Thread: A Few Mystery Stones...

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Thanks for posting this. Good pics of lapped hone surfaces are very useful for those of us affilcted by the HAD disease!
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I think you're going to fit in here on SRP just fine.

Another one in today. It came from someone in Conwy, which is a small town in north Wales very close to most of the historic quarries, and turned out to be something a little peculiar...

This is a fine-ish sandstone (I think), around 2k I guess, and relatively slow. Slurries easily enough with an atoma and feels quite a lot like a Dalmore or Hindostan in use though finishes a little coarser, but that probably doesn't tell you anything other than it's a fine-ish sandstone.

The stone had been used with oil previously so was probably a lighter shade originally, I'm inclined to think this is a Gwespyr stone. What do we reckon...?






[Dunno why these pics have come up sideways, and not sure how to change it. Lie down to view them properly.]

Wow, that's a nice looking stone. I have no insights but I'll be watching eagerly. I love sandstones. It's one of the few usable types of naturally occurring stones we have here in Florida other than lots of chert which is normally too included to use for honing. If that's what that is that should be a really good one from the look of it.

The first one might be a Rouge de Salm.

Originally Posted by PaulFLUS

Wow, that's a nice looking stone. I have no insights but I'll be watching eagerly. I love sandstones. It's one of the few usable types of naturally occurring stones we have here in Florida other than lots of chert which is normally too included to use for honing. If that's what that is that should be a really good one from the look of it.

Quite cool isn't it! Was pretty dirty when I got so probably wouldn't have bid if I hadn't noticed where the seller was from - I thought it might be an Idwal tbh - but I was the only bidder so nice and cheap . Having used it a bit last night, I'm pretty certain it is a Gwespyr (which is only about 20 miles from Conwy). Apart from G&H there's vanishingly little info about them, just one guy on B&B who found one after a long search and reckons it's a very good natural bevel setter.

You're lucky to have good sandstone around you - I've tried finding some and making a few in Aus and all the stuff near me is either too hard, too soft, too irregular &c. Quite a lot of sand sand there though so I'll keep looking

Originally Posted by Kees

The first one might be a Rouge de Salm.

Interesting you should say that; one of the other stones I received at the same time was a Goldfisch Wetzstein, and I understand from some old posts here that general consensus has that as a type of RdS / LaL. I looked at the two side by side the other day, and they're pretty similar looking and feeling, same colour, same slurry &c. I might give them a try together soon to compare, but I think there's a distinct possibility that you're right. Which would be nice, it's a big stone too.

Is RdS sometimes known to have that kind of light green inclusion, like the little 'eye' on my stone? It feels quite hard, not like it's just a bit of yellow coticule that's crept in.

Originally Posted by cotedupy

Is RdS sometimes known to have that kind of light green inclusion, like the little 'eye' on my stone? It feels quite hard, not like it's just a bit of yellow coticule that's crept in.

Pierre la Lune often has those green inclusions.
https://razorlovestones.wordpress.co...12/lalune_011/

I was thinking LaL as a possibility for stone 2 or 3 maybe(?) though I've no idea how I'd tell the difference between that and Melynllyn. All the stones were from vendors in the UK, so I imagine the latter might be more likely.

(Though 2 and 3 came from the same person selling off her late father's collection, and he had some very high quality stones from all over, so who knows!)

Originally Posted by cotedupy

Quite cool isn't it! Was pretty dirty when I got so probably wouldn't have bid if I hadn't noticed where the seller was from - I thought it might be an Idwal tbh - but I was the only bidder so nice and cheap . Having used it a bit last night, I'm pretty certain it is a Gwespyr (which is only about 20 miles from Conwy). Apart from G&H there's vanishingly little info about them, just one guy on B&B who found one after a long search and reckons it's a very good natural bevel setter.

You're lucky to have good sandstone around you - I've tried finding some and making a few in Aus and all the stuff near me is either too hard, too soft, too irregular &c. Quite a lot of sand sand there though so I'll keep looking



Interesting you should say that; one of the other stones I received at the same time was a Goldfisch Wetzstein, and I understand from some old posts here that general consensus has that as a type of RdS / LaL. I looked at the two side by side the other day, and they're pretty similar looking and feeling, same colour, same slurry &c. I might give them a try together soon to compare, but I think there's a distinct possibility that you're right. Which would be nice, it's a big stone too.

I have both: Rouge du Salm is soft, Goldfisch is harder. Inclusions resemble the ones in the Goldfisch.

Check this thread out:
https://sharprazorpalace.com/hones/1...tzstein-2.html

Originally Posted by Kees

I have both: Rouge de Salme is soft, Goldfisch is harder. Inclusions resemble the ones in the Goldfisch.

Ta! Yeah my larger one is certainly fairly soft, and my Goldfisch is one of the small 5 x 1.25 ones, so doesn't have any green type inclusions, that I can see.

I actually used the Goldfisch properly for finishing yesterday, and was rather impressed. It's not a particularly lovely feeling stone to use, but the results were quite impressive. Do you like them?

I'm also going to be trying the large stone again this evening, though not for a razor - I don't have any of my normal kasumi stones with me, and need to finish a yanagi for someone. I suspect that because it's quite soft it might work quite well, BBW can certainly polish quite nicely with mud.