Thread: For Crying Out Loud

I am still working with my one natural: which I believe is a Welsh Slate. This rock has produced a very nice edge and there is something righteous about rock and steel. Yesterday I was touching up a razor and I felt a weird scratching as the razor passed over the surface. Not being able to identify it, I kept going...
I felt it again, and again, and I stopped. I felt the hone with my finger and felt a speck that didn't really belong there. I looked at the bevel and saw an aberration in the stria, a scratch.
I cleaned the Smiths from the hone and ran a piece of 800 wet/dry over the surface and everything seemed Jake.
Does anyone know what may have happened?
Thanks

Someone at the factory screwed up and let a stray bit of something foreign into your otherwise relatively homogenous piece of rock. Blame a deity, or mother nature, or a dinosaur's ancestor. When you notice something like that, you just have to clear it off and continue on and chalk it up as a learning experience.

I've had the same happen with just about every hone I have - synthetics included. Some days it really drives me up a wall. I've learned to stop and clear the hone if I feel anything snag the blade. Could be some random bit of who knows what lodged in the rock millions of years ago, could just be a piece of trash missed in prep.

Be sure to wash/rinse hones off before use, it is surprising how small a piece of dust or lint can be felt. And if you overlooked that little piece of hair from the HHT that stuck to the blade via static, that feels like honing with a boulder on the hone.

As far as natural inclusions go, sometimes you just have to deal with them. It isn't unusual to have to 'pick' one on a jnat now and then.

Cheers, Steve

I've had that with just about every stone I've had, something gets embedded in there or something works it's way out. You can usually feel that when honing, when I do I give it a few passes with a DMT and problem solved

I don't use naturals but I have had similar incidents with synthetics. I chalked it up to dirty hones. I started giving my stones a good rub down under running water before use and it hasn't happened again.

The key is to stop and deal with it as soon as you notice it. I hone over a cafeteria tray, so I can be liberal with water on the hones. If I notice anything odd, I stop honing, tilt the hone lengthwise, and squirt water so that it washes off the surface from one end to the other. If that does not clear it, then I wipe my hand across the hone a few times. One of those almost always solves the promlem but if it does not then its time for a diamond plate.

Originally Posted by WW243

I am still working with my one natural: which I believe is a Welsh Slate. This rock has produced a very nice edge and there is something righteous about rock and steel. Yesterday I was touching up a razor and I felt a weird scratching as the razor passed over the surface. Not being able to identify it, I kept going...
I felt it again, and again, and I stopped. I felt the hone with my finger and felt a speck that didn't really belong there. I looked at the bevel and saw an aberration in the stria, a scratch.
I cleaned the Smiths from the hone and ran a piece of 800 wet/dry over the surface and everything seemed Jake.
Does anyone know what may have happened?
Thanks

That was probably just a flawless 3 carat diamond you just pulverized and flushed down the drain. You never know about those inclusions.

Originally Posted by thebigspendur

That was probably just a flawless 3 carat diamond you just pulverized and flushed down the drain. You never know about those inclusions.

Sir, may I offer you a diamond-studded Jnat? I'll make you a good price on it and there are more than pictured!

Cheers, Steve