Peoples Hone of infinite grit

Hey Ya'll

Found a little store called woodcraft, driving down US 19, assumed it was the same as the site (it was), and couldn't leave empty handed so I grabbed a PHIG, This thing is cool. I lapped both sides and boom

Attachment 205251Attachment 205252

Smooth as glass, you can see the reflection of the Knock-down(paint texture) on my walls (theres something about this stuff and Florida, but that topic is for another day). And i hope you can see in the picture that ~1/2 of the hone is a little more grey, it also seems much finer there. I Finished a wester bros, on this side.

Thats the first side, i decided to also lap the back (320-1200 wet dry), and started to see these faint gold lines, and dark streaks on this side so i decided to finish a gold dollar on this side unsure of what would happen (didn't want to offend the torrey)
Attachment 205254

So the only sane thing to do would be to shave half my face with the wester, the other half with the gold dollar.

Results:
The wester brothers (i believe it was honed on the coticule originally) was sharp, Fairly silent hht and a good shave, 3/10 on the Clubman pain test. 2 passes Wtg and Xtg (ATG for chin and stache)

The gold dollar (norton 4/8->PHIG) and this thing got along like old pals (irony?) was a very pleasant shave 2/10 irritation and was the sharpest i personally have made a razor, im going to attribute this to the fact that i may of underestimated how slow this rock was and only used the proper amount of strokes on the grittier side.

Both razors i went circles (5 laps-20 circles) Then about 20-30 xStrokes then Crox strop(15 Laps).25 Diamond (5 Laps) Leather (~70 laps)

I think overall it was a great buy, but now i have to get a real 12k to compare (naniwa!)


Thanks For reading!
Bowne out

I thought it was "indeterminate" grit.................:D

I love woodcraft, they have a great selection of tools, hones, handle scales and other goodies. I avoid going there too often becasue I always leave with too much stuff...

Ya i can see that being a problem haha

Quote:

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Originally Posted by mrsell63

I thought it was "indeterminate" grit.................:D

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Ya i was just messing with the fact this thing has 3 seemingly different grits on it Lol

It's great that you had pleasing results from your experiment but remember that you shaved of the edges delivered from the pastes. To evaluate the stone you'll need to strop and shave right off the stone.

The PHIGs are extremely variable, perhaps more so than other naturals but it's just part of the game. I had two of them (one from Woodcraft) and neither was what I'd call a decent finisher. On the other hand, many others have found good ones and, in fact, at least one of the pro's here uses one on customers' razors from time to time. By the way, most people find them to be very slow so you might want to experiment with more laps.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Bowneuscg

I think overall it was a great buy, but now i have to get a real 12k to compare (naniwa!)

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And that's how it starts. :)


rs,
Tack

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Tack

It's great that you had pleasing results from your experiment but remember that you shaved of the edges delivered from the pastes. To evaluate the stone you'll need to strop and shave right off the stone.

The PHIGs are extremely variable, perhaps more so than other naturals but it's just part of the game. I had two of them (one from Woodcraft) and neither was what I'd call a decent finisher. On the other hand, many others have found good ones and, in fact, at least one of the pro's here uses one on customers' razors from time to time. By the way, most people find them to be very slow so you might want to experiment with more laps.



And that's how it starts. :)


rs,
Tack

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Ill take the torrey off of it and got straight to leather and see how it goes, thanks!

I have three of the phig hones,all from woodcraft. I like all three of them so far. I usually set a bevel with a suehiro 1,200 and raise a very milky slurry on the phig.as u go I add a little water to keep it wet and I imagine it thins the slurry though I do not aim for that exactly. I always finish out on clear water and really enjoy what the resulting edges are. Cheers to all.

Mine, an older one, needs at least 100 laps to achieve good 'stiction' with most carbon blades.

I usually do 20 circles/side, 2 sets of 20 1/2 x-strokes and 50 regular x-strokes on my PHIG (C12K). It works great!

Wow i was way under honing haha

It has the "stretch mark" look on it. In my fairly limited experience so far (5 hones), the ones with the stretch mark tend to be hard, fine and smooth.

You guys taking so many laps on phigs, if they're hard enough to hold onto their grit, you can use medium pressure instead of super light pressure for 3/4ths of the work and then just back off of the pressure for a couple of dozen strokes. Direction of the stroke isn't so important on slow cutting stones like this, either, they aren't turning up a big wire edge, and anything they do turn up tends to be thin and not ragged when it comes off.

Same thing goes for a broken in ark. If the stone is slow, increase the pressure a little for the initial work on it (within reason, of course).

That's good to hear I'll try bearing down a little bit and see how it goes, and really cool to hear that you've had luck with similar looking stones

Attachment 205476 this is one of mine. The darkest one I have so far.

Is it worth getting a few and try them out? And that one looks jet black

Quote:

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Originally Posted by DaveW

It has the "stretch mark" look on it. In my fairly limited experience so far (5 hones), the ones with the stretch mark tend to be hard, fine and smooth.

You guys taking so many laps on phigs, if they're hard enough to hold onto their grit, you can use medium pressure instead of super light pressure for 3/4ths of the work and then just back off of the pressure for a couple of dozen strokes. Direction of the stroke isn't so important on slow cutting stones like this, either, they aren't turning up a big wire edge, and anything they do turn up tends to be thin and not ragged when it comes off.

Same thing goes for a broken in ark. If the stone is slow, increase the pressure a little for the initial work on it (within reason, of course).

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Absolutely! As long as you don't flex the blade/edge. That's my stopping point for pressure but as you said these and arkansas are differnt animals then a 12k synthetic. Slurry, varying pressure, half strokes (back and forth), burnishing stones, large ovals, along with many other little tricks can make these stones fun, faster, efficient, and much more consistent in my experience. With results that are very hard to match. It does take some intimate time spent with these stones to really get to know them which in my opinion is the most rewarding part but something I think a lot of people fail to do as they chase different stones and play with a new one every night. I guess it depends on what you are after. One night of shallow honing or something more rewarding. My Guangxi stone has those "stretch marks" also and it's a great stone. Must be more mature! Lol.