Thread: For a shaver, which single hone.

For a shaver, which single man made hone makes sense to maintain an edge?

I have this pile of hones that I collected to rescue razors and get them
shaveable. I almost have enough razors now and can see how many rocks
I do not need or use when shaving is my goal.

I always recommend that a new razor be honed by a hone master.
I know that the bevel will get set, I know that it will give a darn fine
shave for a long time but eventually it will need a touch up. The hone
master shared the number of layers of tape if he/she used any. So...

Q#1: Is there a single hone that can be used on the first Saturday of the month
to refresh a razor. Five, ten, twenty nice smooth hone strokes. Rinse, dry, strop
and shave for the next month.

Q#2: Might there be a pair of hones that works better than a single hone.

Yes I have a couple hones that I use for my shavers. I do not use a full
progression of hones. I am skipping natural stones because getting a good
one is sort of a lottery.

The razor shaved yesterday... when to touch it up. how to simply touch it up.

You need some type of finishing hone to maintain your razor. There are many types of hones that can be used for finishing, but which one works best for you depends on your razors, your honing method, and your razor edge preferences.

For example, many people love Coticule edges. I can shave off a Coticule edge, but it is not as keen as I would like. If I get a new razor that has been finished on a Coticule, I will shave with it once or twice and then rehone the razor.

Some folks say you can shave off a Norton 8K edge. For me, that is not sharp enough; I want a 12K edge at a minimum. A Naniwa 12K or good Chinese 12K will get you to that level. The Chinese hones vary in quality; not all of them are true finishers.

I prefer finishing around 15K. A good Escher, Thuringen, JNAT, Welsh slates, Vermio, Zulu grey, surgical black Arkansas, or even some Imperia La Roccia stones can finish around that level. Of course, it is impossible to assign a true grit rating to any natural stone. Individual specimens vary.

There are some synthetic hones like the Shapton 15K, the Suehiro Gokumyo 20K and the Shapton 30K, that are good finishers.

Thus, you really have to find out what works best for you. That is why many who hone their own razors have a collection of stones, but they eventually lean towards a couple of favorites.

What RayClem said. Whatever your favorite finisher is would probably be good enough, provided you touch up as soon as the shave feels off. Easier to keep a blade sharp than to put it off until it need a full re-hone. I would say it's probably good to keep a full 1K to finish progression on hand, just in case a blade gets dropped. But if I were to pare it down to one hone I could live with any one of the following:

Norton 4/8
Swaty Barber hone
Pike Barber hone
Raven Barber hone
Celtes barber hone
Glass barber hone
Shapton Kuromaku 12K

Ordered roughly from least-fine to most fine out of the synthetic hones in my possession. I'd probably also be perfectly content with a Naniwa 8/10/12K stone. But it all depends on how refined an edge you need, if your beard is thick like Rays and 8K doesn't work for you finer is clearly better. I suppose I'm lucky that an 8K edge will suffice for my needs, but for the topic at hand any of the stones I named save for maybe the glass one would likely only take 5 to 10 swipes across a stone to bring an edge back to par if caught early enough. I'm not about to retire my beloved naturals anytime soon, but speaking hypothetically I could live without them. Probably.

Not all naturals are a crap shoot, though some have said this about Coticules. This has not been my limited experience and I have three Coticules. As a single finisher, I would recommend the Arkansas True Hard, Hard Black, or Translucent from Dan's Whetstones. The stones are consistent and finish a razor fabulously, and the company reliable.

Well you could go to all places with this. However what is your favourite edge. If you did it yourself or someone else honed the blade, what is your most oh wow edge. Pick that hone.

Simplest, easy-peasy finishing on a synthetic: Naniwa 12k, hands-down. In fact, my neighbor currently has mine learning how to refresh a tugging edge on his newish PRC. I also gave him one of my recent rescales with a Norton 8k edge to see if he could improve it.

Personally, I get a great, smooth shave off a Norton 8k. A Norton 4/8 combo is not nearly as sexy as many other options, but it will do 95% of what any shaver needs to accomplish barring repairs on ebay beaters. Naturals are a whole 'nother rabbit hole, as you guys know.

#1) I would say my naniwa 12k fits the bill, but I have been considering looking at higher grit finishers.

#2) I would say my 5k naniwa with 12k naniwa. I had success the only time I tried it, when I wasn't paying attention and skipped my 8k. I would pick it because I am sometimes tough on my edges and would want something that can overcome minor improper stropping chips. This of course assumes 2 and only 2 hones forever, of which I am and will be eternally inable.

Originally Posted by niftyshaving

Q#1: Is there a single hone that can be used on the first Saturday of the month
to refresh a razor. Five, ten, twenty nice smooth hone strokes. Rinse, dry, strop
and shave for the next month.

Any decent finisher that you already have can accomplish that task. However, even though some people do it, I don't see the point in honing on a schedule. To me, it makes more sense to hone only when you notice that the razor no longer is shaving the way that you expected, regardless of the length of that interval.

Originally Posted by niftyshaving

Q#2: Might there be a pair of hones that works better than a single hone.

In general, I don't think that is necessary. You might need a lower grit hone if you damaged your edge. You also might want to use a pair if you are using a really slow stone, like some Arks, if you are impatient to get the edge back more quickly.

Originally Posted by niftyshaving

The razor shaved yesterday... when to touch it up. how to simply touch it up.

As I've said many times, including just above, touch up the edge when you notice any diminishment in the quality of the shave. How that is done depends on the state of the edge and the particular hone you choose to use. It might be 5 strokes on a Swaty or 200+ on a surgical black Arkansas.

I go back to my first razor which I had professionally honed. I bought a Naniwa 8k superstone, to maintain that edge. I could always shave on my razor that had those 20 touch up strokes and if there were no such things as Suehiro 20k's and the like I'm sure I'd still be happily shaving on the 8k superstone edge.

Well I've have like 25 coticules, collected and tamed thou the years.

All of them can be used as a single stone hone. That means you can finish a razor on them.

Two of these coticules did require a lot more technique then the rest. Both where extremely fast.

But in general all are great stones.

I do have all kind of hones. The Naniwa series is also great, but you'll need more then one hone. I find the coticules are by far the best stones. If you hone all progression on a Coticule you'll get a super smooth shave.

This forum is very great, but I do find that advice and opinions shifts a lot. A few years back coticules was the best, now al kind of exotic hones, takes that place. I think that's natural because most honemasters here, love to collect hones and love honing more then shaving, at least that's how I feel myself [emoji4].

A Coticule can finish around 16K, if the skills of the honer is sufficient. It takes years to learn, but nothing good comes easy and it's much easier to learn with only one hone and a slurry stone.

There's many layers of coticules and must people agreed, that the La Veinette is the best. I find that all layers can reach the same results if mastered properly.

Buy a big one, that holds the entire blade. That way it's easier to hone must razors.

The price is worth it.


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