Thread: Coti bout standard and select differences?

As with any stone/ hone, there are those that learn/ enjoy the hone and those that don't. After a lot of success or failure, the person may develop a definite emotional attitude toward the particular genre of rock.
Such experiences are with any subjective view of life and experiences.
Shall we say:
The stones purchased may or may not satisfy the individual purchasing them but may, on transfer, affect another purchaser differently ?
YMMV
~Richard

Originally Posted by RusenBG

Well this info i get , from observation ,as im also member of the forum . I speak , only from my observation and my point of view .
Anyway , i dont whant to argue , just i have unplaisant experience with 2 stones that i like and i could not get . Anyway , maybe its just my point of view , and bad luck .
I am happy that you are ok , with previous experiencess , with purchasing coticules .
Nothing against Bart , he is very helfull , just my experience was bad and i dont like , all about , coticules and purchasing them . Sorry .

You may have had a bad experience with coticule's and you are entitled to your own opinions.

However I must side with my friend Pieter on this one. Bart and Ardennes were not professionally linked in any way. He loves coticules and tested them and sent them back to Ardennes for Ardennes Coticule to sell and hasn't done so (as far as I know, the vault hasn't been updated in years) for a very long time.. Which is like any one us testing coticules and sending them back to the mine. Never were they auctioned off, or under the table sold off. Pieter was a long time member there. I think he would know a thing or two in that arena but I am not him, as such I cannot speak for him.

To say that coticule.be's vault is an advertising trick? or to say it's naive to think that coticule.be and Ardennes Coticule weren't professionally linked are pretty bold statements.

Where I'm from there's an expression we say. It goes "buck up or shut up" which basically means if you are saying something you better prove it/do it or the latter self explanatory part if you are unable to do so. I will leave you to to think about what I am implying here.

Secondly there are many retailers that sell coticule that you can see pictures of before purchasing. I'm sure Ardennes has thousands of stones and the cost to take photographs of every single stone would be astronomical. Not to mention time consuming when dealing with literally thousands of stones. Pictures are important to me also but you have no guarantee that a stone will be a good razor hone just from looking at it. You can only find that out by use.

I don't know where you get your facts from but I would like to know as I disagree with them whole heartedly.

I have had the honour of meeting bart and staying with his family . No way was bart linked to ardanees. He was passionate about coticule and only wanted help people .
One of the most genuine blokes I have met.

Started the thread with a reasonably simple question, as far as I know Bart was a hobbyist with an interest in coticules and helping others find good ones, emphasis on Was. Ardennes are a small business who stand by their products and are very helpful if you have any queries or are unsatisfied.

Now how about not derailing this thread with personal opinions that seem very like vendor bashing if you've no helpful new information. As the thread is about a question on a specific vendor, maybe open a thread to bash cotis separately...

Originally Posted by dmnc

Now how about not derailing this thread with personal opinions that seem very like vendor bashing if you've no helpful new information. As the thread is about a question on a specific vendor, maybe open a thread to bash cotis separately...

I second that,,,

Well the conversation goes that way - i wount say a word anymore
More opinions on the coticule diference , from standart to select grade , please .

I am a jnat fellow and can't add much about coticules, I've only owned two, but I have to admit that I've read and re-read Glen's post #12 a few times and chuckled every time.

But let me paraphrase Glen's honing statement into one for natural hones: 'Inclusions are not a problem, until they are.'

Cheers, Steve

Originally Posted by dmnc

I did also state that my best finisher was a cheap standard bout from a third party, this stone has red, green, grey and some small black lines. Definitely not defective. The one Maurice chose for me is a great all rounder which doesn't finish quite as well. He's definitely a gent who does his best for customers, I'm sure if I'd asked for a finisher he'd have chosen a different stone. My curiosity was more about when you select for razors on his site, standard bouts aren't in the selection, which lead to my question of whether the criteria for select bouts also includes a more uniform shape?

I would say with the coticule standard bout it is not that they are not good for razors, but more a money and time issue. So not all standard coticules are razor quality. Bouts being much cheaper and more plentiful unless asked for specifically probably are not worth checking and putting up in the razor section. If you ask I am pretty sure he can provide a razor quality standard bout I don't think shape has anything to do with standard vs select. That being said they do have the BBW in the razor section. I would probably choose a standard bout over a BBW, but that is just me.

Right. Back on track, sorry about my part in the derailment here.

Quality wise, I've noticed no difference between standard and select grade coticules. A coticule that has hard inclusions, cracks or is otherwise unsuitable for honing is select nor standard, it simply is a defect hone that is unsuitable for honing. Which in general shouldn't reach the customer but due to (unavoidable) human error sometimes do.

Select coticules in general tend to have a more homogeneous surface appearance, and as I see it are dubbed 'select' for honers' peace of mind rather than for practical reasons. I assume selecting a visually blemish-free(ish) hone takes more time and effort, and I think they are less common than visually more interesting hones, which would explain the price increase over a standard grade.

I have two old coticules stamped "choice", does that meaning anything in particular?