I bought the Natural Finishing Stone - 12,000 Grit is quarried in China, do i need to lap it first? it seems like it has a lot of scratches and stuff in it.
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I bought the Natural Finishing Stone - 12,000 Grit is quarried in China, do i need to lap it first? it seems like it has a lot of scratches and stuff in it.
O yes you do draw a pencil grid on the stone and lap it with a dmt or sand paper
a pic of the stone would be nice !
I'll get a pic, but i have two other questions that go with this: 1) i have the 4000/8000 norton and does that need lapping right out of the box and 2) if you use a courser grit than the stone, does that make the stone more course? I've read that using 400 grit paper and a glass plate is the way to go or is the lapping stone better?
and what is DMT?
yes what that guy said ^ :D
so, I've been working on my honing skills and getting less than stellar results and it could have been b/c i didnt lap them right out of the box? I'd have thought this was done at the factory. They're new.
no its not the norton look like a cinder block when you get then once you lapp then you'll be amazed of how much smoother they get
When lapping a hone, either a Norton or a Chinese 12K, both of them should feel smooth in order for them to be lapped good. When I lap my hones for the first time, I feel the different parts of the hone as I am lapping. If I feel a little rough patch, I go back and lap it until it is smooth. Your less than stellar results could be from a hone that needs more lapping, or it could be from honing too little.Quote:
Originally Posted by weirdbob
and since your new at hone i would tape the spine on the razor so you dont destory it with spine ware
A Norton isn't even usable when new an unlapped, it certainly needs it.
Ok, so after reading the lapping section in the wiki, I know I can do my nortons myself. However, I'm worried it will cost more to buy the stuff to do my chineese stone and my Swaty or spend hours doing them. Is there an alternative? Should I just buy a better finisher or does someone lapps these things? or does the lapping stones speed up the process? thanks.
For the Chineese you can start with some 160-180 grit paper and work up to ~400, it will take some time, but when you're done it will be a long time til you need to lap it again.
The Swaty isn't closa as hard as the Chineese to lap, you should do fine with 320 or 400 grit paper.
Whenever you re wandering if you need to lap a new stone before the first honing, do it. In most cases it's not time consuming, and, it will save you much effort restoring the damage you might have cost in your razor or knife or whatever you re honing. For higher grit stones, you can start from 60 grit sandpapers or lapping stones, and and after that you can go up to 600. I don't think there will be a need for 60 grit abrasive to be used for a new stone, only if there are really deep scratches or cavities.
1) The swaty may not need lapped.
2) The other stones definately do
3) 12k is a very generous estimate on that stone, but you can still get nice edges off of it.
4) Lock the 12k in a drawer until you get good shaves off of your norton 8k.
This has been a Slartibartfast production.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Slartibartfast
I was already thinking the swaty needed it. it was brand new in the original box. Yeah, i got lucky and prob paid too much for it. Anyway it has a rough look with minor pits and things of that nature. So maybe it want new.. In any event, can i use the swaty in place of the 12k? If not, I'll prob just get something else.