Thread: Hone of the Day

You go Mike that lead is a great medium. Tom sent me a chunk and I've been using it on my daily strop routine,, I like the effect . Smooth. Tc

Originally Posted by tcrideshd

You go Mike that lead is a great medium. Tom sent me a chunk and I've been using it on my daily strop routine,, I like the effect . Smooth. Tc

Yep, keen like a Escher/ Thurigan, but smooth like a coti. [emoji6]

I honed a Greaves & Sons that I just finished cleaning up. I thought I'd have a little fun and use my largest and smallest hones. After setting the bevel on a King 1k, I went to a Shapton 2000 then on to these... I used the brick-colored side on the big Norton followed by the black side with a drop of dish soap. This thing works quickly and gives a great edge, extremely sharp so I like to tone it down a little with a coticule after the black side. For this I used my smallest coti but one of my favs. The Norton is something like 12 x 4 inches and the little coti is almost 6 x 1 1/8 or so. I like handheld honing so the Norton sits halfway up my forearm while the coti fits right in the palm. It was a good exercise and the resulting edge was right in that sweet spot combining sharp with comfortable.

Originally Posted by outback

Yep, keen like a Escher/ Thurigan, but smooth like a coti. [emoji6]

You know that's a very accurate description,, I wish I had thought of that! But it's true, I don't hone, I only touch upon a regular schedule, you know 5-10 laps on a Nani 12kevery 12 shaves but since my razors are going on the lead I've been going more like 20 shaves easy. So just like paste but I feel it still keeps that buttery smooth edge going a long time. Tc

Re-finished a Hamada frameback for a friend of mine in France. It was already shave-ready, we're just swapping edges so I used a tomo and a nice karasu razor hone that does smooth really well. The frame is soft so I used 1 mil DuPont Kapton to protect the frame without increasing the angle much and also because it is what he used to hone it. Finished up with a few dry strokes on the fine polishing uchigumori, some palm stropping, the 20/50 on the Kanoyama. Silent HHT root in or out.

Cheers, Steve

Well I'm down to honing around three razors a week. Today's hone job is a Joseph Smith & Sons on a full Arkansas progression. The bevel was set on a Washita stone. I went with a layer of tape since there was a visible chip to be honed out. Then the blade was taken through the rest of the progression- soft, hard, surgical black. And then what I did next was interesting. I took off the layer of tape, inked the bevel with permanent marker and did 10 x strokes on the surgical black Arkansas to see how far from the edge I would be without it. Ink still there. 10 more xstrokes. Most of it's gone. 10 more X strokes and the ink was all gone scratches all the way to the edge. I spared the blade all the hone wear at the same time within 30 extra strokes on the finishing stone I get away from any kind of future need of tape for touch ups etc. BEST OF BOTH WORLDS.

Stropped and shaved and this razor is one of my top edges. A BBS shave in two effortless passes. God I love my Arkansas stones. I haven't used anything else in roughly two straight years!

Originally Posted by Steel

Well I'm down to honing around three razors a week. Today's hone job is a Joseph Smith & Sons on a full Arkansas progression. The bevel was set on a Washita stone. I went with a layer of tape since there was a visible chip to be honed out. Then the blade was taken through the rest of the progression- soft, hard, surgical black. And then what I did next was interesting. I took off the layer of tape, inked the bevel with permanent marker and did 10 x strokes on the surgical black Arkansas to see how far from the edge I would be without it. Ink still there. 10 more xstrokes. Most of it's gone. 10 more X strokes and the ink was all gone scratches all the way to the edge. I spared the blade all the hone wear at the same time within 30 extra strokes on the finishing stone I get away from any kind of future need of tape for touch ups etc. BEST OF BOTH WORLDS.

Stropped and shaved and this razor is one of my top edges. A BBS shave in two effortless passes. God I love my Arkansas stones. I haven't used anything else in roughly two straight years!

Oh Yes! It's actually fairly easy to touch up a blade without tape (whether or not the blade was honed with tape) I know as I've done it!

Glen (gssixgun) showed that in this video quite awhile back. I'm very happy that you've found it true also!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oMchDtXzUO4&t=14s

Roy, I actually seen that video a while back also. After watching that I started setting bevels with tape and then removing the tape for the rest of the progression. This is the first time I went all the way through and "touched up" the razor without the tape. My only problem with tape in the past has been I can never remember if I used tape or not when it came to the touch up. now that's not a problem.
The angle difference is indeed minimal and almost negligent while the spine protection is welcomed.

Originally Posted by tcrideshd

You go Mike that lead is a great medium. Tom sent me a chunk and I've been using it on my daily strop routine,, I like the effect . Smooth. Tc

Real lead?

Are you concerned about the stropping motion causing lead to come off and ingesting it?

Lead is pretty damn dangerous to mess with. Plenty of boys in my hood have come down with a sudden case of lead poisoning !