Thread: Natural finisher from Montenegro

I took the last chance before the sun set today and snapped a few photos I intended to show, outdoors. First photo shows the surface and the tiny grey spots, thought to be responsible for the cutting ability of the stone. I'm no chemist, nor geologist, but this is supposed to be some form of silicium oxide, or some other oxide that cuts steel (sorry, I'm sounding a bit illiterate right now). The image is a little exaggerated in contrast to show the concentration clearly. The second image shows the true look of the surface.

The second and the third photo actually aim to show the finish, after I've used some sandpaper on it. The bottom of the hone still has the rough edges, left behind by the cutting wheel and I didn't touch those much, other than just killed the sharp corners and chips. Edges on the top actually looked the same, until I lapped it. You can see that with my "manual method" of hand-sanding I couldn't (or, wasn't really willing to) remove all the dents. I now fully understand what the miners and the stone cutters were saying in the video. Actually lapping with very low grit doesn't help... quite the opposite! Go too low and the edges will start to break off again, so there's no easy way around it. I got an advice to try loose grit alu oxide, but sadly, I have no easy access to it.

The hone is 100% usable in this state, I chamfered the edges enough to not hurt the process. With time and lapping, the surface will surely expand to the full size of the hone.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/qhgkh7d9fw...edges.jpg?dl=0

I don't know about the particular rock you have however that area is commonly a producer of lime, marble and limestone as well as bauxite which is Aluminum ore.

Originally Posted by thebigspendur

I don't know about the particular rock you have however that area is commonly a producer of lime, marble and limestone as well as bauxite which is Aluminum ore.

Very true! This isn't lime, or limestone, or marble, so that leaves us with the possibility of bauxite. Looking at google images, it certainly looks like it could be it. Perhaps certain layers are a lot richer and suitable for production of aluminium.

I recently found a good piece of limestone, with similar grey dots, resembling metal oxide. Perhaps the same as in this one. The difference being, obviously hardness. Tried it on a razor, had a friend try it too, the rock gave some good results on a few razors. I believe it's rare to find a lot of usable specimens of the sort. I tried a few others, they had no cutting power at all. All good fun though!

Let to join a little .
Two razors that I use in the last time, an old Solingen and other cheap Enzo, just a couple of laps on a thick slur with gradual dilution and at the end of 20- laps under clean water doing a perfect job. Enzo razor I took a couple of years ago when I started to shave with a razor , I can not remember exactly but it was quite cheap and for my term of the lower grades, however, after this stone shave with it at the level HHT4 ( softer tempered by others that I have, the steel quality is questionable, holding the blade briefly ..... ) .
It is a sufficiently well-known stone whose time will come .......

Hi to all,

I just want to participate in this thread and share my finds about this stone. Also I like to share this beautiful picture of stone on first morning sun.



First time I got stone I try to use it after Norton 4k and i think that my stone is not able to remove scratches from Norton. Maybe with more and more slurry refreshing.

Later I did some honing and find him very good as finisher after Norton 8k.

After 8k I start with moderate slurry I rise with my Atoma400 (It's very hard stone so it's hard to get slurry with nagura I get with stone).
I do 2-3 dilution when slurry change color. After that I check edge with microscope and if I see scratches from 8k I do all this one more time. I use some pressure in this phase.

After that I do some strokes on clear water. When stone start to drag my razor I know I'm ready to move to runing water. There I do some more strokes until razor dont start to "sing". For now I find this as good progression for this stone. I still learning this stone but this is my notice for now.

After cleaning and drying razor can pass HHT2-3 right of stone. After stroping now I can get HHT4. Hope that I will master this stone even better because I like him very much.

I forget to say - shave was smooth of course.

Cheers,
Davor