Few Questions Thanks!!

1. Is lapping easy? Could I send it out to be done?

2. Where can I find a C12K? What's the average price? What's the deal w/ slurry on these? Just cut faster (less strokes) or does it alter "grit" like cotis?

3. I'm looking to purchase; Norton 4/8, Coti, C12K. Good? Should I get a diamond pasted felt strop? What about horsehide strop for regular stropping.

Thanks!!!

All I'm looking to do is touchups, maintenance and kill time or relax/ meditate with honing. Of course, two months ago I vowed I'd not do my own honing at all either....

Yes, lapping is easy. There is an article about it in the Wiki called Lapping 101.

C12k can be had at Woodcraft. They have brick & mortor stores across the country or you can order online. The small on is $20 and the large $35 iirc.

You don't really need anything more than the Norton 4/8k (unless you want a 1k to set bevels), and IMO you should not use higher grit hones until you can get good shaves off the Norton 8k. After that, a coti will give you a smoother edge, and I found my C12k gave me a better shave than my coti. Paste will also smooth/keen an edge, but I'm not sure I'd say you "should" get it. For strops, I'm not too knowledgable, but I trust anything from any of the reliable vendors. Personally, I have a Tony Miller and I really really like the SRD English Bridle.

If you really only want to do touchups, you shouldn't need the Norton 4/8k; just the Coti, C12k or paste (paste will prolong an edge's life, but you will need to hit the hones sooner or later).

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Originally Posted by rickboone

1. Is lapping easy? Could I send it out to be done?

2. Where can I find a C12K? What's the average price? What's the deal w/ slurry on these? Just cut faster (less strokes) or does it alter "grit" like cotis?

3. I'm looking to purchase; Norton 4/8, Coti, C12K. Good? Should I get a diamond pasted felt strop? What about horsehide strop for regular stropping.

Thanks!!!

All I'm looking to do is touchups, maintenance and kill time or relax/ meditate with honing. Of course, two months ago I vowed I'd not do my own honing at all either....

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1. Lapping is easy if you have a lapping plate or a perfectly flat area and some low grit wet/dry sandpaper

2.Chinese Stones are cheap and readily available (Woodcraft seems to be the among the best places to buy them around $35.

3. To be perfectly honest, I'd pick one of those and stick with that for now... If you choose the Norton 4k/8K, I'd certainly get some type of medium for applying pastes (but only use it after learning how to get good results on 8K). However, if I picked a coticule, I personally would just use that... Either the Norton or the Coticule will work for your purposes...

If you don't have a good strop you need one...

I have a 340/1000 combo diamond plate and a smallish coti. Using the two, and possibly an entire evening, I can reliably sharpen a completely blunt razor to a satisfactory edge. For best results I have to use the tape on the edge - as in Bart's suggested unicot method.

I have a few razors that have been sharpened by experts and a few that I have done - but I'd agree with Holli that the C12k leave a better edge.

But it sounds like you just need a barber's hone. Why not start with that?

For the record, I've never gotten an edge off of a C-12K that I thought was as good as the edges from my Coticule. But, it takes work to get there :)

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Originally Posted by richmondesi

For the record, I've never gotten an edge off of a C-12K that I thought was as good as the edges from my Coticule. But, it takes work to get there :)

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Thanks for that. I like the edge off the coti too, but it feels like it's sharper off the Chinese stone.

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Originally Posted by Frankenstein

Thanks for that. I like the edge off the coti too, but it feels like it's sharper off the Chinese stone.

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This is something that I've noticed too. However, I don't value a razor "feeling" sharp. If I can shave off all my whiskers achieving a BBS result with a razor that "feels" dull/smoother with no pulling, weepers, cuts, etc... then I'm happier. My Coticule edges almost feel dull when on my face (meaning not harsh at all, leaving me undamaged in the shave), but they wipe away the whiskers and my face feels like I have no damage whatever... That's my preference, and I fully understand that it isn't shared by all. :)

In my fumbling between Arkansas, Belgian, German, Japanese, and Diamond hones, I've found there are times that I can usefully 'step down' to stones normally used earlier in the progression of finer 'grits'.

I'll use a BBW with slurry before an AOTO with slurry sometimes, to clean up the edge somewhat from micro-nicks (chips), and then polishing the whole bevel off with the aoto. That's not the best example but with some natural stones there are wide enough variations in the effective 'grit' rating (w. & w.o. slurry) that it allows such overlaps. I'll use a coti sometimes before and after a japanese stone, but not yet the reverse. Seems to work one way but not the other..

And NONE of this concerns razors, it's about fairly hard kitchen cutlery sharpened by a knife knut.

But, I'm curious as heck if something similar does apply to razors, that techniques affect the order of use in natural hones..