Thread: Coticule Hones

Good thread and a lot of interesting points Dylan. I won't try to address much of it but in terms or the old barbers.... In the mid '80s I used to hang out at a barber shop owned by a really good friend. He had old guys who cut hair for 50 years work there at one time or another and I talked with them a fair amount about razors, strops and hones.

I bought 3 vintage coticules from different old barbers back then. They each showed me how they honed. They all used lather and slurry was never mentioned. Weight of the blade... no pressure. That is as much as they told me. That may be why I didn't succeed and gave it up until I found SRP. Anyway, none of the barbers I talked to ever mentioned lapping a stone. I don't know that they didn't lap there hones but none ever mentioned it. The coticules I bought from them were not dished to the naked eye.

As for me I lap my stones. Coticules, Eschers or whatever when I feel they need it. Nowhere near as often as I lap synthetics but I do like a relatively flat honing surface.YMMV. I am not saving them for posterity. I bought them to hone razors and if lapping them improves the performance I will lap them.

As far as rarity, I don't know exactly when Escher stopped making hones, eighty years ago or so ? I have gotten 6 of them in the last couple of years and two of them are NOS in the box. When I decide I don't want or need all of these hones .... or when I die a half dozen Eschers and 14 coticules are going to be for sale. Out of my 14 only three are current production. Point being there may not me much left in the ground but there are many out there already. Like the vintage German hones the price may be stiff but there will be coticules be they vintage or of recent harvest.

BTW, my favorite coticule and the one I would keep if I got rid of all of the rest is an 8x3 natural that was sold to The Perfect Edge by Ardennes a couple of years ago. I bought if from a forum member who wanted to get 'scary sharp' edges and didn't feel the coticule was the vehicle for that. Next best is another natural that came with a label glued to the blue side. It is an 'Old Rock' and is a 5x2. I think it is from the '50s or '60s but I'm not sure. The label glued to the blue means it was before they valued bbw as a hone and before they began using slate to back the yellow.

Edit; Dylan, didn't see your last post or I wouldn't have mentioned your name. Rich, it's all good. A stimulating conversation and exchange of info on the venerable coticule. No need to delete anything. IMHO.

Lots of excellent information in this thread

I have to +1 Bart on his response to the whole "the best are mined/produced first" comment.

Since coticules ARE naturally produced layers of rock, there is NO way a comment like that could be proven. Even if there was a "best" section of coticule, there's absolutely no way, unless you ARE God, or whichever almight deity you may believe in. Who knows what lies hundreds, even thousands of feed below the areas they are mining now?

And as far as the coticule being an endangered rock, so to speak, I'm sure there is many other places, as Bart said, where coticule still exists, and was mined in the past.

Who's to say that Bart (or any of us for that matter) might inherit/amass a fortune sometime and purchase some land known to contain coticule, and decide to "harvest" those veins?

True, just like any precious natural resource, there is only so much of it in the earth, but I don't think we'll see the end of it anytime soon, as long as it is not squandered.

Just a few of my thoughts

Originally Posted by zib

If I had known that my comments would scrutinized like this, I would never have posted.

Now now, you know that's not true! You care about people and about this forum and when you see people making mistakes you can't help but say something

There's a lot of info in this thread. I think it should stay

I have practiced very little on the few coticules I've had, and my improvement on them when using them as finishing hones doesn't compare to the success I get off other finishing hones. I'm always interested in more information that might encourage me to keep playing with them and trying to get a better edge

Originally Posted by avatar1999

Lots of excellent information in this thread

I have to +1 Bart on his response to the whole "the best are mined/produced first" comment.

Since coticules ARE naturally produced layers of rock, there is NO way a comment like that could be proven. Even if there was a "best" section of coticule, there's absolutely no way, unless .......)

Yep sort of like digging the bottom half of a post-hole first.

Originally Posted by hoglahoo

Now now, you know that's not true! You care about people and about this forum and when you see people making mistakes you can't help but say something

There's a lot of info in this thread. I think it should stay

I have practiced very little on the few coticules I've had, and my improvement on them when using them as finishing hones doesn't compare to the success I get off other hones. I'm always interested in more information that might encourage me to keep playing with them and trying to get a better edge

I agree. I'd hate to see this thread go away because there's a lot of good information. I'd also like to see Holi back here because I don't think that the back and forth would do anything but help the entire community.

Yes, Please keep the post. I'm so enamored with Coticules and their production. I find all information from Rob and Maurice facinating. Your example from them is one of the main things I look for in Honing section.

Perhaps we could encourage them for regular updates of their one of a kind production on this forum. Bart's new forum was a great addition helping our knowledge of this facinating stone.
MikeB

I ripped this off from Bart's site. Here is some coticule porn to stimulate y'all.

I sincerely hope this thread isn't locked or removed, it's one of the best I've read in a while.

Zib, I really enjoyed reading your post, and Rob Celis' thoughts that you included as well. Rob is kind of like a hero to me. I read Dylan's response not as an attack at all, but rather as a frank "yeah..but" that one would find in person around a table at which people share an intense common interest. Around natural stones, especially rare ones, I have the same mental dialogue between culture/sentimentality and skepticism. And I'm very interested in reading other peoples' thinking on these things, especially if they are experienced.

In terms of disclosure, I fall very deeply on the sentimental side of these discussions. There is no scientific support for owning the number of naturals that I do just to hone my razors, and skepticism never really entered into it. Aside from what they do, I love the stones for what they are, how rare they are, their history, and the cultures that unearthed and prized them. Jimmy has a line from one of my favorite Yeats poems as his sig: "Man is in love and loves what vanishes." That's this forum in one sentence.

That out of the way, I actually enjoy reading contrarian views, to keep my love for the hones themselves from blurring too deeply into what they can actually do as a practical matter. Or how valuable they really are to people who don't share my interest, or how long before the stones and any knowledge of how to use them, are both gone for good. Sadly, few kids today get to grow up with a knife, let alone learn how to sharpen anything, or care for tools, or know why that might be useful.

I'm not chucking out my naturals for a set of Shaptons anytime soon, but I do appreciate an honest reality check. Otherwise, my kitchen cabinets would be stacked with hoarded naturals instead of groceries. Really.

All I was trying to convey was information passed on to me by Rob. I don't have a problem with Holli. I think there is merit in his lapping comment (Rob), He feels people lapp stones when it's not needed. Coticules do not glaze. When they come from the quarry, they are pretty much flat, but I still do the grid lines and hit it with the DMT for good measure. As far as so called "Vintage" Those comments were made by Howard. They too have merit. The proof is in the stone. period...Are Coticules rare. Of course they are. they are natural.
If the Celis's go out of business, Will someone pick up the torch. who knows, I hope so, but I ain't worried. I have my Coticules. I by no means am an expert. I digress to Bart and Rob when I have Coticule questions. As far vein names, I don't follow them. I don't care if the stones say's ACME Co. on the side, if it works and it's a good hone, fine by me. Vein names were common on the older hones you see on Ebay. it wasn't until recently, with Bart's site that we see vein names. Maybe with the Data he collected and the info on his site, we can find some trends and then maybe say, This vein has the best....Rob told me there are two vein from which the Straight Razor hones come from....that's about all I know about veins....I'm not claiming to be right or wrong either, I'm just trying to share information I have with you guys....

Originally Posted by JimmyHAD

I ripped this off from Bart's site. Here is some coticule porn to stimulate y'all.

Don't mind the heavy breathing..