Thread: Barber hones and petroleum jelly

Most all of my barber hones don't need lapping, but some do. Some have been treated like he$$ over the years by prior owners & had staines & substances on the surface that were God knows what.

Some had chips on the edges that had to be smoothed out.

I would not lap a barber hone that was in good condition already.

Originally Posted by RezDog

Huh, you got old cars just sitting around that you store stuff in. Do you live next door to me?

,,,,,,,, no, just my back up car that I have should my 4Runner break down. If I sold the old thing, I would not get much for it. So I keep it, drive it down the street once a month to keep the oil circulating.

Originally Posted by Hirlau

Where do you get the 'metal particles" from?
Are you referring to swarf?

Yes, that's the word I was fumbling for.

Originally Posted by Neckbone

This just seems wrong. The metal particles mixed with the oil/grease would clog the stone.
Sounds like a water stone being converted to an oil stone.
The water or oil is used to flush the particles out of the stone to keep the grit sharp.
I may be wrong, but the grease thing seems counter productive.

Now that I know you mean swarf, here's my thoughts, some of this I'm sure you already know;

The OP & the link that is refered to is not about "honing" with petroleum jelly, it's about refurbishing a barber hone, either after lapping one for flatness or repairing a damaged one.

Once the procedure is finished, water or lather is usually used as a method to hone with. A dry barber hone is often used too.

Water & oil is not used to flush the swarf out during honing; water, oils, WD-40, lather & many other substances are applied to the hone to decrease the friction between the steel & the stone, a "buffer/cushion" so to speak. Different substances can provide different results on the same stone. Some substances will "float' swarf better than others, but the act of stroking a blade on the stone, will still push some metal into the grit/stone.

Yes, some of the above substances can be used to clean a stone after use & remove the metal transfer/particles. I use WD-40 on oil stones to clean them, also Simple Green works great on oil stones ,To remove embeded swarf; dish soap & a toothbrush on waterhones. Sometimes the transfer is deep enough that it requires a couple of strokes with the appropriate level DMT to clean the face of the stone again.

I'm not going to defend Modine's method, as he's a member here & can speak to the topic himself. I do trust his information & acknowledge his dedication to the subject of barber hones. I have 6 hones under this method now. I'll have further comments on it, in about a week.

I used the method described in the link of post # 10.
I used 6 barber hones to test this method. They stayed in a hot van for about 7 days, taken out,,,wiped off,,,& then washed lightly with a dish soap. Five of the hones looked to improve cosmetically & the surface felt consistent to others of the same brand that were NOS & not treated. I have included photos of two, the other photos did not take well. I will treat a couple more hones soon & show the results later.

Before:



After:



Before:



After:

Seem to improve the surface of my hones(at least in my mind). The BHs seem to suck the blade to the surface (draw?) pretty effectively.

What's your experience honing with the treated hone?

Thanks for the pic.

ps-How does one know something is truly flat with any degree of certainty unless one laps it? I've always wondered. And, since I know of a way of making certain, why wouldn't I employ the knowledge. I'm pretty new to it, so I just try to stick to the basics. And, following a progression of grid lapping, I do notice the surface becoming smoother(more polished).

I have not honed with these treated barber hones. I rarely use my barber hones, I just collect them. I use an old Swaty for my knives & other edges regularly,,,,a NeverDull barber hone to maintain a couple of edges on my travel straights & now I carry a Pike strop/hone to maintain them.

To be certain,,, I guess you have to lap,,but,,,since the barber hones are just stroked 5 or 8 times to refresh,,,I don't feel the need to lap them,,,,unless the surface has problems.

All the stones in this test I did , according to the link, had surface problems,,90% of my barber hones have no issues,, so I don't feel a need to lap them.

My concern with the lapping of barber hones; is the little knowledge this is out here on the make-up, manufacturing specifics on barber hones. Yes, there are a lot out here & many use them. We can say which hones perform better than others & we set the price on certain hones, but we cannot tell you much about how they are made; getting manufacturing documents is difficult, it seems.

So,,,the question is , 'do we really want to lap every barber hone that comes into our hands, I say , "No" based on what I have seen in some hones. What I have seen in barber hones of dual grit/ dual texture is that this difference is sometimes only skin deep , a coating of fine grit/abrasive applied to the hone on one side; lapping in this case removes this coating. Not a good thing I believe.

If members have manufacturing specs on barber hones,,,I hope they share it.

I also say no, there's no reason to lap them. If I had one that was coming apart, I'd brush it with shellac before putting any jelly on it. I'm late to the party here, but that's my story and I'm sticking to it.

(in reality, I'd just discard it because I've already got good barber hones that didn't require lapping or that were hard and 100% dense all the way through).

The exception is that I'll freely lap a frictionite #00, #821 or #825 or any of the other similar hones (super punjab) because I know they use those as bench stones at colonial williamsburg, at least they did until they ran out of them in the supply shop.