Thread: Carborundum & Vaseline

Summarizing, fill up pores with hot melted vaseline and blade will be held up off the hone to some degree and cut gentler and slower, and clean out pores with kerosene and greater contact will result in more efficient honing.

Quite practical!

this should be of some use a clear pic

The most interesting thing for me is the thought that this approach should be generally applicable to vintage hones that are too aggressive.

I think it would only work for oil hones.

all and my stone is a 109 which is 6x2x1

Originally Posted by holli4pirating

I think it would only work for oil hones.

Not that I would want to use vaseline on a barbers hone. But, when using a barbers hone, I use varying amounts of lather (and pressure) to control aggressiveness. It seems to me that this is the same technique, generally speaking, as using vaseline to fill up pores and kerosene to clean out pores.

I am not thinking about use on barbers hones and other high grit size hones. From time to time, I buy a straight razor off Ebay that comes a whetstone that is quite fine, but definitely more gritty than a barbers hone. Maybe, 1K to 4K range.

Could one of these lower end grittier whetstones be tamed down a little using this technique? I'm going to try, just out of curiosity.

My point was, if you soak the hone in vaseline, I think you would have to use oil on the hone. I would think water would just bead up. If you try, I'm sure you'll find out one way or the other.

Originally Posted by holli4pirating

My point was, if you soak the hone in vaseline, I think you would have to use oil on the hone. I would think water would just bead up....

Thanks for clarification. I didn't understand at first.

Here's another image with the full text. This time from a Carborundum stone made in Trafford Park, Manchester, UK.