Thread: I found a good Turkey stone

Hi,
My searches for Turkey stone described as being better than Charnley's in some century old books has started to give results. I now have a Turkey stone that is as smooth as my Coticule (or a bit smoother) and performs much faster.

Some poor quality photos:
One side is coarse that resembles inside of a cooked aubergine(leafed pattern , yellowish in color)


The other side is very smooth and black in color:




Is this two stones glued together? That I have to find out.

Better pics would help if your looking for opinions.

Originally Posted by life2short1971

Better pics would help if your looking for opinions.

Unfortunately I don't have a good camera.

Using daylight may even be of help.

Originally Posted by life2short1971

Using daylight may even be of help.

I will try tomorrow (it is evening here).

Excuse my ignorance, but better that Charnleys for doing what? I thought I remembered reading that the Turkey stone was used in the earlier stages of honing (to set a bevel or just after), while the Charnley is a finisher.

I guess my real question is - At what stage does the Turkey stone come into honing, and what's it like to hone on?

Originally Posted by holli4pirating

Excuse my ignorance, but better that Charnleys for doing what? I thought I remembered reading that the Turkey stone was used in the earlier stages of honing (to set a bevel or just after), while the Charnley is a finisher.

I guess my real question is - At what stage does the Turkey stone come into honing, and what's it like to hone on?

I can't link you to the source but in some of the hundred year old geology books, where they talk about hones, the Turkey stone is mentioned as being the cat's whiskers. The Charnley is said to be good but slow and the Turkey more desired by honers of that period. I got the impression it was for sharpening and finishing.

I have read that they are comparable to mid range Charnleys in the 9-12K range, while some Charnleys exceed this - at least I think mine do.

I have also read that Turkey Oilstones are much faster.

Ah. This is where my issues with relative terms come into play. I remembered Sham saying it's a "fast cutter," but didn't realize it was "fast for a finisher."

/digging through old posts

The major problem when discussing Turkey Hones, is that the term in itself isn't descriptive of one particular hone, there are several types of hones using this label, excluding the designation of Turkey Grit which covers a vast number of hones from all over the world, there are at least five types of Turkey Hone. In the English language literature, the black hone and the white hone that are called Turkey Stones are those that come from the island of Crete; these stones are still available today known as both Akoni Oilstone and Candia Hone. These tend to be medium to high grit hones, anywhere between 6k - 12k would be a fair estimate of their grit equivalent. Their major benefit is their cutting speed, you can use these hones right after bevel setting (or even for bevel work if you don't mind a very narrow bevel,) and can quickly make a blade ready for finishing on pastes. It is this type of stone that represents Turkey Stones in Knight's famous catalogue of honestones. There is an article about one of England's earliest "Natural Philosophers" a man by the name of Stoddart who was also a master cutler, and he dismisses Turkey Hones as never being very fine, and used before the Coticule, he is most likely referring to a coarse variety of these particular hones.

In the French language literature Turkey Stone, or Pierre a Levante, is the name given to at least three hones, that are distinct from the Crete stones. The confusion arises when certain authors, Griswold in his Geological Survey of Arkansas for example, who don't recognise the different varieties, simply attribute all of the characteristics and information concerning the multiple hones, to one particular type. The confusion over the fineness of Turkey Hones is attributable to one particular type of hone available on the French market, which was known to be very fine and used as a razor hone. It is a dirty olive-green colour, and was recorded as being a type of hardened limestone. Unfortunately, I haven't been able to uncover any detailed information about the origins of this type in any of the French literature that I have.

Kindest regards,
Alex