Thread: The Frankonian Hone

Has anyone ever had any luck with a Frankonian rock?

If so how, This thing is driving me nuts

Stingray

Start here http://straightrazorpalace.com/hones...rankonian.html

What stage of the game are you using it at ? It is supposed to be a finisher so it ought to be towards the end with an already shave ready blade. Not saying it is good or bad .... dunno, just that if you are going at it too early in the progression you may be shoveling against the tide.

I have one, never was able to get edge that is better than ~8k on it.

Originally Posted by JimmyHAD

What stage of the game are you using it at ? It is supposed to be a finisher so it ought to be towards the end with an already shave ready blade. Not saying it is good or bad .... dunno, just that if you are going at it too early in the progression you may be shoveling against the tide.

I am using or trying to use it as a fine finisher but can't get it to really do anything. I might as well be using a piece of glass.

Originally Posted by stingray

I am using or trying to use it as a fine finisher but can't get it to really do anything. I might as well be using a piece of glass.

Get a razor shaving well at 8k and then once you've got that try the frank with light slurry ten light pressure or weight of the blade round trips and test again. If that doesn't improve it does it make it worse ? May need more on the finisher .... may need to try a different razor .... or the hone may not be any better than what mainaman found with his .... if it is even as good as that. Natural stones aren't poured into a mould and baked like a ceramic or whatever. IOW, not all the same. Keep fooling with it and maybe you'll find the sweet spot.

I've got one and I'm very happy with mine. I start off doing 50 or so laps with a light slurry and then fiinishing with 50 or so laps on water. I get a good improvement on edges over my Shapton Ceramic Pro 12k. Ask Voidmonster what he thinks of the edge on a Dahlgren wedge he recently acquired off me. That was finished oon the Frankonian.

Originally Posted by stingray

I am using or trying to use it as a fine finisher but can't get it to really do anything. I might as well be using a piece of glass.

For me this usually means the razor isn't ready yet for the hone and I need to get back to the last hone or use another hone in between to bridge the gab. You could use slurry on the Frankonian but it may be better to find out where you at first. So unless your Frankonian doesn't have any cutting power it's a good thing it currently doesn't seem to do anything.

Modine, I don't think you can compare a Fox/Goldfisch Wetzstein to a Frankonian.

@ Stingray,
just to clarify this a little bit:
there is not a Frakonian hone. Frankonia is an area in Germany, not a country. Most of the area of Frankonia is in Bavarian but even a part of south Thuringia is Frankonian.
As for the hones, there have been a lot of mines in the Frankonian area in the past.
Only about 5-10 miles from the thuringian main hone mining area Sonneberg-Steinach there is a famous Bavarian-Frakonian area around Lauenberg where hones have been mined in the past and were known as the “Lauenberger Wetzsteine”. The mines around Lauenberg have been closed with the end of WW2.
The stones that were mined here have been in the same geological age as for the Thuringians (Ordovician age) and are quite comparable to the hones mined in Thuringia. The best quality stones have been the yellow ones followed by green and blau/gray coloured hones – just like the Thuringians. But of coarse Frankonian is a large area with a lot of other mines in the south or elsewhere.

Browsing the forum I have noticed, that the general understanding for Frankonians is a brown/black hone (in the forum also sometimes called brown Thuringian) that has a yellow/brown slurry that distinguishes them from Thuringians (most green and blue Thuringians produce white/gray slurry)
I have some of those hones too, but cannot yet for sure state, where these hones have been mined.

Even now I am doing some research on these Frankonian hones and visit some of the mines that have been known and could still be located today.

But I can confirm that they are very good endfinshers, finer than blue or even green Thuringians of the Ordovician layers, like the Escher type Thuringians.

You should even use these stones without slurry if you want to use them as an end finsher. Slurry makes the stones much coarser than using the stone with only water - compared to what is known from other hones, where the difference is not that much.

Hatzicho

Nice hone collection. The two boxed examples are actually Schwedensteins from Saxony, Germany. While indeed German, they are slightly softer than Thuringians, and the slurry on mine and others owned by forum members I have conversed with, is brown/yellow as has been your experience.

From what I understand, the Frankonian is significantly harder than Thuringian stones. I have yet to try one and doubt I will at a purchase price of 120 Euros from their only known retailer since there is considerable inconsistency in their attributes and a lack of unanimity regarding their use, and consequently, their value as a finisher.

Samples seem to differ greatly even among experienced honers which (very much like all naturals, particularly coticules) causes difficulty in assessing whether a problem is due to the honer and/or the methods employed or the hone itself. At least with coticules, this is generally accepted as most on this forum have tried at least one coticule.