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Sorry if this has been covered before.
I have been offered a thick, flat piece of slate (it used to be a snooker table base).
I was told by the guy making me the offer that his grandfather used to hone his razor on piece of slate.
Any thoughts on this before I try it and ruin a blade.
Give it a shot. You won't hurt the razor if you use light pressure and you know how to hone. Not sure of which hones are composed of slate but pretty sure that some are. One of the geologist members will no doubt add to the discussion.
This kind of slate come from my area,are used for pool table or in building construction, but believe me
isn't good for hone a razor. Give him a kick in the ass .
For razor use you want a stone to be homogeneous without any coarse impurities. If the slate offered looks clean you could give it a try with a (cheap) razor. The grit could be anything between 6-12k. If it's not suited for honing it might be useful for backing a thin stone.
Ask him for pictures :)
What the gentleman remembers as slate could also be some form of hone like a thuringian.
But you never know.
The Dragon's Tongue hone is Welsh slate its the mica that, apparently, does the cutting. IME its a tough one to use, however I find it works best with oil.
Go for it...Quote:
Originally Posted by mowfow71
The trick is learning where it fits in a
stack of hone stones. I have seen
slate that is smooth as silk and slate
that was very sandy.
Old blackboard slate could be deluxe.
Snooker table slate depending on the
age could be great or not so. The
eight ball bar table slate that I have
seen is on the hard and nasty side.
Since this is snooker table slate
the odds are good. Try and get
a couple of slices if you can.
Well if its wesh I have to look in to a Dragons tongue, maybe I could go full on welsh and wet the stone with Felin Foal or Brains beer but im worried I might end up spending hours licking it :-)Quote:
Originally Posted by Jeltz
Will definatley look in to that though thanks, just hope I dont end up with HAD the RAD is bad enough .
I was a vendor for Ardennes. Their Coticules are backed with Slate/Schist. I was told it could not be used for honing...My two cents....Good Luck...
Just what we need; another hone licker. Did Dylan put you up to saying that?
We've discussed slate before and as I recall the consensus was that it's ain't that great as a hone. It's metamorphosed shale and made up of really small particles and is usually found in stratified layers so it can be split really easily. It comes in different colors too depending on the trace stuff it has in it. If you polish it you can get a really nice luster on it.
http://straightrazorpalace.com/hones...discovery.html
I think the consensus was there are many slates most of which we know under different names. A lot of them are of high quality like e.g. Eschers and Coticules.
Typical coticules are no way slates. Not even close.Quote:
Originally Posted by Piet
The back of Coticules is often just strong dark stone thatQuote:
Originally Posted by zib
has no quality. Sometimes on older hones they used
what is now known to be blue water stone and it has good
sharpening qualities (sharpening is not honing). Some natural
combos exist...
Today the good blue water stone has a market of
its own so the rock on the back is just backing.
Sometimes it pays to experiment on a junker
blade to see what you got. They do not sell
the back -- the Coticule material on the top is
the difficult stuff to find and a good one is worth it.
Has anyone tried to use chalk, like schoolroom chalk as a nagura. I did and it works although it is not fine enough to create a razor worthy edge. I guess in a pinch though, a chalkboard and a piece of chalk could be better than nothing. alx
This thread got me thinking about razor sharpeners and their lust for great finishing stones. If you were sharpening almost any other type of tool, you could get away with being creative using anything from slate to cement blocks. But really the choices for us are mostly limited to historical rocks that have been tried and true or relatively recent discoveries in manufactured abrasives.
Alx, we have not used chalk in schools for some time now, if you like I will send you a whole chalkboard and a big box of nagura chalk from surplus and trade you for one of yours:)
Hey Kingfish
An appealing idea, but I think the shipping would kill the deal for you. alx