Thread: Honing

I'm using my Chinese Waterstone as a finishing hone, and now because it gives me a smoother shave than my chromium pasted bench hone, also a refresher stone. My question is, barring any injury to my razor's edge, how long is it possible to go before I need to use my Norton 4/8 again? I mean if the bevel is set and my shaves are bbs, why would I need to? Will the time come when my bevel wears and needs to be reset? Just curious. I know that on my knives, once the initial edge is put on, only an occasional run on a steel or ceramic rod is needed to bring the edge back to snuff. It's usually not until I take out the edge on a bone, or something that I ever have to rehone my knives.

You should be fine unless you nick the edge on the faucet.

Hugh,

I agree with Alan. The consensus seems to be that if you use stones to refresh your razor, you can just do touchups with your finishing hone.

A pasted strop has a tendency to round the bevel over time, so eventually you'll need to reestablish it with something hard and flat (a hone).

A few strokes on your 12K should keep your razor going forever, unless you damage it.

Josh

I agree with the above, except......

I have one razor that for some reason doesn't like my finishing hone (a Swaty) or maybe it doesn't like the way I strop. After about three months in rotation it needs to go to the water stones again. A Short session (less than the short pyramid) there and it is good to go for another three months. Refreshing just doesn't seem to help this razor.

All my others are still going good with just quick refreshes and haven't been back to the hones since their initial work up.

I remember someone (Tony Miller, maybe) saying that a barber hone is like a pasted strop, in that you'll eventually need to rehone the razor. I'm not sure how this would happen, exactly, but it goes to Wildtim's point, so I thought I'd throw it out there...

Josh

personally, i go back to the 8k side of my norton every 5/6months on my shaving set and do 10/14 strokes. inbetween they get the 12k or pasted depending on the blade and how it takes to that finisher.

obviously they are light strokes on the 8k more of a refersher before refined more. so far im very happy with this set up.

~J

I think that's a very personal question which only you can answer satisfactorily through exploration. I have a pretty light hand on the hone and see real benefits to going back to a very small pyramid each time my razors dull.

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