As a newbe honer i buy a lot of old stones on the local fleamarket , old razor hones .80 % of the Coticules are heavy dished in the midle of the hone , and looks like a BBW hone with 2 higher white coticule spots on the ends . I use them like a slurry stones , and usualy the BBW side . when lapped is ok for honing . So i got few old BBW . They are diferent ,as coticules are one from another .
I notice that there are generaly 2 kinds of a BBW - pinkish , with some fine shiny flakes in it ,soft and fast - no patern on them.
The second kind is a harder stone with a destinctive , beautyfull wave and dots patern , snake skin like , darker blue and finer , mutch slower stone from my humble observation .
I like my Belgian blue whetstones , a lot and i am a fan of the first kind of stones from them . I love the edge they leave , witch is enought for a comfortable shave . They are amazing prefinishers , i use them after 3 K with sucsses , every time i hone .
My question is have you observation on the first kind of BBW and opinion on using them - they are coticules after all , i notice that Dilucot works pretty well on them every single time .