Thread: Hone Identification?

That last pic does make it look like a soft Arkansas. Some of them can be pale, particularly the new ones called "hard Arkansas" (actually a soft Ark following the older system of description).

Originally Posted by cotedupy

Many thanks for this Steve, and actually looking back at the catalogue your pics do tell me what I wanted to know...

You can see in the picture below from a 1935 Catalogue, that the No.1 appears to come in a different style box from the LW, that doesn't have triangles on it. Queer Creek's came in the same, though later they changed to a box that did.

And I didn't know whether the No.1 changed too, but clearly it did. People often seem to have thrown away the cardboard boxes that old Washitas came in, so I'd never actually seen a No.1 in the triangle box before yours.

Nice stone btw! One side of it looks almost unused, was it 'NOS' when you got?

Attachment 339857

I'm glad my pics helped a little bit.
No the Washita wasn't NOS and I had to soak it in simple green before lapping it.
I could probably have left it soaking for longer really but I'm inpatient and I wanted to try it.
I have both sides at different grits for want of a better word and with different fluids and pressures it will go from bevel set (although I use a 1K for that) to surprisingly high. I have it on very good authority that it can go to 10K in better hands than mine.

Originally Posted by Brontosaurus

That last pic does make it look like a soft Arkansas. Some of them can be pale, particularly the new ones called "hard Arkansas" (actually a soft Ark following the older system of description).

Haven't handled an old Norton soft ark. This is finer than modern soft arks and the burnished areas have more shine/polish than I've seen on one. Surface feel more silky. It may be what would have been a soft ark at the time if it isn't a hard or Washita. When I find time I need to see how it does on an 8k edge.
If there isn't a stone this hard and light colored from overseas, I guess it is pretty safe to say it a novaculite anyway. If I get to go to BladeShow this year I'll take it by the Dan's Ark booth. I would like to buy a Washita and Black Ark anyway.
Thanks!

Maybe 8k , with that one. But after years of use....maybe.

Originally Posted by STF

I'm glad my pics helped a little bit.
No the Washita wasn't NOS and I had to soak it in simple green before lapping it.
I could probably have left it soaking for longer really but I'm inpatient and I wanted to try it.
I have both sides at different grits for want of a better word and with different fluids and pressures it will go from bevel set (although I use a 1K for that) to surprisingly high. I have it on very good authority that it can go to 10K in better hands than mine.

Steel (is he still posting?) used Arks like that. I would like to try that myself someday and see what I can do with a single Ark..

Originally Posted by JP5

Haven't handled an old Norton soft ark. This is finer than modern soft arks and the burnished areas have more shine/polish than I've seen on one. Surface feel more silky. It may be what would have been a soft ark at the time if it isn't a hard or Washita. When I find time I need to see how it does on an 8k edge.
If there isn't a stone this hard and light colored from overseas, I guess it is pretty safe to say it a novaculite anyway. If I get to go to BladeShow this year I'll take it by the Dan's Ark booth. I would like to buy a Washita and Black Ark anyway.
Thanks!

Your description of it sounds very like an old Norton Soft Ark; they're far finer than a lot of modern Soft Arks with the colours/patterns.

Here's a picture of a 30s/40s era Norton Soft that I have, and below a pic with the soft on the left and a No.1 Washita of the same era on the right (the same stone that Steve posted pic of above, just mine is 'mounted' in a wooden box, and his in cardboard):





Visually the stones themselves are very similar. The big difference is porosity, which means the Soft Ark has a SG of 2.39 and the Washita 2.19. But when clean they can be incredibly difficult to distinguish from each other, because they're basically the same thing...

As far as I can make out the whole idea of 'Soft Arks' was an invention of Pike's sometime between 1891 and 1897, which is the first time I've seen them mentioned. Before that what we call Soft Arks now, were very likely sold as Ouachitas. It's quite complicated and not entirely clear, but from what I can see: A lot of the modern soft arks have quite low SG readings, toward the bottom end of Washitas, and might in the c.19th have been sold as 'Calico' Ouachitas. Old Pike and Norton Soft Arks seem to have SG readings at the high end, or beyond old P-N Washitas. These stones might be more comparable to what some companies sell as Hard Arks today. The really big difference between old, 'real', Washita stones and Soft Arks is porosity, in fact it's the only difference.

(If that stone feels like a novaculite, then I don't know of any others in the world that would look like that. It's almost certainly a soft ark in that case.)

I'm used to the modern classifications, so that threw me off. Makes sense. I'm curious about how it was used. As a finisher, or possibly as a coarser option if the edge needed more than just a few laps on a finisher? Of course, it could have just been used on their scissors.

I'd say its an Ark. of some sorts. Take a look with a loupe, if ya got one, Josh.

And not all Washitas are the same, either. As said...porosity/density is the difference.

Under magnification, u can see the differences.

Like these two Washitas. One is a typical Pike, white in color, little to no transparency. The other is called a Butterscotch, more noviculite, denser, more transparent, finer cut.

Originally Posted by JP5

If there isn't a stone this hard and light colored from overseas, I guess it is pretty safe to say it a novaculite anyway.

Looks like we're all settling in on it being a soft (contemporary hard) Arkansas...

If the stone is closely cut to a 4" x 2" x 1/2" dimension, as your first photo would seem to imply, then it probably comes from an American source or at least was intended for an exclusively American market.

Overseas, it sort of recalls a Pakistani sharpening stone* I've seen, although that one is not all that hard and sandstone rather than novaculite.

*Interesting to note that the seller is now claiming that the red and white stones are rated at 400 and 3000 grit respectively, whereas around ten years ago, he was rating them at 4000 and 8000 as I recall...