Thread: Ridding an Arkansas Stone of Oil.

I got a bottle of Ballistol along with a razor I bought on ebay. European seller gifted the bottle. Stuff reminds me of mineral oil. Anyone know if it is petroleum based or ........ ?

Supposedly Mineral Oil.
Lots of links on the webs. Herse one. Ballistol, The World’s First “CLP”

Originally Posted by JimmyHAD

I got a bottle of Ballistol along with a razor I bought on ebay. European seller gifted the bottle. Stuff reminds me of mineral oil. Anyone know if it is petroleum based or ........ ?

Yup mineral oil. It does everything mineral oil does but is water soluble and when mixed with water is supposed to neutralize skin oils which is helpful when dealing with steel and/or Ivory. I pay about .80¢/oz and then mix with a bit of water so end up paying about .50¢/oz. pretty cheap and very useful as I also use it ALL around the house. From hinges to wood to leather. Cleans guns, great honing oil, doesnt hurt strops, keeps my ivory from drying out, ect. Oh boy, don't get me going. It is Steel recommended.

I posted the following on another forum site;

Hi Kees; there's a common statement commonly referred too by users of honing stones; if you start using oil on a stone, you should continue using oil on that stone. There is relevance within that statement to the fact that, if you wanted to change over to water, you would 1st need to leech the stone of existing oil. But there is an opposite argument that can be put forth, that being, the stone may actually perform better with water.

I have heard arguments on the Razor Forum suggesting that Washita and Ark stones are OIL STONES. That in my opinion is a misleading statement. There are very few natural stones that you could categorise as a true Oil stone. I can only think of 1 from my own experience, and that would be some of the darker Hindostans. Due to their high properties within Iron Oxide, the use of water would turn the stones surface to a Rust Oxide, which is something most would likely want to avoid, as a measure to protect the integrity of the stone itself, and the tool being worked.

Now, returning to the discussion on Ark Stones. As you mentioned from your own experience, Arks are more than likely slow cutters, primarily as they fail to release any cutting slurry to assist to rate of cut. I don't have a great deal of experience with Arks or Wahita, but from my experience with other nat stones oil as a lubricant can be used to slow the rate of cut within any given nat stone due to the inherent viscous film it generates between the 2 surfaces being worked. This Ark stone that was the basis behind me started this thread, is a very slow cutting stone, unsuitable for my needs as a woodworker. I had 2 choices available, 1 was to put the stone aside and let it gather dust through lack of use, or 2, leech the stone of existing oil and trial it with water as the surface lubricant. As you have been following this thread, you would know that I went ahead with leaching the stone of oil, and tested this Ark with water. There was a notable improvement in the cutting performance of this stone, to the level that will see its further within fine honing my woodworking chisels and irons.

I have learnt a great deal from this journey, and hopefully by sharing that experience with other forum members, they will have gained a similar experience.

Appreciate your feedback Kees.

I was hoping for a bit more feedback from other forum members, but that's okay.

regards Stewie;

Originally Posted by StewieS

I was hoping for a bit more feedback from other forum members, but that's okay.

Stewie, you may get feedback down the road. Ark users who've followed the thread would have to be motivated by your posting this new method to try it themselves. That would require removing the oil from existing stones, or using water on a new stone. IOW, it probably won't happen overnight, but I imagine there will be some who will give it a shot. Many honers and stone mavens are curious folk, and will want to try it themselves.

As I already posted I had tried water only. My stones are all cleaned up of any oil residue. I found the stones to cut much faster but ran into two problems over the many months of doing this. First- They loaded up with swarf which slowed them to the point of not being useful for my purposes and secondly although they were faster (at first) I found a much better edge using oil. Now, I only hone about 5 razors a week and have only been using an ark progression for a couple years roughly so I am not saying others won't have more experience but at the same time it is not anything new to me.

Originally Posted by StewieS

I was hoping for a bit more feedback from other forum members, but that's okay.

Just a W.A.G. but I'd postulate that most members use Japanese style synthetics or naturals other than Arkys so I wouldn't expect a flood of feedback.
Might make an interesting poll if someone was interested enough.

I've used Arkanstones for years on my pocket knives. Only recently did I acquire a suitable bench set for straight razors.

My findings are as follows: Oil is good for a very keen edge. And Arkanstones don't care what kind of oil you use, as Steel pointed out. Yes, it does curtail the speed a bit. Oil lets the blade skim over the 'tooth' of the stone and remove a bit less with each pass. But if you care less about speed, and more about how keen your edge is, IMO oil is hands down the way to go. It also keeps the swarf afloat, which keeps it from getting into the pores. And here's another tidbit I'm sure you're not seeing yet with water but may eventually, oil will also prevent the left behind swarf from rusting - at least for a little while.

Now onto the set I use for straight razors. These stones have been used with water only, maybe slurry from a different stone, with exception to the finisher - a banded 6" Translucent stone. My soft and hard stones I've used with slurry made from a Dragon's tongue rubbing stone and a piece of coticule. Both slurry types work, coticule more so to speed it up. Not sure if you've ever used a slurry, but coticule made my Hard Arkie cut better than the soft one with plain water. Handy tidbit of info to have.

With water my findings are much like yours, Stewie. It's a grittier feed back, and certainly is faster to remove metal from the blade. But you have to be a little finicky about cleaning the stone afterward, you don't want metal left behind in the pores to rust or clog them. Water alone is fine for the bevel setting phase and mid level polishing. Perfectly acceptable for just about any blade. Maybe even a shaving razor if you're OK with how yours feel coming off a Black/Surgical/Translucent. But I like my shaving razors a little more keen, so I put a little shaving lather atop the finisher I mentioned earlier, and do my final strokes on that.

Shaving lather has all the added benefits of oil - floats swarf, keeps pores from clogging, slows the cut and makes it finer - while still being easy to wash off so your stone isn't 'contaminated.' Added bonus, my translucent stone smells like one of my favorite shaving lathers.

So basically, you need to tailor your honing medium to the desired performance you're looking to get from your hone, and level of maintenance you're looking to put in it. Oil turns it into a splash & go affair. Wipe swarf away when you're done, put it away slightly wet until it's needed again. Repeat until cutting speed diminishes enough to need a quick scuff with sand paper to rough up the surface. I've sharpened countless knives, chisels, and scraper blades on the set of stones I have at work (oiled). Takes me maybe 5 minutes per blade to get where I want to be for scraper blades, maybe 10 for a pocket knife. Less for chisels, but a mechanics cold chisels aren't quite the same animal as a wood worker's chisels. They're small hard and translucent stones, so only 2 steps nothing fancy. And since these reside in my toolbox at work, there's no time to be fussing around lapping or scuffing the surface to improve cutting speed - better to just use the oil that came with them and let them do what they do oh so well. I surfaced them once when I got them, and that's all the care they've needed.

With water you're likely to find yourself flattening/lapping/scuffing the surface up a little bit more often to clean pores and refresh the cutting power of the hone. I don't particularly need to worry about that with straight razors - slow cutting is removing less metal, leaving a better polish and finer edge - the desired end result. A burnished stone, even if it's a soft Arkie, is not a bad stone in my book. If too slow in the bevel setting phase for my taste, there's always slurry to kick things up a notch or 2.

Perhaps one day I'll invest in another set of 8x3 stones so I can enjoy both worlds without the aggravation of leeching oil from my stones. Until then, the large stones I have will remain water stones.

Originally Posted by Marshal

With water you're likely to find yourself flattening/lapping/scuffing the surface up a little bit more often to clean pores and refresh the cutting power of the hone. I don't particularly need to worry about that with straight razors - slow cutting is removing less metal, leaving a better polish and finer edge - the desired end result.

I have also done plenty of trials (years worth) using water on stones that are traditionally used with oil. I have found that the stones dull and load considerably faster at the low end of the grit spectrum, as stated by Marshall. If oil is used instead, the speed falls off after lapping, then stabilizes and very very slowly drops off gradually. This rapid dulling on water can be mitigated by more frequent lapping, as Marshall also mentioned, but personally the thing I like about Arks is NOT having do that, so I use oil. At the finer end of the spectrum (especially on a burnished stone like used for razor honing) there's very little difference in what is used for lubricant because the stone has already been drastically dulled/slowed.

Gents; I cant say I have had any of the problems mentioned regarding the use of water on my honing stones. The stones gets a wipe down after use, and any fine hone metal is removed. Some of my water stones are designed to be used with a cutting slurry , and others without.