Thread: Need some help with wetstone selection

Hi Guys,
I need some new wetstones, the ones I have just aren't fine enough. Just pricing some Shapton stones on Amazon, yikes $380 total for 1000, 4000, 8000, 16,000 with the steelex stone holder. I do have some honing experience, and watched Lynns videos on razor sharpening. The finest stone I have is an Arkansas hard stone. The thumb pad test is good to go, arm hair mid shaft good to go, but razor to cheek... nope. WTG right cheek, nope. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out I was courting disaster. I stropped the heck out of my razor off the stone, but I do need better stones. $380, sigh... ouch, either I'm getting gouged by my razor or gouged by the price of decent wetstones. What are my alternatives? Reviews I've read on the Nortons are mixed in they're not flat out of the box, need laping? Do I need to go up to 16,000? Would a 4,000/8,000 Norton be enough? I've read some good reviews on the Kings... $130 for the 16,000 Shapton, ouch! Help

I only have experience using the Shaptons. Did you check ebay "shapton japan". A lot of the Shapton stones on ebay come from Japan instead of through the USA Shapton distribution network. With your location in Hawaii the shipping may be less.

I would assume any new stone needs lapping, just some more than others. Either way you're probably going to want to factor in a lapping method, a DMT D8C 325 is a nice lapping tool but you can keep things flat with a piece of glass/tile & some wet/dry abrasive paper.

I picked up a few Shapton Pro's from Tools from Japan a couple weeks back and found them to be pretty good value. I have the 1.5K for bevel setting and the 5K to transition to my coticule. Looks like something like 1.5k>5K>8K>12K could still shave $100 or so off the line up you mentioned above.

For bevel setting on the cheap a King 1K might be worth a look.

I've not used the Norton combo but if your stones top out at 8K or so chromium oxide or some of the other pastes/potions are a cheap and easy way to give a little extra refinement.

king stones are good IMO , cheap and findable .Arkansas stones soft through translucent are nice and easy to find, again just my two cents....I don't claim to be the best just good enough . salute . [emoji4] CAM .

You should be able to get a good shave ready razor off of what you currently own I would be looking at your honing technique. Are you laying the razor flat on the stones using the spine as your guide to keeping a good angle on the edge? Are you lifting the spine anywhere along the stroke? Another area I would be looking at is your stropping technique, you could easily be rolling the edge or damaging it in some other way. How long have you been SR shaving? Have you shaved with a properly honed razor from a honemeister? Lots of questions and not enough answers. I would suggest trying to find a Mentor in Hawaii and learning to strop, lather and shave and only move on to honing when you have mastered those areas. I know this is not what you want to hear but going off of what you have told us and the fact that the Arkansas stones should be giving you a good shave from a practiced hand then that is my advice.

I got rid of my synthetics and went with a "one stone hone". It takes a little effort to learn the stone but for $35 -$100 and the fun and rewarding experience I am glad I went this route. You could get a Guangxi (c12k) or a coticule along with a bevel setter (1k) and along with what you already have would be all you would need.

What brand of hard do you have? Or what type?

Is it translucent or black? If not, it may be a newer grade hard (which is really not up to par with vintage stones or some of the newer stone cutters and mines, like dans or halls). Even a cheap hard, however, can be made to work with a razor, especially if you have a decent linen, but you may not want to invest the time to figure it out.

You need only one additional stone if you have a stone that isn't fine enough, not a whole set. And maybe only a paste or powder.

I exclusively use Shapton GS stones, however I have had sets in Naniwa and Norton as well. You will only hear me recommend these three mfg's. Of the three, I feel the shapton's can be the least forgiving and I don't recommend them for beginners.

Most of us will recommend for you to learn to touch up a shave ready razor when it starts to pull first, then work down the stones, learning to bevel set on a 1K last as it's the toughest to do/learn.

With that being said, the Naniwa Super Stone is a good touch-up stone to start with and runs +/- $83. Then I would recommend that you look for either a Norton combination stone 4K/8k that runs +/- $80 or a Naniwa 3/8K that runs +/- $95. Then, once you are proficient with those stones look into a quality 1K stone.

I will never recommend a natural stone for a beginner honer as you must have a proper foundation of honing fundamentals before you get into naturals as each and every stone is different. Lastly...honing and sharpening is as different as armchair quarterbacking and NFL quarterbacking.

you can shave your arm hair, right? in that case you can dull the edge by "cutting" once in a beer botle using only the weigt of the blade as pressure. Check on your arm hair again to make sure it doesn't cut armhair and redo the honing to make sure the bevel is set correctly (if so you should be cutting armhair again in no time, also, you could color the bevel with a permanent marker to see if it is set on both sides)

After this you would need only 1 hone a bit finer then the one you currently use, if you want to stay with the arkensas hones you could buy a black or translucent one but you should read up on how to prepare this type of hone!

otherwise pick a finisher you like, Naniwa super stone 12K if you want to be sure or a nice natural if you like a gamble.

an entire progression is nice when you need to hone a LOT of blades otherwise there are better ways to spent you money

You need to post pictures of your Arkansas stone.

We need to see how it's finished.

Arkansas hones are very interesting. At the softer end of the spectrum they work by shedding grit and have a low grit rating.

At the hard end of the spectrum they work by physically grinding the grit into a smooth surface. This is why a Hard/Black/Translucent stone may have a grit rating of 1000-1500, but the effect on the blade is closer to 15,000. In order to get the stone into that high finish range you have to burnish it. And this involves a lot of time and effort with some hard steel scrubbing the surface.

Until we see your stone, and we can appraise the quality of the finish it's impossible to give you a stones to buy list. You may well have a badly finished finishing stone, and actually need a lower grit stone in the long run. Or you may have a middle grit stone and need to fill out the bottom and top end a little.

A good test till you get some pictures up is to take your hone and a chisel. Put your water on and go to town with the chisel. If the stone sheds grit it's a soft type. If it starts to polish then you have a lot of work. A finished Arkie can be a near mirror finish.