Thread: Arkansas Oil Stone...use or not?

I have a old Arkansas Oil Stone. Can it be used to hone a razor? I havent seen any mention of oil stones in any of the threads. Is there a reason everyone uses whetstones?

There's nothing to say that you can't use an oil stone. Most people don't because Arkansas stones have a tendency to cut extremely slow compared to most wet stones.

on occasions i use arks it depends on what type of ark you have there washita, soft, hard, surgical black, and translucent the great thing about arks is they polish as they cut but their slow but once you set the bevel it shouldnt take long to finish

+1 on previous posts re Arkansas stones. There are different types of oil stones. Most oil stones are novaculite material including the Arkansas stones. The bottom stone in the attached pic is a translucent arkansas oil stone, I've heard it refered to as gravestone too. All the stones in the pic are oil stones. This type of stone is desirable on certain steels. That's just a sample of some oil stones, there are more. wanna see? schtick around! Piet knows.
MIke

here are some arks first pic is washita second pic with three stones is soft ark and thrid is hard and fourth pic is surgical black and fifth is translucent and sixth is cf

Originally Posted by Ta2dbear

I have a old Arkansas Oil Stone. Can it be used to hone a razor? I havent seen any mention of oil stones in any of the threads. Is there a reason everyone uses whetstones?

With the availability, choices and quality waterstones today it would be a much better choice, and that is not just my opinion that is the advice of some of the best people in the field and you will find tons of information here based on years of collective experience.
A good quality translucent is not cheap either. Not to say you can't because it can be done, but for speed,versitility and ease of use, and the hard steel of a razor begs to be sharpened on water stones.

Originally Posted by Ta2dbear

I have a old Arkansas Oil Stone. Can it be used to hone a razor? I havent seen any mention of oil stones in any of the threads. Is there a reason everyone uses whetstones?

You can hone a razor on an Arkansas. I'm currently trying to set a bevel using a Soft Arkansas, it's going slow but my synthetic 1k waterstone doesn't seem to be any faster. It was a cheap combination hone.

There are plenty threads on oilstones although the stone in question being an oilstone isn't always mentioned. Oilstones are whetstones too. Not everyone uses whetstones, some use an all synthetic progression because it can be faster and more consistent. A synthetic progression with one or two natural finishers is popular too.