Thread: Full Rotation of Oilstones

Given the recent threads about hard arkansas, I had two razors to set bevels on and hone today - a friodur 451 and a razor marked griffon 99 (though I think it's much newer than the mark would imply).

I use arkansas stones a lot, but more for tools. But I dug out a good typical progression for honing razors and got both of the razors bevels set and honed through shave ready in about 40 minutes.

Here's the rotation, from left to right, a soft arkansas, a razor washita (this is the finest washita I have by far, out of 10), and came in a strop top box where someone had been using it for razors as they had allowed it to load. I lapped it and got a smoothed surface. Anyway, third is a semi-translucent hard arkansas, and to the right is the chinese agate, which is a bit finer than the hard ark.



Here's a razor after being honed by the washita:



Then after the bone colored hard (which is only slightly finer than the prior washita, but much finer than most washitas):


And after the chinese agate (I was wrong about this stone because it's so slow - it's a great follow on to a translucent ark, but not good to follow anything more coarse than that):