Thread: Chinese 12k stone

hi, i'm new to straight razor shaving and honing especially. I ordered a shave ready dovo and a 12k chinese stone hone from the invisible edge. i was wondering if anyone has used this stone and has any feedback for me. also is this a good stone for touching up the edge when the strop wont cut it anymore? can this stone be used similar to a barbers hone?

Welcome to SRP. A couple of razors I've received from Steve at the invisible edge had great edges. The Chinese 12k has the reputation of being a slow but fine cutter. So it might be good for a touch up when the time comes. If any members are in your geographical area and are willing to demonstrate stropping, shaving and honing for you that would be very helpful. If not take a look at the SRP Wiki tutorials and videos here and ask any questions you have as they come up.

Originally Posted by bkk

hi, i'm new to straight razor shaving and honing especially. I ordered a shave ready dovo and a 12k chinese stone hone from the invisible edge. i was wondering if anyone has used this stone and has any feedback for me. also is this a good stone for touching up the edge when the strop wont cut it anymore? can this stone be used similar to a barbers hone?

JimmyHAD has Hone Acquisition Disorder so he should know.

The Chinese 12K hone being a natural stone can be excellent to just ordinary hone.

For the price it is a great hone. They do cut slow.

When your razor begins to tug start using your C12k the way you would
use a barber hone. Assuming your rock is already flat all you need
is a modest coarse DMT to lap it a bit and work up a light slurry.
As with any hone start with a modest number of hone strokes
then strop and shave test. Some people report that they use
as many as 100 strokes. That sounds like too many to me assuming
the blade is still sharp enough to shave with and all you want
is a refresh.

Check the classified... once in a while you see cut off chunks from
these Chinese rocks to use as a nagura (rubbing stone). I think
nagura is a Japanese word so do not offend anyone with my
ignorance of the Chinese word. Some wood carving shops have
rubbing stones too.

If yours is as hard as mine you can also use a variety of rubbing stones
on it to build a slurry. I would even try a chunk of coticule rubbing
stone with it if you have a chunk handy. I happen to have a well worn
DMT that I rub mine with.

If your C12K is not flat expect to wear out a coarse DMT should you
get serious about getting it flat (I did). An XXC is about what it takes
to flatten a C12K quickly. Some care and a pack of 3M wet dry will
get you close, use lots of water.

There are several threads dedicated to this great little rock. Over the last 5 month, it's been my only finisher. It does better than I do. I found that using mostly circles before a few x-strokes was a faster way to get to the level of keenness desired.

Because of variations in the naturals, you may get a good (fast) one or slow. The slurry approach can speed it up.

I can get keen edges from the stone, but smoothness was elusive until I tried an experiment w/ crox. One side of my stone has the black tiger-striped inclusions mentioned in one of the threads. The other side lacks them entirely. On the side without the black stripes, I drew a cross-hatch pattern with the Crox crayon from SRD. The benefit of having the crox on the stone is that you avoid any issues with edge-trailing strokes making the edge fragile. It smoothed out the edge nicely. Anyway, something to try.

Best of luck w/ your new razor. Don't be a stranger here. I'm proof that even 'dumb' questions are treated kindly. Seriously, the help is outstanding, and the attitudes are also.

wow thanks guys, the advice really did help. upon doing some further research, which i probably should have done before asking haha i found that some people dont use a rubbing stone to build slurry, is this true? does the chinese stone, being a natural stone need slurry and water? i seem to find mixed answers on this, even the website i ordered from (theinvisibleedge.com) doesn't really say....now that i know it is a good stone for maintance a finishing an edge, i really would like to know how to use it correctly instead of finding out the hard way and ruining a razor.

Slurry helps on the C12K, and as niftyshaving said, there are several ways of building it. I use an extra-fine DMT pocket hone. It's faster than using a natural nagura stone, slower than using a coarser diamond stone, but doesn't leave scratches like a coarser stone can. Some people don't mind scratches. I do.

One tip: if you do flatten the stone, you'll make a LOT of slurry in the process. Don't let it go down the drain. Save the muddy water, and when the water evaporates you'll have a nice stone dust that you can save in a baggy for making slurry in the future.

Originally Posted by wsfarrell

Don't let it go down the drain. Save the muddy water, and when the water evaporates you'll have a nice stone dust that you can save in a baggy for making slurry in the future.

I do this with the slurry from an asagi also.

It's a good stone, just slow. As previously mentioned, there are variations because it's a Natural. Some are faster than others. A slurry will speed up the process, how ever you choose to do one. I always recommend the slurry be the same as the host hone, espcially for touch ups. I would not use a Coticule slurry stone due it's aggressive nature. Coti slurry contains Garnets that are capable of removing steel pretty quickly. Either use a Diamond plate, wet sandpaper, or a C12k slurry or a Thuringian or Escher slurry.

Also, This is a very fine stone, Don't let your razor go too long. Once it starts to tug or pull a little, break out the C12k, Do 10 lapps, test...

i was just going to mention not to use coti slurry stone . zib mentioned it and i totaly agree. infact i got my ch12k slurry stone from zib. may be he can send you one as he sells them at a very reasonable price .. i reckon if you gave your razor 30 laps on water once a week wheather needed or not it would keep you going for a very long time. i have ch12k and i liked the edge just as much if not nicer than my escher.and for the price it has to be best value finisher.

What size C12K is appropriate for touch up honing/refreshing a shave ready edge?

150 mm x 50 mm x 17 mm in depth versus
200 mm x 50 mm x 20 mm in depth

Obviously the smaller one is cheaper. I must also read up about what is lapping/flattening...