Thread: Lapping Plates

I just wanted to start a thread to talk about lapping plates. I'm curious as to which plates you guys have and what you think is the best lapping plate. The lapping plate I used was a dia sharp 325, however, I didn't notice till too late that there were 2 pieces sticking up from the plate which badly scratched my hones. Because of this incident I'm a bit untrusting of dia sharp plates. So any opinions or information is greatly appreciated.

When I got my DMT 325 I took the advice voiced on the forum to run some steel across the plate to level out the surface. Most suggested the shank of a screw driver. I happened to have a broken razor and the broken off piece was about two inches wide. I ran that up and down the plate a goodly number of times and then lapped my 12k Chinese stone with no scratches. I did pencil a grid on the stone to make sure I was evening it out properly. A good friend, though swears by the Atoma because the diamonds are placed in a regulated pattern instead of scattered like on the DMT. Which ever one you choose remember to use it under running water.

DMT, Atoma are probably the most used amongst our members.
I have had a few eze-lap's in the past but only used them on utility type knives never considered them for lapping plates.
Iwood is another brand that has a decent reputation and I have owned in the past.
Dia Sharp I have no first hand knowledge on.

I like a piece of inch thick granite countertop as a lapping plate.
I can use various grits of various types of sandpaper to get the job done.
I use a much coarser grit to flatten my hones used for kitchen and pocket knives and finer grits for straight razor hones.
A coarser grit on a given hone will cause it to cut quicker and leave somewhat coarser scratches than it would if a finer grit paper is used on it.
Also When using a fresh piece of paper I like to make a couple passes and then rinse of the paper. a couple more passes and rinse the paper again.
This gets rid of the odd pieces of grit that stand taller then the rest, to break in the paper.
Continued use without rinsing has a similar effect as using a slurry while honing a razor.
I have a 325 DMT but usually when I break out the heavy piece of granite I want to do several hones and usually use different grits for different hones.
If I were to lap every hone every time I used it certainly the 325 DMT would be much much handier to use any varying pressure with it would give somewhat similar results.
I never tryed the DMT before thouroughly breaking it in by sharpening several kitchen/fishing/hunting knives.

I use a well broken in 325 DMT on all of my Naniwa hones and am left with a angle mirror surface. Using the same 325 on my Norton 4k/8k I only get a passable finish. On my Japanese natural hones I use the Atoma in the larger size and the credit card size DMT on my Zulu grey.

I just got my 325 DMT a couple of weeks ago, and lapped all my hones 250, 1k, 4k, 8k, C12k, 12k ss, Zulu Grey - pretty sure from what I've read so far, I went about it the wrong way....
I've had no issue at any grit level though. I've honed 6 razors bevel to finish over the past couple of weeks with great results, with just a cleanup on the DMT maybe 8-10 lap's.

I use the 325 DMT as well, works great!

I just got my DMT 325 today and tried it out and am happy with the results. I had an old stone 1k stone that I've replaced with a Shapton 1k and used it to make several passes before using on my Norton 4k/8k. Seemed to work out fine.

I use Atoma 140 on coarse stones like 220 -320 grit, Atoma 400 on 1k - 5k, Atoma 1200 on 5k & up. QC seems better on the Atoma rather than DMT. I've never had to return an Atoma. Owned 7 so far.

I'm a DMT 325 user. I broke it in "accidentally" by rubbing a 220 waterstone on it; I didn't know any better at the time. If I got a new one today, I'd break it in by sharpening a chisel on it.