Thread: Arkansas Translucent preparation

Originally Posted by S0LITARYS0LDIER

1) you bought the ludicrously expensive Shapton lapping plate?
2) there is no way in hell I would even attempt to lap something as hard as a trans ark on it.

As to #1, why, yes I did.
As to #2, that's why I'm asking questions.

No, don’t lap on your Shapton’s, they won’t phase it. If the Arks are out of flat, lap on lose grit Silicon Oxide starting at 60 grit up to 500, GotGrit.com. Then switch to wet & dry up to 2k. You will only have to lap it flat once. Honing a razor you will never hone it out of flat.

Burnishing is smoothing the stone using hard, carbon steel a wide chisel or large kitchen knife using lots of pressure and water or oil as a lube. The more laps you do the smoother the finish on the stone face and smoother the finish it will put on a razor. Minimum of 2-300 laps more, the more better, use pressure.

On a 4 in stone I would figure out a way to hold the stone, stone holder or padded vice and put some steel to it. I use carbon steel cleavers, the wide, hard, thick blade give you a good two handed grip.

Check this trans thread.

Originally Posted by Euclid440

No, don’t lap on your Shapton’s, they won’t phase it. If the Arks are out of flat, lap on lose grit Silicon Oxide starting at 60 grit up to 500, GotGrit.com. Then switch to wet & dry up to 2k. You will only have to lap it flat once. Honing a razor you will never hone it out of flat.

Burnishing is smoothing the stone using hard, carbon steel a wide chisel or large kitchen knife using lots of pressure and water or oil as a lube. The more laps you do the smoother the finish on the stone face and smoother the finish it will put on a razor. Minimum of 2-300 laps more, the more better, use pressure.

On a 4 in stone I would figure out a way to hold the stone, stone holder or padded vice and put some steel to it. I use carbon steel cleavers, the wide, hard, thick blade give you a good two handed grip.

However I get it burnished I gotta do it up in the truck, probably. They should be in by Friday and I'll be home Sunday with about 48 hours home time.

Remember, these are pocket stones 4x1 5/8. I'll likely have to hold them in my hand to burnish them.

The sales rep gal at Dan's Whetstone guaranteed they'd be flat. I'm not too concerned about that. But things don't always turn out as you think they should.

So, 1. Lots of pressure. 2. Hard steel instrument. 3. Lots of strokes. And I'm looking for a high polish, luster to come up on the stones, right?

Yes. After burnishing it should feel like glass

The black I got from Dans came flat enough to use although I did go and lap it anyway. Like was said before, conditioning the stone is very important, I uses a meat cleaver with heavy pressure for mine. That's after lapping it up to 2K with wet/dry sand paper.

All excellent advice here. Sounds like you're understanding pretty well. Dans is great for lapping their stones flat. You should be fine there. I burnished all of my translucent pocket stones by putting them on the floor and using pressure with an old wedge razor(any heavy blade). A couple hundred laps and they were good enough to start. They get better with use but at some point the glaze on them has a point of diminishing returns in my opinion.

Arkansas properly used will give you some of the best and smoothest edges.

My wife is the carpenter in the family. I was telling her about the burnishing process and what I've learned. I've read where some take chisels and burnish the Arks. Without mentioning the chisel idea, she says, why don't you use a chisel? She now wants a set of chisels. Okay, I say. Just be sure one is a 2 incher.

BTW, I did a search of "Translucent Arkansas Burnish Burnishing" here at SRP in advance search and found pages of great stuff from over the years.

Once I get the stones and chisel, I intend to come back here and do before and after pictures and describe the process.

Originally Posted by Longhaultanker

My wife is the carpenter in the family. I was telling her about the burnishing process and what I've learned. I've read where some take chisels and burnish the Arks. Without mentioning the chisel idea, she says, why don't you use a chisel? She now wants a set of chisels. Okay, I say. Just be sure one is a 2 incher.

BTW, I did a search of "Translucent Arkansas Burnish Burnishing" here at SRP in advance search and found pages of great stuff from over the years.

Once I get the stones and chisel, I intend to come back here and do before and after pictures and describe the process.

That's a great idea that has not been done before and IMO would really be helpful. I'm m looking forward to seeing it.

It might be easier to burnish a small stone on a block of steel, moving the stone rather than steel, so you could put some pressure on a corner, without worrying about slipping off the edge.

I have a small 1.5 x 1.5 x 3 in block that would work fine for that. I have never burnished anything smaller than a 6x2 in stone, using chisels and knives. A piece of rubber drawer liner keeps the stone from sliding.