Thread: Norton flattening stone not flat

What is the quickest way to flatten a Norton flattening stone?

I recently picked up a used norton flattening stone that is severely cupped in the middle.

I am thinking coarse sandpaper or garnet embedded paper, granite slab and a lot of elbow grease.

What grit of paper should I use? And are there any other suggestions on how to go about reflattening my flattening stone?

I've never done it, but I would guess something in the range of 60 to 80 grit would be best.

You can start on a concrete block or 1' square paver. Could save a few bucks. (a paver cost a dollar) I hate buying sandpaper.

+1 on what Kevin said, with the exception that I'd get some sand and put on the concrete block first, then work the flattener in a figure 8 pattern on the sand. Every now and then flip the stone 180° then continue.

Then some 60 grit or so as suggested on granite.

Thanks for your suggestions gents.
I uses a cement cinder block to flatten the norton flattening stone. Took about 30 minutes to get the stone flat. Next up will be some 80 grit and 120 grit sandpaper to finish up the process. I had to remove quite a bit of material but there is still plenty of life left on the flatting stone.

Let us know how the lapping goes with the stone.
In my experience, the Norton Flattening Stone did
not leave an acceptably smooth surface on my
Norton 4/8k. I splurged for the D8C at that point
and was happy with the results.

- Scott

There's a wiki on this that's helpful.
Hone Lapping 101 - Straight Razor Place Wiki
Kent

Originally Posted by sebell

Let us know how the lapping goes with the stone.
In my experience, the Norton Flattening Stone did
not leave an acceptably smooth surface on my
Norton 4/8k. I splurged for the D8C at that point
and was happy with the results.

- Scott

The Cement block did a good job of flatting the flattening stone. I then used 80 sand paper and 150 grit sand paper laid on a granite floor tile to finish the norton flattening stone.

Since I had everything out I used wet dry sandpaper progression of 320, 800,1200, 2000 to lap all my hones.

In the end, I don't know how the 220 Grit flatting stone would have done, but I was quite happy with the results using the progression of wet/dry sandpaper so I will be going this route till I run out of the wet/dry.

Anyone want to buy a norton flattening stone?? It's been freshly lapped flat.

Hi!
Can you tell what Grit hones have you lapped this way?
Did you finish all of them on 1000 and 2000 grit sand paper or just the finest ones?

Thanks!