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Thread: Norton 4K/8K
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09-28-2014, 01:30 PM #1
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Thanked: 25Norton 4K/8K
I finally got a chance to use my Norton 4K/8K that I bought back in early August. I had been using a Bester 1200 to set the bevel and then J nats (Aoto, Yaginoshima Asagi and Ozuka Asagi) and then stropping on 1/2 and 1/4 micron CBN pastes on Balsa wood strops. Never really got a comfortable shave with any of the blades I had honed. So I picked up the Norton, made sure it was flat and went to town on a few blades. Did much better than I thought with the 4K/8K combo, edge was bright after the 8K and then went to the Ozuka Asagi and Illinois 827 strop for a clean, smooth looking edge under 30X magnification. Got a pretty decent shave, used one of my heavier smiling SR's to shave 7 days worth of coarse growth and 1 pass knocked it down very well with some light stubble, first SR attempt in a few months. I tried to do a Xtg pass, but got a nice cut from it because I was very tired and shaky (out in the AM to go hunting after 4 hrs sleep, shaved that evening). Gonna go back and try re honing all of my SR's now. I think my J Nats weren't fully flat. Many are fairly hard and take forever to truly flatten out, even using diamond plate 140 grit and other methods. Now I have 11 more razors to hone!
Knowing the stone was flat seemed to help me keep a better view on the edge bevel and what I was doing. My J nats are pretty flat, but not as flat as the Norton and the Norton was a bit easier to flatten. I use the J Nats on my kitchen cutlery and that doesn't need a perfectly flat stone; I though by using the X strokes it may compensate for some slight unevenness, but I learned it didn't work that way!
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The Following User Says Thank You to taz575 For This Useful Post:
JReed (10-07-2014)
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09-28-2014, 03:36 PM #2
I am awaiting Glens take on this
One tired old Marine- semper fi, god bless all vets
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12-20-2014, 03:53 PM #3
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Thanked: 25Added Naniwa Super Stone 1K and 12K to the mix with the 2 Nortons so I have a full set up for my razors and a different set of stones for the kitchen knives. The Naniwa 12K is sweet! Also got a horsehide leather strop and a Roo leather strop to go on a magnetic strop base. Surprised at how much draw the Roo has! It looks like it is untreated, too.
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12-20-2014, 04:32 PM #4
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Thanked: 3795I think you might be putting too much fault in the lack of flatness in your japanese hone. Have you tried shaving off of the 8k? If you cannot get a decent shave there then the higher hones won't fix that. The higher hones will refine an edge but it has to already be a shaving edge.
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The Following User Says Thank You to Utopian For This Useful Post:
cudarunner (12-20-2014)
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12-20-2014, 04:42 PM #5
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12-20-2014, 04:57 PM #6
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Thanked: 25The edges I get off the 8K can sometimes tree top arm hair and as I go up, they tree top the arm hair better and better. I can shave arm hair starting much lower grit wise with contact with the skin. With the J Nats, I was having trouble getting the bevel set and polished as I worked my way up the stones. It was difficult to get the edge bevel cleaned up at the very edge with the J Nats and hit all the way to the very edge evenly. With the new stones that are flatter, I can get the actual edge much more refined than I was before. I still use my Ozuka Asagi for the final stone occasionally, but with the new synthetic stones, the quality/evenness of the bevel is much cleaner. The 1K Naniwa SuperStone feels smoother than the 4K Norton, the 8K Norton isn't too bad feel wise.
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12-20-2014, 05:00 PM #7
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Thanked: 1184If your bevels are set properly ( <<< a must) then you should just go thru the 4/8k with all your blades and try them out. If you can't get bbs off the 8k Norton then anything you do after that is like polishing a dog turd :<0)
Good judgment comes from experience, and experience....well that comes from poor judgment.
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12-20-2014, 05:08 PM #8
The next time Glen posts what I'm going to attempt to 'Quote' I'm going to copy and paste it and save it so I can actually provide a direct quote. With that said I like what Glen says when he posts something close to this;
Synthetics are Science, Naturals are Romance.
This is what you are finding out with the Norton 4/8. I've posted time and time again that if I were to drop my Naniwa 12k I could live off of my Norton 8k edge for the rest of my life. However If I were to drop and break my 4/8 I'd eat peanut butter sandwiches day in and day out until I could afford a new one.
As has been mentioned if the bevel isn't set then all other work is for naught. Keep working on getting a good bevel set then work on getting a Clean, Close and Comfortable Shave off of the 8k then play to your hearts content on the others.
Have fun!Our house is as Neil left it- an Aladdin’s cave of 'stuff'.
Kim X
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12-20-2014, 05:29 PM #9
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Thanked: 25Yeah, the Synthetics are much easier for me to keep an eye on the bevel set at the 1K stage and as I go up, make sure I am still hitting the actual edge with each stone and the bevel remains "set". With the uneven J Nats, the bevel wasn't staying "set" as I worked my way up the stones. The Norton 4/8 showed me that and the 8K showed me what a nice polished edge looks like! The Naniwa 1K Super Stone seems to have a little different feel from my Bester 1200 that I used the last time to set the edge and with the eye loupe, I was able to see a little better when the bevel was actually set. The Bester 1200 set the bevel fine, but the Naniwa feels a bit better with the razors; it has a creamier feel to it. Way smoother feeling than the Norton 4K actually!
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12-20-2014, 05:36 PM #10
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Thanked: 3795