Thread: Vincent Razor Sharpening Stone

Hi, everyone.

I'm a newbie and I bought this two sided stone at a barber supply store.

This is the product description:

Product Description

* Professional precision-edge maintenance for your razor, clipper and knives, this is the traditional Japanese method for shaping and finishing blades to razor-sharp edges.

* The 500 grit is for rough-grinding, to return edges to their original shape. The 800 grit is for fine finishing, smoothing and polishing cutting edges. Double-sided stone requires no pre-soaking.

* These softer stones have several advantages over harder stones, because they are softer, they do not become glazed or loaded with detritus, plus, they are lubricated effectively with water rather than oil, which can ruin the stone. In addition, with these stones the worn material and the water from slurry, which in conjunction with the stone, sharpens and polishes the blade.

I also attached this picture:





I assume the darker side is the 500 grit and the lighter side is the 800 grit.

My question is what can I use this for, to refresh a razor, hone it, etc. Also how do I use it, how many strokes, which side?

Thank you,

Charlie

It might not even be suitable for razors. If it is then only for removing chips and setting a bevel. Can you still return it?

Welcome to SRP! I have never used this stone, or even heard of it, but I will try to help you...
when it comes to razor honing the following grit ratings is what we use for sharpening and bevel setting:
1000 is what we use for bevels (give or take 200)
4000 is for sharpening
8000 is for prepolish
add a finisher which can be a stone from 10,000 to 40,000 grit level, or pastes on a strop.

To me the ratings for this stone are very low and are more for restoration then honing. A razor's edge is extremely small and fragile, so we need to use delicate and high grit hones to get the edge without a negative impact. That being said the rating of this stone according to the manufacture may be a completely different system than what I have ever read about...

Hones and honing is a big part of forums, but in reality, you really shouldn't even be looking into stones until you have a straight razor that was sharpened for you, you've used it for months with good success (after learning curve of using it), and then became curious how a honing is done. I see you have 2 posts, are you experienced with using straight razors?

Stones you can use for maintaining an already sharp razor are:
Any synthetic hone such as a norton 8K, Naniwa 8K-12K, barber hones on ebay, Coticules, pastes on a strop. These will all keep a shaving razor sharp for a long long time.

If you want to learn hone to do a full honing after getting a touch up hone then you will need more stones to make the process less frustrating.

Please read the Wiki/Library on the what hones do I need chapter.

It's probably intended to lap clipper blades. You never know what grit it actually is until you use it. There are several different grit scales out there, and then there's the effective usable fineness of a stone after it settles in (which in a friable stone or one with super hard abrasive is usually both the same, but in a stone that's harder with a less super hard abrasive, there is a big difference between a freshly made or lapped stone and one that's settled in).

I have used arkansas stones that are sold specified as "1200 grit" with better effect than 10k japanese waterstones, but part of that is the abrasive and part of that is the fact that a 1200 grit particle by some measuring conventions is a lot smaller than a 1200 grit particle under the old japanese grit spec.

That said, if the stone is just a cheap hard aluminum oxide vitrified stone, you can keep it around to do coarser work and buy a proper razor finisher, even one that's fairly inexpensive and have a decent pair to work with.

I have to agree with colleagues above. Many newcomers into SR shaving do the same mistake when they believe that what they hear from many sellers and take it as true. Keep this one for really rough renovation and either spend cash on set of well recommended hones like Norton, Naniwa etc. or go to local SRP meeting and ask sometimes you will also have chance to try and learn new skills.

I concur that the stone you have may be a good place for serious edge repair, but not so good for actually keeping your blade shave ready.

You can always look at getting something like a Belgian blue whetstone (BBW) or any number of other natural or synthetics.

I happen to like the BBW stone, although the preference is as varied as the shaving styles here and there isn't one do all stone. They can be good for setting bevels, with a lot of patience, and/or finishing depending on slurry/wet/dry/high tide/full moon/Haley's Comet/whether or not you're wearing a shirt while honing... They can be had relatively cheaply.

They can also be very tempermental/require some finesse. As adrspach mentions above, a lot of folks love the Nortons for their consistency and (relative) ease of use.

If you're serious about honing, check out this thread about BBW stones, which includes some (more) great advice from gssixgun, Disburden and others.

Thanks to all of you for your input. I've been straight shaving for 4 or 5 months now. I have a razor from Whipped Dog that was honed and is working fine. I also have a Dovo that Lynn honed. They both recommended refreshing with pastes. I'll have to think about what to do when that no longer works but it should be awhile.

I bought the Vincent hone to get a vintage Sheffield razor shave ready. I used pyramid honing and pastes. The razor will shave but it's not nearly as sharp as the other two and I usually have to do touch up with a DE.

I have a lot to think about. Don't know if I want to spend a lot on stones when I can get a new Dove for around $90USD.

Thanks again.