Waterstones Test/Comparison. Which is fastest-best?

Waterstones Test/Comparison. Which is fastest-best?

I came across these two charts buried on the Tools from Japan website/blog, that I found interesting and what I have always suspected about, quality Waterstone performance.

Back in 2011, Stu Tierney tested a variety of the popular water stones on a variety of tool steels, to see which was the fastest cutting.

Now, I know he was not testing razors, but the results are interesting, and pretty much what I have suspected for years… it really does not matter all that, much which brand you use, they (Quality Waterstones) all perform pretty much the same.

What is interesting but not surprising is the consistency in performance of the stones, across the board. Nice to see it in print.

Yes, you could nit-pick the procedure, and some of the newer stone are not included, but I believe results would still be the same.

So which is the best…The ones you know how to use…

Here’s the link to the whole test. Tools from Japan, Waterstones Test. Thanks Stu.

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Originally Posted by Euclid440

So which is the best…The ones you know how to use…

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Need say no more...

I'm having a hard time with the hone wear calculations. When they are down to the pico-meter scale, which is a million fold smaller than the micron scale for single pieces of grit, then it seems to lose a little credibility. I appreciate the effort made, but I cannot accept that level of significance for hone wear in Waterstone testing part IV.

The significance on razors is small, but from all the stones around 1k I've bought and used them on swords, my results were similar. For example, comparing the king 1k with the sigma select II 1.2k, the second is at least 10 times faster. It could even be 20x as fast. Or the difference between the Bester-fast and Naniwa superstone-slow, which is similar to the king. And Norton 1k. I would like to get an Arashiyama some time soon but I have no clue on where to find them. Without ridiculously expensive shipping.

Also, we need a thread with the exact same title that compares natural finishing stones, with/without slurry, that's what I thought this thread was about when I read the title.