Thread: Please help me ID this stone

Hey guys,

So I'm definitely a newbie so please forgive me. I've been scouring the forums on everything straight razor related for about a month trying to figure out how this whole honing thing works. I decided to get a finishing stone and decided on a Thuringian because they got good reviews and I can afford one, so I bought one a guy was selling on ebay. I thought it was reasonably priced (about $50) and it came from the UK. Here are a couple pictures and my first question is, do you guys think its a Thuringian or something else?


Those little light specs are in the stone and the light colored lapping marks are how the stone came. It didn't seem right to have such deep lap marks so I polished it up on sandpaper and glass (220 then 600). It seemed very hard, but my only comparison is my norton's 4k/8k, which I feel is pretty soft. From what I read the Thuringians are both lighter, greener and softer so I'm now a bit concerned.


This picture is a bit more true to the color of the stone. Its pretty dark grey and a little bluish. The slurry (which is very hard to create, I have to lay into it with the slurry stone) is about the same color as the light grey around the corners. I also notice that when I try to create a slurry it gouges the stone, which doesn't seem right.

I should also mention when I was lapping the stone is smelled very "fishy".

I used this stone last night and I'm pretty sure it made my edge worse. I found the easiest sharpness test for me (since I don't know what all the other ones feel like yet) is to shave my leg hair. I stared on my 4k after setting the bevel and did (20) x strokes with medium pressure followed by shaving part of my thigh (dry). I repeated that until I didn't notice any difference in the ease of shaving (about 4 times) and did one last time with light pressure.

Then i switched to my 8k and did the same thing with medium pressure. I definitely noticed an improvement on the 8k and it began shaving with very little resistance. I repeated 2 times and didn't notice much improvement so I did one more with light pressure.

Then I switched to the mystery stone and did the same thing with very light pressure twice (no slurry since I didn't want to scratch my stone again). Both times it seemed the dry leg shaving got worse, but I thought that maybe it was just in my head so I headed to the stop and did about 50 passes. Shave test was horrendous, it tugged terribly and barely even cut the hairs. I looked at it under my 60x loupe and the edge looks fine (as far as I could tell for being a newb).

What do you guys think happened? Do I need to lap my stone better? Is it just a cheap crappy stone and I got swindled?

Thanks for the help.

At first glance, it looks a lot like a slate hone I purchased a while ago from AJ on Ebay. According to some posts, they are actually some form of Bohemian slate. I will try to get some photos of mine for you and see if they are similar.

Well to me also looks like one of AJ UK ebay slate thuringian wannabe, but that said many have found this stone to be quite a
good reliable finisher.To me it sure looks like you need to lap this stone a lot more until all the scratch line and specs are completely gone. After you set the bevel (the most important part of honing) you should do a progression on the 4k/8k norton
at this point you should be able to shave comfortably, then after your new stone is lapped properly, use it till the scratch pattern
of the 8k is gone. A finishing stone like this one properly lapped should feel like smooth glass with a little water.

To get all the scratches out of mine, I had to lap it on my Norton 1k. The DMT 325 left it with swirly scratches that would not go away. I lapped it for 20 minutes on the 1k and it came out very smooth. Then I ran it on the 4k and it is now glass-like. This is not the Welsh slate, but rather the one I think it Bohemian.

not thuringian.....just a blue stone, rubbish ....

Rubbish? If it leaves a good edge, that's what's important.

If the colour of the slurry is the same as the stone, it is not a Thuringian. Thuringians generate a whitish slurry. Despite this you are less likely to find a Thuringian in the UK. It is most likely you have a species of British slate, perhaps Yellow Lake. These can polish between 4 and 8k equivalent, but it is possible with light enough strokes that it could leave a finer polish and allow a smoother shave than an edge from a Norton 8K. You need to test it further, perhaps lap it up to 1000 grit.