Thread: and it begins...

After watching and then touching & smelling some unknown & known hones/stones/laps folks brought to the last Greater Pacific Northwest Wet Shavers meet, my first meet, I was hooked.

Studying the forum/library and collecting some inexpensive entry level hones, I spent the last few weeks familiarizing myself with and learning how easy some hones gouge/damage, then what it takes to clean them up, edge beveling, lapping and, polishing my hones.

I read where the Norton laps are not always flat out of the box and will additionally need correcting from time to time. That worried me. I notice, with cross hatch pencil marks, the lap repeatedly seemed to be high in the middle and or remove material in center of hones. Tonight I found a DMT 325/1200 10" for a good price. Can't wait to see what is true and what is not.

I'm hoping the inexpensive Imperia la Roccia 12K turns into a good finisher. It cleaned up nice and polished like glass on 2000 wet/dry. My novice nose smells a slate like for this stone. Anybody else get a whiff?

No razor to touch stone until they are just right and then to let the stone do the work. I'll be looking for a couple practice razors soon. Being as heavy handed as I am I have lots of work and practice ahead. gssixgun makes it looks so easy.



Sorry my writing skills are so poor. colon pee ()

Glad to see you jumping in to the honing game. Knowing your attention to detail I bet you will do great.

Matt

Advice from a fellow heavy handed shaver. It takes a great deal of conscious reminding to constantly think in light pressure terms. The mental image that gets the process going for me each time is a feather floating on the breeze. That gets my muscle memory to remember that hard learned lesson and I immediately lighten my pressure.

The way I also remember it is Muhammad Ali's quote, "Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee." That equals light pressure and a firm attack of the problem. Increased my percent of getting good edges from a low of 5% to a current estimate of about 80% (only going back to the stones after the shave test fails).

As I stated on a different thread, I could now declare myself a genius and then I doused myself with cold water to bring me back to reality.

I purchased the same 12k and it showed up today. I'll be testing it out tonight, but from what I've read it is a good hone. Welcome to the club!

"Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee."

Perfect. I can use that. Thank you.