Thread: Foe the coticule guys.

So I am talking to you guys that have a bunch of coticules or have used a bunch of coticules. Have you noticed if there is any correlation to a stones fineness and its color or markings. Like is a paler stone that is consistent and color and few to now markings or chatoyance usually a finer stone? Or is a stone with many markings and variances in appearance usually a coarser stone? I would love to be able to find this out on my own but I do not have the money to do so.

that would be hard to answer, cotis are nats and being such two cotis from the same vein cut 6 inches apart could vary. same vein. nats vary and a bad coti I haven't ever had, faster and slower I have seen.

I've noticed that coticules with pink bits, and/or a pinkish hue tend to be faster than those off white or yellow. When you get a coticule make a fine slurry, do some back and forth, A.K.A. Livi strokes on it, and see how many it takes to turn slurry gray.

Some are faster than others. Fineness is another matter. Thomas Wolfe wrote a short story called, "Only the Dead Know Brooklyn." You could substitute 'coticule' for Brooklyn and it wouldn't be far from the truth.

Yeah I have two. One has pink specks throughout but mostly a creamy pale yellow and it is what I would consider fast but it is also fine. Atleast compared to my other one, which is more yellow and has a lot of chatoyance and many different markings but not really any pink but it is crazy fast even without slurry but it is definitely not fine enough to finish a razor on. I can't obviously make a conclusion based off of just two stones though and thus why I am asking. Also for like when I am buying from the bay it would be nice to be able to possibly be able to look at it and think it might have a better chance of being fine by the way it looks.

I have one that is almost the color of an eggshell. It is only slightly off white and it is both fast and fine. I had one that was a strong pink uniformly throughout and amazingly fast but not fine. I don't pretend to know what makes one have that balance we look for. When I get one that does I appreciate it though.

I finish mine on an apache strata after the coti, if you want fineness you might want to try one of those they give a very fine edge to a razor.

as to what JimmyHAD said , i have a darker coti with a pink hue and what appears to be reddish/pinkish garnets that i would say is fast , hard , smooth feeling on the edge and is a great finisher on water alone .. but i also have a bout that is pale in color with a pink hue through the middle of it and is gritty feeling , soft and yet fast enough that i use to set bevels on all of my razors that dont need heavy bevel work then go to enie meanie , minie moe after , but again it has that pink hue to it like Jimmy stated so i dont know if its a set in stone theory or what but from mine that i have it stands up to what he said ..

as far as the bay goes , unless a stone has distinct feature it is gonna be a crap shoot as to what your getting . and most of the fun on a ebay coti is lapping it and finding whats beneath all those gouges , dirt , and age ...

I think especially on Cotis its difficult to get a proper statement which parameters in colour or inclusions is working on which factor...

In general stones with Manganese lines and pink veines mentioned before seem to work fast...

Also very hard cotis seem to be very fine...

But thats just a general statement, i think nature made these stones quite different to work ;-)

You need to hit the "Get Together's " if there are any in your area

I love testing stones at them, especially J-nats, PHIGs and Coticules as they seem to have the greatest variations between them, you can really get the opportunity to try many stones right next to each other and it doesn't cost you a small fortune

Originally Posted by gssixgun

You need to hit the "Get Together's " if there are any in your area

I love testing stones at them, especially J-nats, PHIGs and Coticules as they seem to have the greatest variations between them, you can really get the opportunity to try many stones right next to each other and it doesn't cost you a small fortune

Glen I would love to but it seems there are never any get togethers here. I guess I will just have to buy more cotis.