Thread: Japanese combi-stone

Hi all. First thread and a question i'm afraid . . . I'm going to soon be looking about to acquire some shaving tackle. However before i do i was wondering if my existing sharpening stone would be suitable for honing a straight razor ?

I'm not exactly sure of the spec but it's a two-sided Japanese waterstone. I believe it's a 1000/6000 grit ? I use it for sharpening my camping and kitchen knives. From what i have already read the process for honing a razor is similar to sharpening a knife. The stone has a brown coloured rough side and a tan coloured smooth side. I normally soak it for about 15 minutes prior to use then work up a paste on the surface with the nagura stone. I can get very nice edges on my knives with this stone but don't know if it would be suitable for the much finer edge of a straight razor

Thanks
P

By your description it sounds like king 1/6k combo stone.
You will need an 8k stone and may be CrO or diamond spray strop added to this set up to get a nicely refined edge.

I have a similar stone which I used for kitchen, pocket, and camping knives. You will probably want to flatten it using either a flattening stone or wet/dry sanpaper on glass before you hone your razor on it. From either this 6k or an 8k I would go to a 12k followed up with CrOx on balsa and your normal stropping.

Another cheap flatenning method is using loose SiC grit on glass, if you can find a supply of free glass cut offs ( Window shops, glass repair ), a bottle of 120 or 180 grit Sic is only 3 to 4 dollars, and you will be able to flatten your stones for far less money than a sand paper flatenning set up.