First Hone Purchase: The Ebay Guessing Game

Well, last week I found that I had burnt through a substantial portion of the lapping film I purchased (so that I could quickly and cheaply sharpen up my blades and start learning to hone), so I figured it was time to get something a little more permanent. Lusting for a coti and fancying myself cool and clever (note: sarcasm), I sifted through ebay until I found a few miss-labeled coticules, waited 'till bidding aaaaaaaaand found that I was far from the only cool and clever person in existence. Those puppies don't even sell for less than the properly listed ones.

Anyway, desperately needing hones of any kind, I found a really terrible listing- with bad pictures that seemed to vaguely describe two hones, one of which was probably a double-grit. The surface of both looked smooth, so I decided to (for the price) bet on natural and bid. I figured that since I needed hones I could find a use for them no matter what I rolled.

ebay listing pic, note, the long one is the double grit:
Attachment 123641

Well, they arrived the other day and the double-grit was........... most certainly not a coti (Looks like a pike or norton). My silliest and most fanciful dreams dashed, I turned my attentions to the other stone that I had previously ignored. It was a dark blue, almost black, and I figured hey, maybe this'll be something. After playing with it a bit, I discovered that the stone was absolutely soaked in grime, and after a good bit of sanding, scrubbing and soaking in grease remover (these steps repeated many a time), I had unveiled a stone of completely different character. It was now a light brownish green, or perhaps a greenish brown, with some shiny speckles and color variances spread throughout. It's actually kinda pretty, and I half fancy it might be a natural. It seems to be a finisher, but i'm not very experienced in these matters.

Anyway, I'd appreciate your help in identifying it. Or at least attempting to. The stone is hard, and I do not think it is meant to be slurried, though I have included slurry pics below (taken during sanding). Additionally there is still some oil spotting left. It's almost gone, but not quite.

http://imageshack.us/a/img824/4955/p1000245a.jpg

The dark splotches (near the ends) are oil stains, as far as I can tell anyway. It's a pity it doesn't have well defined sedimentary layers:
http://imageshack.us/a/img856/4906/p1000249d.jpg

Here are some pictures wet and with slurry (taken while sanding):http://imageshack.us/a/img96/8646/p1000233s.jpg



Anyway, if it's not anything special it's not a big deal. I have this on the way to me :rock::
Attachment 123642

I can't help on IDing the stones you've received but I can tell you that I've heard, from a reliable source, that easy off oven cleaner will effectively remove oil from stones. I haven't had occasion to try it myself but it was suggested that the can with the blue label is oder free and the one to get.

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Originally Posted by JimmyHAD

I can't help on IDing the stones you've received but I can tell you that I've heard, from a reliable source, that easy off oven cleaner will effectively remove oil from stones. I haven't had occasion to try it myself but it was suggested that the can with the blue label is oder free and the one to get.

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Thanks for the tip, my stone still reeks of the cleaner I was using.

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Originally Posted by JimmyHAD

I can't help on IDing the stones you've received but I can tell you that I've heard, from a reliable source, that easy off oven cleaner will effectively remove oil from stones. I haven't had occasion to try it myself but it was suggested that the can with the blue label is oder free and the one to get.

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Can't see why that would not work. I have used no name oven cleaner to draw the oil out of wood gun stocks. Repeated doses of cleaner and flushing with water seem to work there. A little bit of warming the stone might aid also in getting the oil to release.

Bob

Put the stone in the dish washer and put on a very hot cycle with plenty of detergent.

Jamie

The second thuringian is nice. Congratulations

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Originally Posted by celticcrusader

Put the stone in the dish washer and put on a very hot cycle with plenty of detergent.

Jamie

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Wow, that worked really well. The stone is much much lighter in color now, more of a light greenish gray. There are still some oil spots, but I'll keep working those. Thanks! I'll post pics later tonight.

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Originally Posted by Frameback

The second thuringian is nice. Congratulations

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Thank you, I may have overpaid for it, not knowing exactly what the lines are between thuri, escher private label and escher. I'm excited about it none the less. As long as it hones well I think I'll be happy with it.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by UrEnki

Wow, that worked really well. The stone is much much lighter in color now, more of a light greenish gray. There are still some oil spots, but I'll keep working those. Thanks! I'll post pics later tonight.


Thank you, I may have overpaid for it, not knowing exactly what the lines are between thuri, escher private label and escher. I'm excited about it none the less. As long as it hones well I think I'll be happy with it.

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If its a thuri and you got it in a no name auction you most likely didn't over pay as they go for more then coti's normally

Anyway, if it's not anything special it's not a big deal. I have this on the way to me :rock::
Attachment 123642[/QUOTE]

Congratulation to that hone. Thuringians with this label are quite rare ones.

The hones were traded by the company: Deutsche Schleifmaterialien Gesellschaft. The initials of that company were the letters DSG, written into one another.

The company was located in Steinach/ Thuringia and existed in the early 20th century. The quarries where these stones have been mined are the same as the quarries of the Escher labelled stones. All the quarries of the known thuringian waterwhetstones have been located in the woods around the small town Steinach in Thuringia, Germany.
The quarries have been exploited in the 19th century by whetstone makers, mostly one or two people together with their families. They sold the stones to the big trading companies like Escher, Deutsche Schleifmittel AG, Luthard and DSG, etc. These companies finshed the precast stones they got from the whetstone makers, labelled and sold them around the world. In some years of the 18/19th century, there has been a strong separation between mining and trading of the whetstones. For some years the miners were even not allowed to sell their stones to the public. This was only done by the trading companies. With the ending 19th/ beginning 20th century, the big trading companies began to rent or buy the bigger quaries and mined and sold the stones on their own.

Like all the thuringian stones they may vary a little bit in quality, even the Escher stones do. But the Escher company always was strongly watching about the quality of the stones they sold.

The chance is good that this labelled DSG stone is of very good quality too.

Please send some detailled pictures when you got it and report on the honing capabilities. Enjoy!

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Originally Posted by hatzicho

Congratulation to that hone. Thuringians with this label are quite rare ones.

The hones were traded by the company: Deutsche Schleifmaterialien Gesellschaft. The initials of that company were the letters DSG, written into one another.

The company was located in Steinach/ Thuringia and existed in the early 20th century. The quarries where these stones have been mined are the same as the quarries of the Escher labelled stones. All the quarries of the known thuringian waterwhetstones have been located in the woods around the small town Steinach in Thuringia, Germany.
The quarries have been exploited in the 19th century by whetstone makers, mostly one or two people together with their families. They sold the stones to the big trading companies like Escher, Deutsche Schleifmittel AG, Luthard and DSG, etc. These companies finshed the precast stones they got from the whetstone makers, labelled and sold them around the world. In some years of the 18/19th century, there has been a strong separation between mining and trading of the whetstones. For some years the miners were even not allowed to sell their stones to the public. This was only done by the trading companies. With the ending 19th/ beginning 20th century, the big trading companies began to rent or buy the bigger quaries and mined and sold the stones on their own.

Like all the thuringian stones they may vary a little bit in quality, even the Escher stones do. But the Escher company always was strongly watching about the quality of the stones they sold.

The chance is good that this labelled DSG stone is of very good quality too.

Please send some detailled pictures when you got it and report on the honing capabilities. Enjoy!

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Thanks for the info! I know there was some confusion with these stones as a few came with escher labels as well as DSG ones.

Anyway, mine arrived today (no escher label, but certainly wasn't expecting one), and it's beat to hell. It's got loads of cut marks on all sides, two dips on the top, and a dip on the bottom, where the previous owner tore the stone out (leaving some of the stone behind) and then began honeing on the useable part remaining. Additionally, the hone itself is a parallelogram, but not a square. Suffice to say, it's gonna take some work.

On the plus side, it has to be a very, very soft stone. I'll post pics when I get home later tonight.

Alrighty, here are the pics. I got a vintage natural combination coti today as well, so I'll through in some pics of that as well.

The top and bottom look to be slightly different colors, the bottom appears (to me) slightly more greenish.

http://imageshack.us/a/img201/7878/p1000537t.jpg

http://imageshack.us/a/img96/5084/p1000538f.jpg

http://imageshack.us/a/img839/6085/p1000535d.jpg

http://imageshack.us/a/img827/394/p1000539ib.jpg

And here's the coti- the remnants of it's original stamp are still visible. I can't make out the words, but it looks like it might have had a crown or paw in the center.

http://imageshack.us/a/img22/687/p1000543m.jpg

http://imageshack.us/a/img833/1264/p1000546qp.jpg

Anyway, I can't wait to start honing. The coti seems pretty hard, it's a lot harder than the slurry stone I got from the superior shave, and after 125 laps with water on it I saw no signs of natural slurry release.

Just a quick update, and sorry for all the posts. The thuri honed up a lot faster than I was expecting.

http://imageshack.us/a/img594/6878/p1000549z.jpg

http://imageshack.us/a/img194/9158/p1000551d.jpg

Great stones, both of them. The Thuri seem to be one with a colour change from more bluish green to more (yellow) green - like for example the most Barbers deligth stones have. Also it looks like it has some yellowish streaks on the back side. These Thuringians are some of the best ones you can get according to my experience.
Looking forward to hear of your honing experiences!

Let us know how well the actual honing goes.

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Originally Posted by sffone

Let us know how well the actual honing goes.

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Well, I've spent a good chunk of time on the stone, and I'm happy to say that my results are my best yet. Even better than my earlier goes with lapping film (erm, experience may be the main cause of this). Anyway, I can finally sharpen my razors to shave ready (mildly shave ready, lots of room left for improvement), and let me just say- shaving with a sharp knife is so much more pleasant than the alternative. It's also highlighted a number of shaving errors I was making before hand.

But enough about shaving, the stones are what's fun.

I do believe that the coticule is on the hard side of the coti spectrum, as it has absolutely no tendency to slurry on it's own. This isn't a bad thing though, I've been using it with a much softer slurry stone from The Superior Shave, and I hope this will prolong my cotis life. At some point I'll slurry it up with a plate and see how that goes.

Anyway, as I've been using it, it functions as it should. With slurry it cuts fairly quickish (or so I assume, my dubl duck makes gray slurry pretty quick, but my henckels and mozart change the color far more slowly), and seems to polish nicely on pure water. I've been getting an inconsistant (heavily hair dependent and somewhat regional on the edge) HHT 1-3 after 90+ strokes on pure water. I assume that I'm not spending enough time with a light slurry.

On water the coti has a slick, gentle feel. The overall impression is that of soft. With slurry it takes on a gritty texture. I'm still learning to feel for the changes that let me know the razor is ready to move onto the next dilution.

As for the thuri, I've only smoothed up the dark blue side. I haven't tried the other, lighter, greener one and am somewhat reluctant to lap it as I'd need to remove another mm or so from the bottom. It wouldn't take long, but I hate to throw away purty stone. Anywho, after the coti my razors like 90-150 laps on the thuri. Improvement is fairly steady throughout this period, and I walk away with an edge HHT1-4 (depending on hair, but much more consistant than before) from bevel to tip (I'm sure the smaller width helps me reduce regional variation), that is much more likely to fall in HHT 3-4 than before. The edge may continue to improve with more laps, but I tend to lose count.....

This stone has a silky, luxurious feel while honing, as the blade just glides across. It's quite pleasant to use.

My edges have not been lasting very long, typically one shave if that. But I suspect this is due to improper shaving technique developed with dull razors, that is, a very very wide, almost perpendicular blade angle during the shave. I'm pretty sure this is tearing my edges to bits.

Overall I am very pleased with my honing progress, and am very much in love with these stones. I would like to improve sharpness some more. The razors don't pull, but they do take a little more push than I'd like.

For me, the quest for the perfect edge is never ending. I've not yet tried using film, so I think I'll have to give it a try.