Thread: 20K water stones

Try a crox strop after the 12 k .. I think u will b quite surprised..

Originally Posted by Airportcopper

Try a crox strop after the 12 k .. I think u will b quite surprised..

Ditto. 10 stropping strokes on balsa with CrOx and you are good to go.

Maybe think about Jnats?
Since using a jnat i am rapidly going off synthetic stones and pastes are a thing of the past for me.

Originally Posted by JOB15

Maybe think about Jnats?
Since using a jnat i am rapidly going off synthetic stones and pastes are a thing of the past for me.

One of these days I will be able to visit or go to a meet where there is all different kinds of stones to look at. some of these I here about on the place are completely new to me.

Originally Posted by rhensley

One of these days I will be able to visit or go to a meet where there is all different kinds of stones to look at. some of these I here about on the place are completely new to me.

Sorry. A jnat is short for Japanese natural stone..

Originally Posted by JOB15

Maybe think about Jnats?
Since using a jnat i am rapidly going off synthetic stones and pastes are a thing of the past for me.

Find a good true silk finish NOS vintage strop to go with the jnat, and you'll be pretty much set up forever - as long as your leather that goes along with it is hard, slick and shiny. I've cast off my pastes, hone less than once every 3 months, and put the razor to the vintage linen once per week. It took making my own strops (call me a little cheap) to get away from the myriad of $40 strops out there that really don't arrive ready for a razor. Broken in horse butt strip is super hard and slick and doesn't degrade the edge as it comes off of a vintage linen.

Needless to say, no pastes, powders or diamonds for me. The hone on a vintage japanese barber hone every 3-6 months lasts about 5 minutes and that's it. It's a great ratio of shave time to upkeep time, and no less sharp than 0.5 crox was, though right after the hone, and before linen treatment, the razor is a bit less sharp. I believe a razor can last a lifetime (if not dinged off of a sink) with this routine, and without taking on much hone wear.

The total cost, for me, was less than the gok. $25 for a horse butt strip to make a strop, $45 for the unused horse butt strop that I found with the unused silk finish linen attached and $165 for a vintage ozaki mine barber hone. Ceasing honewear on my prized fried. dennert without giving up any keenness or smoothness - priceless.

Level 5 jnat. Asagi Ozuku for instance. Learn how to use properly though to get the tomo slurry to break down. Stropping then honing, stropping and honing.
You will be delighted with results.

Where do I learn from?
I am a creature of habit and tend to stick to the same thing :/
I do about 12 mins of strokes at the moment with a load of "S" strokes included.
I havnt figured out if I should be using thick slurry or watery slurry or thick to thin slurry.
And now I have a Nakayama Nagura to play with and some new Tomo's.
Its gonna take a few years.
The best edges ive produced so far were from thin watery slurry going for 20 mins on the jnat, but ppl pointed out that that was too long a time to finish.

Originally Posted by JOB15

Where do I learn from?
I am a creature of habit and tend to stick to the same thing :/
I do about 12 mins of strokes at the moment with a load of "S" strokes included.
I havnt figured out if I should be using thick slurry or watery slurry or thick to thin slurry.
And now I have a Nakayama Nagura to play with and some new Tomo's.
Its gonna take a few years.
The best edges ive produced so far were from thin watery slurry going for 20 mins on the jnat, but ppl pointed out that that was too long a time to finish.

I just do what works with my stone which is quite easy to use to be honest. I do large S strokes in sets of 20. I don't think it matters about thinning the slurry as long as you stop it from drying out, it's not like a coticule slurry, it doesn't work the same way. It's more about time on the stone up to a point of no further returns. What I find works for me is to max the edge out on my lv coti before going onto the jnat (anecdotal I know, but seems to offer something). Also I find I can improve the hht by successive stropping's and then back on the jnat where I left the slurry, again anecdotal. I do use light x strokes toward the end but have got just as good a result using circles only, I don't find it necessary to use anything but light pressure.
I have one of my customs out with a member honed in this way, will be interesting to see what he thinks of it when he shaves soon.

Originally Posted by Deckard

Level 5 jnat. Asagi Ozuku for instance. Learn how to use properly though to get the tomo slurry to break down. Stropping then honing, stropping and honing.
You will be delighted with results.

Your honing,stropping,honing technique was an excellent tip..Thanks for that..
I tried my usual shobu technique with the Tomo on my new Nakayama and it shredded the edge and gave a shockingly bad shave.
So I tried the Nakayama Nagura with your strop hone strop technique and the edge is truly amazing under the scope.
I did 10 mins honing , then, 50 linen strops and 100 leather strops , 5 mins honing and same again 150 strops.
It has that super fine line of light running down the edge and mid level arm hair pops off it.
I cant wait to shave with it.