Thread: Razor Sharpened on Coticule Not Sharp Enough

Originally Posted by Steel

+1 to this. My first razor (dovo best) not too long ago I bought which was finished on a coti. It felt dull and pulled but I tried to 'shave on' thinking it was my technique (which It could have been). I just ended up re-setting the bevel on it too with great results (for now anyway)

IMO, nine times out of ten, you can take any blade, as in the case with the GD's, and give it to an expert honer, and you will get a smooth BBS shave and a perfect edge. In the same instance, take a top of the line blade, and give it to an inexperienced honer, and you'll end up with a crappy experience and a compromised blade edge.

IMHO, it's the honer, not the hone, nor the blade....that makes all the difference.

Originally Posted by Phrank

IMO, nine times out of ten, you can take any blade, as in the case with the GD's, and give it to an expert honer, and you will get a smooth BBS shave and a perfect edge. In the same instance, take a top of the line blade, and give it to an inexperienced honer, and you'll end up with a crappy experience and a compromised blade edge.

IMHO, it's the honer, not the hone, nor the blade....that makes all the difference.

Thanks phrank but I wouldn't consider myself an expert honer. You are right though. It doesn't matter what hone you have if you don't know how to use it.

It sounds like there's one heck of a learning curve on a coticule. When I got my Naniwa SS (1,5,8,12ks), the only thing I knew about honing was from watching Lynn and Glen on the videos. I had 2 razors purchased from SRD that I knew to be sharp. I had a W&B and a Robert Williams also. I dulled both the W&B and the Williams (GASP). I went to work on the near wedge W&B, cause I reckoned it would be the toughest to hone. I used Lynn's progression, but Glens 2 handed approach. It took 5 attempts before I had a sharp blade again. I learned that at the 1k level, the bevel is set when the blade feels like the stone is sucking it down, that's the best way I can describe it, the contact between blade and stone feels sticky. After that the rest is easy. I'm not a honing expert by a million miles, but if you are thinking of buying your first stones, I recommend the Naniwas.

Originally Posted by Wayne1963

It sounds like there's one heck of a learning curve on a coticule..

That really depends on what you are asking the Coti to do, as a Polisher/Finisher I find them as easy as any other chunk o rock

But if you start asking any hone to do things across a larger spectrum then the learning curve gets much higher...


Think about taking your Naniwa 8k and using a slurry stone to set the bevel, then dilute it out to sharpen the edge, and finally to clear water to polish the edge.. That would take a bit of practice to get it to a repeatable process (BTW it can be done) Now think about how easy your 8k is when used simply as the polisher it is, after your 5k sharpner, and moving to your 12k finisher.. Easy Peasy

All comes down to what you are using the hones for

^^^^^^^^^
That's been my experience exactly. I had the chance to try a Coticule recently that left an edge close to my Escher. I used it after the 4k Shapton glass and started with a medium to low slury diluting to water. The shave was 3 passes with minimal touch ups for BBS and no alum burn. I had try the same with my Coticule and had to go to the 8k, then light slury to water to get 3 pass razor with more passes for a DFS no BBS and minimal alum burn (because the many passes needed).

This tell me that the borrowed coti is a better finisher than the one I have. I don't know how to use a coti still, but it's my next stone to achieve sharp shave ready razors from start to finish. Maybe when I can do bevel setting to polish then go to the Turi for a killer edge, I would sell all my other hones and keep those two only................NOT!

Double O