Thread: So I bought a stone...

Ok, I read your last post.

What do you mean a V shape edge, how badly warped is the razor? How is the other side?

You might try the other side of the stone, if it is smooth it may be more aggressive if unused and you can use the two sides as a progression. I recommend lapping one side up 600 and burnish the other as fine as possible.

If you are going to lap one side, lap the bottom. When you use the 600 side, use more pressure and finish on the burnished side with lite pressure.

Ink on a dry stone will show you where you are making contact. Were you able to get a good shaving edge with you Coticule? If so a translucent will improve a coticule edge.

By V shape, I mean that the edge is not straight it looks like an open V; the blade does not have a constant width, it is widest about a third of the way from the heel. See picture:



There is a possibility that the blade is not warped, but has bad geometry. Because of this, it is tedious work to do lots of passes over an Ark. Not impossible, but time consuming. This particular razor was honed by a friend of mine. It was shave ready. The bevel is set. I just want to refresh the edge, as it doesn't shave like day one anymore.
@Euclid : about the coticule - I'very bought a stone that was advertised as being a coticule, but turned up to be this Ark. The seller has no idea what he was selling.

I had another go today using lather as a lubricant. I can treetop my arm hairs now. I'll probably shave test over the weekend. I do not think the lather was better than the wd40, I'd say that is the extra honing time that made a difference.

Chances are if your sharpie mark the edge, you will find you are not making full contact on that edge, the razor has issues.

It has been honed aggressively and honed on the tang. Additionally, without a stabilizer and hollow ground the blade will flex easily and lift the edge off the hone and grind the back of the bevel. So, the honer added more pressure on the heel and ground the heel half of the edge more than the toe and given you the V edge.

The problems were too much pressure, flexing the bevel and honing on the tang, lifting the heel half of the razor off the stone.

The edge now needs correction, reprofiling. The easiest would be to grind the edge straight, even with the spine. It can be easily done on a Diamond plate or low grit stone. You will lose some blade width, but not that much. It will make the razor much easier to hone.

Take some measurements and mark a straight line from the lowest point from toe to heel, then grind to that line with high angle grinding or bread knifing.

Or draw a line from the toe to the heel and grind to that line, the edge will not be parallel to the spine, but the edge will be straight and easier to hone.

I didn't take one of the nice razors to test an unknown stone. I need to work on this razor however.
The shave test wasn't successful. The razor wasn't keen enough, but somehow smooth. I can't even describe it. I need to work some more with he ark.

Smooth is an ark's "je ne sais quoi" that certain undefinable something. I know exactly what you mean. I have been playing with arks a LOT lately, to the point that I put my waterstones away, and even if you don't get it quite "there" in terms of keeness it still feels very smooth. It's perplexing but one of the things that I love about them. Try doing half laps like brontosaurus describes. Half X down and back in sets on one side then switch to the other side. I do sets of 10 then 7, 5, 3,1 then ending in traditional x strokes for about 100 with progressively lighter pressure until it is almost leveiating at the end. I don't really count the sets. I just do a bunch at 10 then less as I go to lower numbers. This speeds the process too because it eliminates a lot of the flipping. I would also try roughing one side and burnishing one side so you can do a small progression. With that stone properly flattened, smoothed and dressed you should be able to refresh and get WOW edges.

That is exactly what I have been doing.
I won't mess with the stone just yet. I'll try a better razor first and work from there.
The only other razor I have with me is a kamisori and I'm tempted to give it a go on the ark.

Okay good then. Didn't mean to hone-splain.

I ordered a Belomo 20X loupe. I find it more difficult to use than the 10X one. I'll give it another try tomorrow with better light.

Originally Posted by Eurofighter

I ordered a Belomo 20X loupe. I find it more difficult to use than the 10X one. I'll give it another try tomorrow with better light.

The 20x loupe will have a narrower field of view, a shallower depth of focus, and a closer focal distance, which does make it more difficult to use than lower powers. And wait until that closer focal distance lets you bump the loupe into the edge and you go back to your bevel setter. Don’t ask me how I know this.

My favorite, the best balance of wide field of view and good depth of field, is for me the 7x B&L Hastings triplet.

For those wondering which loupe to get, get 3 cheap ones of varying power. They can be had from $5-8. Once you know what power suits you, buy a B&L or Beolomo of the same power. Give the others as gifts to people that you don’t like, lol.

If you have to go cheap, the best cheap one I’ve found so far is the CKTG 20x Illuminated Loupe in the chrome body. I think that it’s more like 12x - 15x and it distorts at the edges like all cheap optics, but it has a large diameter lens and is very usable.

I have a 60x it took a bit of getting the hang of and you are right about banging into the edge with it Steve56, so I'm told LOL.