did initially and didnt see a difference. I was using it as a touch up. The next time I tried it was after a fresh honing and in between I'd heard it suggested that I give it a couple hundred no pressure strokes on oil. Big difference then. I haven't tested to see how few strokes I could use and get the results I get with 200. In fact, I'd been going the other way, but I suppose it's worth trying to see where the lower limit is. Keep in mind that with mineral oil and an ultra smooth surface of a well worn stone, it's almost as if the edge isn't even touching the arkie at first. By the end of the honing you get much more feel from the stone but nothing like what I get from any of the jnats on even a very light slurry.

I need to use identical razors though to test with a reasonable degree of control. I may have them. I've got a pair of Karnaks that might serve the purpose and 6 day set of Wosty's. this will take some time.

It’s funny you should mention this 1KnifeGuy4U. I am testing different novaculites out now. The translucent Arkansas and the CF pictured are prime grade specimens. Both exhibit similar high performance characteristics.
Mike

Originally Posted by MODINE

It’s funny you should mention this 1KnifeGuy4U. I am testing different novaculites out now. The translucent Arkansas and the CF pictured are prime grade specimens. Both exhibit similar high performance characteristics.
Mike

Modine,
Is that Iwasaki's symbol peeking out from the lather?

That CF is beautiful. I've never used one or seen one I particularly wanted until now.

How are you testing your novaculites and what have you found out so far?

200! I'm impressed. Remembering 20 on barber's hone and two strops taxes me in mornings!(:-)