Quote Originally Posted by kcb5150 View Post


Here's something new, a good experience that went south, unfortunately. Personally, I would try lapping through a crystalline issue since it appears to have been a testing/proving ground stone anyway. Thanks for adding to the info pile.
I had some slightly similar issues if you recall. What seems to remove the issue for me is to clean the stone with a Strata nagura before use. That got rid of all grittiness (which I thought was coming from contamination, not the stone itself). I just honed four razors on the Shapton Pro 1.5k, Apache Red, Strata, and Gila. Running the edges of all three razors (three redone Gold Dollars, one custom in 63HRC AISI W2) up the inside of my arm, and over the back of my hand...says they're perfect. Sharp, but ultra smooth. Took less than 20 minutes per razor, and honestly...if going by 'feel'...I could probably have skipped either of the middle stones and got the same result. I just love them to much not to use them I guess, lol.

For me, I'm happy.