Sparkley hone that really performs!!!

I'm not sure what this is guys, but it sure does a nice job. This stone gives a pretty much non-existent scratch pattern. Oddly, it still seems like it must be a pretty fast cutter. 100 strokes on a 1200 grit India, 60 strokes on this thing, 30 leather, exceptional shave. I know it's an odd progression but the keenness markers were there with only this. Used on a hollow ground blade, it cut hairs with no pressure silently. They just fell. Completely new experience to this guy.lol.

Measures 8x1 7/8 and came with a chunk of Arkansas that I thought was a slurry stone, but I haven't figured out how to use it yet, or why it'd be necessary. Seriously took me 10 minutes. Which is an all time, complete luck type of honing experience for me. It usually takes me at least an hour, and sometimes days...lol So it's possible it wasn't the hone, and just a lucky day, but I can tell you I've got SR's I've spent days trying to refine that don't shave as well as this one did.

It does give off a purple slurry, but it's pretty hard and I didn't lap it to completely flat. No picture can accurately show the sparkle factor on this thing. It's like a disco ball. lol. Otherwise in the dim light, it looks dull grey. But even a little bit of light and it's sparkling again.

I responded over on RazorAndStone also.

It looks like a Lynn Melynyn or very similar slate hone, mine performs very much like you describe. Mine is markedly purple even dry and very purple with slurry.

I bought the three hone set ( Dragons Tongue, Lynn Melynyn and black hone) from the UK Ebay seller, my very dark green/black 15k (his estimate) stone has the disco ball effect also.

+1 for the Lynn Melynlyn mine performs just like your description, color, slurry, nice one!!

My vote goes to the Belgian Blue.

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Originally Posted by woodsmandave

My vote goes to the Belgian Blue.

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Belgian Blue is a slow cutting stone even with slurry in the 4k range, i dont think that would give a smooth shave at all!!

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Originally Posted by Martin103

Belgian Blue is a slow cutting stone even with slurry in the 4k range, i dont think that would give a smooth shave at all!!

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I have a belgian blue/coticule combo, and I've found the blue side to be a fast cutter with slurry, and at least an equally fine finisher as the coticule without slurry, only much, much slower. But don't take my word for it - some of the guys here (or at coticule.be - I forget) did a study on just this subject, and came to the same conclusion as I did.

Also, the "sparkly" look to it when dry tipped me off. Some coticules, and the BBW, shimmer in light due to the garnet crystals. My creamy le dressante does not shimmer, but I had one before that really did. the BBW side of the le dressante does shimmer, and is purple, and gives purple slurry.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by woodsmandave

I have a belgian blue/coticule combo, and I've found the blue side to be a fast cutter with slurry, and at least an equally fine finisher as the coticule without slurry, only much, much slower. But don't take my word for it - some of the guys here (or at coticule.be - I forget) did a study on just this subject, and came to the same conclusion as I did.

Also, the "sparkly" look to it when dry tipped me off. Some coticules, and the BBW, shimmer in light due to the garnet crystals. My creamy le dressante does not shimmer, but I had one before that really did. the BBW side of the le dressante does shimmer, and is purple, and gives purple slurry.

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I was just going by personal experienced, if you have BBW thats equally to the coticule i could see that possible since naturals vary
a lot, that said the traditional BBW is around the 4k range, and the non- existent scratch pattern is another good clue on it being a
LM.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Martin103

I was just going by personal experienced, if you have BBW thats equally to the coticule i could see that possible since naturals vary
a lot, that said the traditional BBW is around the 4k range, and the non- existent scratch pattern is another good clue on it being a
LM.

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I've seen the BBW referenced as around a 4k stone before, too. I don't know why some people think that. I know some people do bevel setting on a BBW and finish on the coticule, but I think they do that so as not to waste the valuable coticule side - not because a combo stone is like a 4/8 norton. But the only difference between a BBW and a coticule is the quantity of garnet crystals contained within. 20-30% in the BBW, 30-40% in the coticule. In my mind, that makes the BBW a slower cutter, but not something lower in grit. You should read the study done on this subject, it's very interesting. I can't attest to the scratch pattern, but some people might look at the bevel of the coticule and say that there's no scratch pattern there, either. I wouldn't say that, but some would...

It depends on the hardness of the stone, I've got a few BBW's with one being very purple and they are all very soft and easy to lap, my Lynn Melynyn is much harder to lap.
I also have tried shaving straight off the BBW it was very good and on par with a Coticule.

I'll try and take some pictures of my Lynn Melynyn and my purple BBW side by side and post them later today

Honing isn't really my thing (I do it, and JaNorton made me feel kind of confident doing it, but it doesn't occupy my thoughts when I'm not standing in front of a rock). So when I got this hone with a large lot of razors (divide the whole batch evenly and I think this hone cost me $4), I wrote it off as a synthetic barbershop hone and never really thought about it much. I did use it to get a workable edge a couple of times on problem blades, and it seemed to do a great job with that. I've never really used it though.

So I came across this thread just because it was sidebarred on the front page.

The little purple hone I've got is purple. It sparkles. It easily makes very purple slurry. Is this something considerably nicer than I thought it was?

Attachment 89085
(Dry, in sunlight)
Attachment 89088
(In sunlight, showing the sparkles)
Attachment 89089
(Wet, in sunlight)

Voidmonster - I have two hones that look very much like that. One is a BBW, the other a vintage LM. They look astonishingly similar. The BBW has tiny sparkly bits in it, but the real give-away is that it is spoted all over with little dots of yellow coticule. It's a very fast cutter and leaves a mirror-like bevel. It performs very much like a coarse coticule. The vintage LM is given away by the green inclusion it has - one solitary elliptical inclusion in the side of it, which shows that it was cut across the strat rather than with it, otherwise the ellipse would have been more circular. There is a small difference in the smell too - the BBW reminds me of freshly mixed plaster, the LM has a very faint, hard to describe fleeting aroma.

Regards,
Neil

Both of these look somewhat like my Fox/Goldfisch hone, which might be related to BBWs. Mine came in a Thuringian style box but without a label, there's a Goldfisch thread with labels. This stone is sparkly but I should add that I also have a similar sparkly BBW.

Attachment 89090

Attachment 89091

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Originally Posted by Neil Miller

Voidmonster - I have two hones that look very much like that. One is a BBW, the other a vintage LM. They look astonishingly similar. The BBW has tiny sparkly bits in it, but the real give-away is that it is spoted all over with little dots of yellow coticule. It's a very fast cutter and leaves a mirror-like bevel. It performs very much like a coarse coticule. The vintage LM is given away by the green inclusion it has - one solitary elliptical inclusion in the side of it, which shows that it was cut across the strat rather than with it, otherwise the ellipse would have been more circular. There is a small difference in the smell too - the BBW reminds me of freshly mixed plaster, the LM has a very faint, hard to describe fleeting aroma.

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The patterning in this one is purely variations on the same purple. Under a loupe, the sparkling bits are very pale, almost white. There are lighter and darker variations of the same purple, including one very dark vein on the side which has a different texture (at 10x magnification).

I had to raise a slurry with hot water to get any smell at all, and then it was a very transitory smell that I associate with Pu-erh tea and my ChiNat finisher. The difference between this and the ChiNat is the ChiNat's smell builds easily and lingers where this was there just long enough to notice and then it was gone.

My tiny bit of experience with using it as a hone is that it behaves much the way Coticule.be says a BBW does, namely, with slurry, it won't overhone the edge and it's not fast. I don't really have time today to do a full hone on it, but I suspect that with slurry it'll give a mirror polish.

Here's my two hones
Left-Lynn Melynyn, Right-Purple BBW

Attachment 89095Attachment 89096

Hmm, ok, well can anyone pick it out of a line up of Belgians? lol. It doesn't act like them really, and this person wouldn't describe the scratch pattern as similar to my small variety of belgians and their scratch patterns. It also sparkles regardless of whether it's wet or dry. Although, I'd have been happy if it was. I'm happy thinking it's not as well. If it's Belgian, it's an ultra rare version that really would have turned the world on its head if it would have been used in Coticule.be's test. :) But here's some more pics for comparison.

LMAO sorry regularjoe, I didn't really look at who the O.P was in this thread, I was thinking you were a newbie. In the top picture, it's second from the left, and in the bottom picture the same. Now that you gave us some reference point (compared to 3 BBW's) and said that it doesn't behave the same, I'd say maybe its not a BBW. (BTW, I've noticed different coticule's have very different feedback, however)

Also on one of your bbw/coticule combos, it looks like BBW was glued to the coticule, as theres too distinct a line between the two for a natural combo. Am I correct? At first i thought it was slate backed, but i saw the character of the stone in one of those pics...

Also, in your mystery stone, i dont see the typical coticule pattern in it, so now i really dont think its a BBW.

Do you see how a little more information helps us determine things? :)

LOL. I figured that was the case. I'm still pretty new really :)

When I was taking the oven cleaner off of it, I was thinking "Hey, I got another Belgian!" lol But after it was clean, then I was stumped. Honed on it, and the results were amazing IMHO, so I had to ask on here for opinions of what it is. That one you're talking about is also a natural combo, but it must have been cut juuuust perfect. On the opposite end of the stone, the coticule goes almost all the way to the BBW surface on one corner. :)

We'll see if anybody else picks differently before I reveal the correct stone. lol.

That is a crazy distinction on your combo coticule, mine has the purple and yellow blended together in the stone. On your mystery hone, If it didn't have that sparkly stuff in it, I'd say it looks like welsh purple slate. I've used slate hones before and I was amazed at how fine an edge, and how velvety the feedback is on them. Looks like you got yourself one mighty fine mystery hone :)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by woodsmandave

I've seen the BBW referenced as around a 4k stone before, too. I don't know why some people think that. I know some people do bevel setting on a BBW and finish on the coticule, but I think they do that so as not to waste the valuable coticule side - not because a combo stone is like a 4/8 norton. But the only difference between a BBW and a coticule is the quantity of garnet crystals contained within. 20-30% in the BBW, 30-40% in the coticule. In my mind, that makes the BBW a slower cutter, but not something lower in grit. You should read the study done on this subject, it's very interesting. I can't attest to the scratch pattern, but some people might look at the bevel of the coticule and say that there's no scratch pattern there, either. I wouldn't say that, but some would...

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Well thats interesting!! since i do most of my honing on a 4k/8k norton then followed by a yellow lake, then a finisher, im not
using my coticule a lot and its not backed up by anything its glue to a piece of wood.In the past i did have 2 others coti but never
use the bbw side since i believed is was something around 4k, so i pretty much used the coticule side only.Im definately interested in finding that study for sure.

Im pretty sure its listed on coticule.be. It concluded that while a BBW is a slower stone, the finished edge is just as fine as a coticule. Apparrently, though, with heavy slurry, the BBW can be a fast cutter, and so some use it for bevel setting. I've found this to be true, at least on my 2 coticules.

Dave, you got me thinking on that one combo. That one just might be a bonded coticule. Now I've got another one though with similar lines of delineation that is definitely a natural combination, so it does happen. I've seen examples where the purple fades to yellow, as I think you're describing, but they can be either way.
Martin, here ya go! Not sure it'll work..let me know.
http://www.coticule.be/heritage.html.../BBW-study.pdf

I would say the last stone on the right is the new hone. IN the 3rd and last picture.

Voidmonster's has the same line pattern which can only be seen from certain angles just like mine. So I'm pretty sure that's a Fox/Goldfisch. regularjoe's does have dark veins and tiny white speckles just like mine so it could be one too, although BBWs occasionly have white speckles as well.

I'm sure BBWs come in a wide range just like Coticules, some coarse and some fine.

http://straightrazorpalace.com/hones...your-pick.html

Well I wanted to update this thread with new information. I sent this stone off to a well known razor honer for testing, and his results were very much opposite my experiences with it. It should be said it's an old thread, but information should be amended if it's inaccurate. According to his testing, the stone is no good for razors. It kills an 8k edge, and is too slow to work well at the 1k level. Both of us are stumped as to what it is, but don't blow your fun money on it if you find one. A little embarassing to get such different results, but I'm nowhere near as knowledgeable as this person, and even less so at the time of OP. So there you have it, this sparkly stone is a pretty paperweight. haha. Moderators, feel free to delete the entire thread, if that would be a better way to mitigate misinformation. Some guys don't read the whole post, and it'd be better for them to never see the post at all, than skim it.

If you like then edges the stone produces, the who gives an f what anyone else thinks about it?

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Originally Posted by myersn024

If you like the edges the stone produces, the who gives an f what anyone else thinks about it?

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+1 on the above, if it worked once, it will work again. Once someone is an expert, it means they probably have a set way of doing things. Adding an unknown stone to the equation could throw them off, just like it could the rest of us.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by regularjoe

Well I wanted to update this thread with new information. I sent this stone off to a well known razor honer for testing, and his results were very much opposite my experiences with it. It should be said it's an old thread, but information should be amended if it's inaccurate. According to his testing, the stone is no good for razors. It kills an 8k edge, and is too slow to work well at the 1k level. Both of us are stumped as to what it is, but don't blow your fun money on it if you find one. A little embarassing to get such different results, but I'm nowhere near as knowledgeable as this person, and even less so at the time of OP. So there you have it, this sparkly stone is a pretty paperweight. haha. Moderators, feel free to delete the entire thread, if that would be a better way to mitigate misinformation. Some guys don't read the whole post, and it'd be better for them to never see the post at all, than skim it.

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lol it sounds like words from sham's mouth. if the stone gave you a good edge and the shave went well then it's a good stone. everyone face is different some like super sharp razors some don't you have to go off what your face tell's you.