Thread: Scotch Hone

Well, mine is certainly a Mauchline-ware TOS. The TOS won two awards, one in the 1880s and another in the 1890s, if I recall correctly. Mine is glued into a mauchline box with a stamp for only one of the awards, dating it approximately 1885. There's a photo earlier in the thread that only some of us can see. It's my understanding that in honor of the 100th aniversary of the Ayreshire poet Robert Burns' poem "Tam O'Shanter, The Ayrshire Hone Quarry (don't kill me people--this all from memory) renamed all their Water of Ayre hones to Jonny Suter, Tam O'Shanter, and another who's name I forget. There was an anouncement about the name change in the newspapers, and you can find it online somewhere. At some point when I picked up the hone I thought that it might actaully be a WOA because very few of us had ever seen a real one, and the manner in which they were named by the quarry is undocumented. I enjoyed being under the delusion that I might actaully have a WOA. This was, of course until I found tons of Tam photos. I've got a tam.

But it's also been mu understanding that the only Ayeshire hones comporable to Escher's, Charnleys, Fine Coticules, Nakayamas, etc... were the Water of Ayre hones, not the one's graded as Tams. So to hear that a Tam can be used post-coticule isn't something I can accept without testing it.

I've got the pamphlet, "Ayrshire Hone-Stones" by D. Gordon Tucker, that gives a history of these stones. My impression from reading it is that the various mines that harvested these stones were a bit informal in using the WOA name. IOW sometimes tams may have been referred to as WOA in past years. The WOA I've got is black and has no visible specs or dots as a tam does. Before getting that one I had and sold a small stone marked WOA Pen Knife Hone. It was very dark but had the specs characteristic of the tams.

Just my $.02 here... I have the light colored Tams with dark speckles. I have used it many times over a number of years. The best use I have found for it is with a slurry and used between a 4K & 8K. That is as a 6K stone. It has one great additional quality when used with a slurry. It removes microchips like a champ. Mine are very hard stones and it takes a lot to work up a slurry.

FWIW