Thread: slurry

Originally Posted by onimaru55

Slurry cannot possibly change the grit rating of the stone in a big way unless you dig at the stone with a coarse medium & have large particles floating around. It does increase the cutting speed to match a slightly coarser stone & it also gives a slightly less sharp edge due to the slurry dulling effect... generally speaking... with synthetics.
With naturals it depends on the individual stone..
You need to try both, with & without & combinations thereof to establish your own answer with your stones .

Thanks for mentioning a slurry dulling effect - I'd never heard of this and I think you've just helped me fix a problem.

Because I've been using a King 1k/6k and a Welsh slate, the jumps in grit levels are large from one to the next. To counter this I'd been using each with slurry, then water, then lather to try to change the effective grit levels and smooth out the jumps. Anyway, I was getting good edges, but not quite there. So I tried going back to the 6k with two almost-there razors, and doing a light honing with 6k (water then lather) and the slate (water and lather). This seems to have taken both razors to a new level. Very helpful, thanks again.

Originally Posted by gssixgun

You need to add slurry when you feel comfortable using it, and confident in your own abilities to realize what is going on with it...

So, to drastically simplify your statement could you be saying that a should get used to a stone and it's individual quirks before utilizing slurry?