Thread: Review of Wood Block Strop/Hone using Progressive Sandpaper for Bevel setting

A wet piece of copy paper under a piece of film will contact only the bottom 1/3 of a bevel from the edge. So leather, thicker and softer will flex much more convexing the bevel.

Using a high grit film you can easily see where contact is made, with high grit final finish film, it is not a problem, in fact can be a good thing as you are only doing a few laps on very high git.

But at a low grit, the bevel becomes convex early on and you may not be honing all the way to the edge with subsequent grits in progression. Ink will quickly tell you and a hard flat substrate eliminates the issue.

Originally Posted by Euclid440

A wet piece of copy paper under a piece of film will contact only the bottom 1/3 of a bevel from the edge. So leather, thicker and softer will flex much more convexing the bevel.

Using a high grit film you can easily see where contact is made, with high grit final finish film, it is not a problem, in fact can be a good thing as you are only doing a few laps on very high git.

But at a low grit, the bevel becomes convex early on and you may not be honing all the way to the edge with subsequent grits in progression. Ink will quickly tell you and a hard flat substrate eliminates the issue.

Timing is everything. I was just honing two old Wade & Butchers when I read your post. I had just finished a progression using 1000, 1500, then finally a 2000 grit. Both were cutting arm hair at 1000, and TNT at 1500. 2000 was looking even better. After reading your post I then tried the ink test to see if the honing was getting to the edge. Both SRs were in fact getting to the edge as the ink disappeared nicely with two passes.

I am reading all the posts on "convexing" the edge and I just don't see it so far. The reason may be that the leather is hard and glued down firmly to the wood. Anyway, I must be doing something right despite using this unorthodox process as I am able to get a bevel and the final shave ready edge, after the coticules, balsa, and latigo leather stropping. I will stay open to the convexing issue and I thank all those who has commented. "Proof is in the pudding" or is it ....."you can lead a horse to water.....drink".

Originally Posted by ajkenne

Timing is everything. I was just honing two old Wade & Butchers when I read your post. I had just finished a progression using 1000, 1500, then finally a 2000 grit. Both were cutting arm hair at 1000, and TNT at 1500. 2000 was looking even better. After reading your post I then tried the ink test to see if the honing was getting to the edge. Both SRs were in fact getting to the edge as the ink disappeared nicely with two passes.

I am reading all the posts on "convexing" the edge and I just don't see it so far. The reason may be that the leather is hard and glued down firmly to the wood. Anyway, I must be doing something right despite using this unorthodox process as I am able to get a bevel and the final shave ready edge, after the coticules, balsa, and latigo leather stropping. I will stay open to the convexing issue and I thank all those who has commented. "Proof is in the pudding" or is it ....."you can lead a horse to water.....drink".

I may have have overstated my success. After I posted, I went back and looked at the edge throught the scope and did find some ink on the tip portion of one of the razors. The other razor's edge looked good. Will need to do a shave test with both and feel the result. Don't anyone go out and buy this gizmo just yet. I may have jumped the gun on my previous post. I'll have do more work on this.

Originally Posted by ajkenne

I may have have overstated my success. After I posted, I went back and looked at the edge throught the scope and did find some ink on the tip portion of one of the razors. The other razor's edge looked good. Will need to do a shave test with both and feel the result. Don't anyone go out and buy this gizmo just yet. I may have jumped the gun on my previous post. I'll have do more work on this.

If you are doing back stroke honing, you will always convex the edge no matter what.
Been sharpening knives on some really hard natural stones and the bevel always convexes.

People use microfilm on glass or granite but with regular forward stroke, that works for razors.

Thanks mainaman. I will try some microfilm on glass/granite. Do you have a source?

I've never used it but have seen this, they also have diamond lapping film in small sheets:

3M Micro-Abrasives for Sharpening

Thorlabs.com is the best source for lapping film, comes in 9x13 in sheets. Cut into 3 in sheets with a paper cutter, you will get 4 pieces from a sheet, so it is about 35 cents per piece.

Buy the AO not the Diamond. Performance is the same, but cost is 11x more. You can get 10-20 honings from each piece of AO.

You only need the 3, & 1um, if you start from a 1k bevel set, the .03 is over kill for me, but you may want to try it. Finish on film over a piece of wet copy paper.

There are tons of threads on using film, it works well, it is aggressive, leaves a very straight edge that can be harsh with too many laps, too much pressure or super fine grits, .03um. YMMV.

You can buy a 3X12 in glass tile from lowes for 5-7 bucks, lap with 320 w/d or 300 diamond plate.

Thanks much to Hart and Euclid440 for those sources. I will get some and try it out. Super!

Arent those whatter sandpapers . Why you dont use watter . Its better i started honing like that .

It is wet/dry sandpaper. I used it without water with some success. Others on this forum have encouraged me to use the 3M Aluminum Oxide lapping film and have made my first purchase which will arrive late this week. I have researched this product and watched several videos and believe this method is superior to what I have been using.