Thread: wojtec hones and their use

Hello all,
I picked up the slate and arkansas hones offered from Poland by Wojtec on ebay last night, and was wondering if anyone had any experience using these hones. The slate one is around 4000, and the arkansas around 6000-8000, so I was thinking this may be a usable substitute to learn honing skills on until the finances make a Norton more reasonable. Anyone know anything about these guys, or have any advice as to their use??

Thanks,
Landis

I have all 3 hones Wojciech is selling, and the best advice I can give you is to experiment. I will say I like the black hone but have two of them and make a slurry with it, which for me seems to work better. The Arkansas I've only used a few times so far, it has no problems getting a razor to a good bevel (and pass the wet thumbnail test) but the shave afterwards was a bit irritating. The creamy white colored stone he sells as "compressed slate" seems to me to be a bit finer, perhaps a finishing stone, although I noticed the stone seems to have a bit of a waxy finish to it which is odd. Haven't tried it with a rubbing stone as of yet though. You could use them, but they are completely different than a Norton.
They aren't a lot of money, you could just buy them and use them to experiment, you may find a method you like. Otherwise, there is MUCH more info on the Nortons, especially if you want to see results quick.
That said,
you CAN get a shaving edge with these hones. It just takes some experimentation to get the right combination with them.
John P.

I picked up the Grey coloured Arkansas hone yesterday - I'm not sure of the grit myself but I have to say it's an amazing hone . Did 2 of wojtec's razors with it last night ( one had a slight chip therefore required some work on the 1000 waterstone firstly ) .. I'm going to plough the forum and the net to see if I can get some more info but I kinda hope one of the US honemeisters will be able to supply some details wrt grit .
This hone so far ( only 20mins or so use ) is a fav of mine .. and at the price I'm really tempted to grab another to keep unopened and boxed ..
I'm really impressed with it's ability

Ok .. the hone I have appears to be the Translucent - still no idea what grit tho

Likewise on my Arkansas from him. Did you use yours with oil or with lather?
John P.

Originally Posted by JohnP

Likewise on my Arkansas from him. Did you use yours with oil or with lather?
John P.

Just a little soft Scottish water :-) wanted to find a little more info on them first - I use lather on my Belgians with amazing results , I'll try some lather next time .. ordered another couple of razors ( OK I admit I'm going for the 7 day set ) so I'll see how well it does then , if it's anything like the Belgians I know I won't be disappointed .
I've never actually put oil on any of my razor stones .

Garry

Garry,
Have you been using your Arkansas in combination with other stones? How close to shave ready have you been able to get your razors on it? Roughly how may laps on the hone?

I too have one of the Arkansas hones, the semi-translucent grey variety. The ebay post said that it was a 6-8k stone, assuming that I guessed my Polish correctly (I learnt a little russian at school, many years ago).

So far I have only used to lap my Norton 4/8k, so I don't have any real testing done. My first take on it is that it is probably softer than it looks; I got up a fair slurry faster than I was expecting when lapping (with just water, as it was against a water stone).

I honed one of wojtecs razors up the other day using his hones (the arkansas and a few strokes on the one that comes with the strop.) I did have to lap the hones a little as they were a little off but one against the other works, slowly.

40 turns on the wojtec smoother strop and it was passing the hht on fairly thin hairs so I had a quick one pass shave with it so it can be done. I'm far from au fait with straight razors either.

It took me longer to hone this razor using these stones than it has taken to do a couple of old razors on a natural japanese waterstone which is probably around the same grit but softer and gives a much better slurry.

Originally Posted by BBSWANNABE

Garry,
Have you been using your Arkansas in combination with other stones? How close to shave ready have you been able to get your razors on it? Roughly how may laps on the hone?

LOL ok ... I have the memory like a goldfish so unless I really concentrate I always fluff up pyramids so I tent to just check after 5 -10 passes ..

On the razor that had a little microchip - I just kept going a 1000 Japanaese water stone until the chips had all but gone I then followed on the 6000 Japanese waterstone until the chip had completely vanished and the bevel was uniform to my eyes ..
This is probably so so wrong but I finished with about 10 passes on the Arkansas stropped on a red oxide strop for 20-30 passes then stropped as usual - shaved with the razor this morning and I'm fairly happy with the results ..
The other razor that was ok .. I did about 15 passes on the Arkansas followed by about 10 very light passes on my little lithide hone ( still trying to find my way with this little baby even after a year ) ... then again onto the red oxide strop for about 20 pass's then strop as normal ..

I tend to use my thumb to check for sharpness off the hone and when I feel the razor pull on the strop I check and see if it pops lifted hairs on my arm


I probably do things in the most awkward way possible but hey ... I have fun getting there :-)

More time is need with the Arkansas I think so I can establish exactly what it can do .