Thread: Question about burnishing Arkansas black

It’s not so much the reflectivity of the stone, it is the smoothness.

When you burnish with a hard edge, like a large carbon, kitchen knife, cleaver or wide plane blade, you will feel any rough spots. You can also hear them.

Keep working those spots until the whole stone face is smooth. Then try a razor on the stone, you want honing performance, not necessarily the shiniest stone.

Keep the ladder on the right wall…

Euclid I am thinking that as well. Lapped up to 800 grit and while reflective it is nowhere near mirror. It extremely smooth though. Took my favorite carbon Japanese knife and went to town with x and half strokes. 2 birds with one stone as it were. The stone is getting smoother and shinier and my knife was getting better by the second. Just finished slicing tomatoes for burgers and while not shaving sharp it is still wicked sharp with a highly polished bevel. Win win. I figure the stone is good to go for now and will improve with use. Have a drawer full of carbon and stainless knives I need to work through and the stone and knives will get just that much better.

Burnishing the stone will make it more reflective. Basically burnishing dulls the abrasive particles, which makes them take a flatter or rounded edge, and that will cause them to reflect more light. All stones will pretty much reflect at a steep angle, this is just refraction. If you want to speed up the burnishing, use water when doing the burnishing.

Originally Posted by EdwinHMcBride

Euclid I am thinking that as well. Lapped up to 800 grit and while reflective it is nowhere near mirror. It extremely smooth though. Took my favorite carbon Japanese knife and went to town with x and half strokes. 2 birds with one stone as it were. The stone is getting smoother and shinier and my knife was getting better by the second. Just finished slicing tomatoes for burgers and while not shaving sharp it is still wicked sharp with a highly polished bevel. Win win. I figure the stone is good to go for now and will improve with use. Have a drawer full of carbon and stainless knives I need to work through and the stone and knives will get just that much better.

I love it! Win-win indeed. I use my Arkansas stones for my kitchen knives, pocket knives, and razors. They leave an amazing edge for sure. I think what you did there was spot on!

So I used a razor that was last used on my welsh slates a few months ago. The edge gas falling off for some time now and was due for a refresh. I ran it over the ark with x and half strokes for about 8-10 minutes this morning. No lap counting just go go go. Checked it under my 60x scope. There was obvious improvement to the edge. Toothiness was visibly reduced and the bevel was highly polished. Stropped on nylon and leather and checked on arm hair it was cutting effortlessly. 2 pass shave was smooth and clean. Minimal irritation.

Very impressed. I think this stone still has a little way to go and this razor is still due for a proper refresh but with just 10 minutes on the ark a notable difference was made. I see good things with this stone in my future.

Originally Posted by EdwinHMcBride

So I used a razor that was last used on my welsh slates a few months ago. The edge gas falling off for some time now and was due for a refresh. I ran it over the ark with x and half strokes for about 8-10 minutes this morning. No lap counting just go go go. Checked it under my 60x scope. There was obvious improvement to the edge. Toothiness was visibly reduced and the bevel was highly polished. Stropped on nylon and leather and checked on arm hair it was cutting effortlessly. 2 pass shave was smooth and clean. Minimal irritation.

Very impressed. I think this stone still has a little way to go and this razor is still due for a proper refresh but with just 10 minutes on the ark a notable difference was made. I see good things with this stone in my future.

A good hard Ark is an interesting hone.

With use an Ark will be smoother and smoother over time and move from
abrasive to more of a burnishing rock (plastic flow). If you saw, sand
or lap an Ark it will have texture the way a steel file has teeth and like
a file be abrasive. With use it will be less abrasive and more of a dull
burnishing tool. This is ideal for many razors....

The best surface conditioner is any old block of steel after
the Ark has been finished with a fine flat abrasive. Slurry from
another hone might be a good choice to give the steel block a
bit of action. The slurry bits will break down and ultimately polish
more than abrade.

Old block of steel... use a Gold Dollar if you have one in the box ;-)

Once conditioned and polished it is good for decades. Yes use oil,
or WD40. I thought I hated mine until I learned this.

At this very moment, while consuming an adult beverage and listing to my favorite music, I'm giving one side of my 2x5 Norton translucent a good working over with a 1x3 black with .5 mic diamond paste (very, very,little) thinned with wd40. the results are astonishing. After, I'll abuse it with a chunk of D-2 steel that I fabricated just that purpose, to be sure there is no trapped abrasive. Labor of love...

Originally Posted by duke762

At this very moment, while consuming an adult beverage and listing to my favorite music, I'm giving one side of my 2x5 Norton translucent a good working over with a 1x3 black with .5 mic diamond paste (very, very,little) thinned with wd40. the results are astonishing. After, I'll abuse it with a chunk of D-2 steel that I fabricated just that purpose, to be sure there is no trapped abrasive. Labor of love...

I'm currently burnishing a charnley forest and things are going SLOWLY. Do you CrOx on the back of a DMT Plate or Chinese 12k would work to burnish the charnley forest?


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Used some mineral oil ( norton) on the black ark with my ATOR. Not impressed. The oil was way too thick and the razor was hard to handle and keep steady. The edge was toothy and uncomfortable. Very little irritation though. I would say it came out very sharp but obviously not very keen. Went back to water and the keenness is back. Will try wd40 soon as it's a watery oil and that may be what I'm looking for. If not then oh well. I get great results with water and I'm very happy with that.

Only thing I had on hand was diamond paste. Used a progression of 4 grits on granite tile. Since my compound is in paste form, I thinned it with WD40 to slurry it up. It's like Brylcream. A little dab will do ya'. I stop at a lower grit for softer stones. One side of my blacks and trans are mirrored real nice with .5, one is the next lower grit I have which leaves the surface ever so slightly hazy. This gives me a very fine, final step before finishing on the mirrored side.