Thread: Scratch pattern off Norton 8k seems too rough

Originally Posted by jag213

That'd pretty funny, but i don't think so. The 4k is the white side and 8k the yellow.

It happens. I had a Kasumi brand 3/8k stone That was marked differently to what it said on the box.

In the past guys have had to lap off up to 1/8" on the norton 4k (white side) to achieve a clear surface. Possibly your 8k is faulty like that ?
Of course appearances can be deceptive & I can't actually see the scratch pattern on your 4k pic but if your edge is chipping there's something wrong

Originally Posted by 32t

Change your hone to edge angle and see if the scratch pattern changes to the new angle.

Tim’s got your answer right there ^^^. If the stria change direction drop to 325 or so diamond plate and take a bit off the 8k side. May be some contamination from the factory, that or return it for a new one.

I think id lap the hell out of it. Those are horrible stria for an 8k!

What else did you hone that razor on, looks like low grit diamond? Those scratches are not coming from the 8K.

And it looks like your bevel is not set.

Did you lap the 8K with a diamond plate? If you did, you might have some diamond debris imbedded in the surface.

Thought about this some more. If you didn’t clean the stone or the blade or the rubbing stone (if you use one) before moving to the 8K, you could easily have contaminated that side of the hone with coarser particles from the slurry or swarf. I always thoroughly clean and rinse the entire stone and the blade and wipe the blade with a clean microfibre cloth before moving to a higher grit.

Ideally, you would go from 1K to 2K to 4K to 8K. Since you are going from 1K directly to a 4K stone, it will take a lot of work on the 4K stone to remove all of the scratches from the 1K. If you stay at the 4K level long enough, none of the 1K scratches will remain. At that point, the 8K should remove the 4K scratches fairly quickly unless, as some have suggested, there is a problem with your Norton 8K.

Low cost diamond plate that has left particals in the 4 and/or 8k?

Thanks for the suggestions everyone. Figured I would just repeat the process and see if the results change. So I ran the edge along my 1k to dull it and reset the bevel on the 1k. Then I worked back up through the 4k,8k and 12k after relapping all the stones. Picture attached is at the end of process. Seems to be less scratches than the original photos. Its hard to get good photos since I am taking them with my phone, so apologies that they aren't the same angle and lighting. There still seems to be some deeper scratches that didn't get worked out with the rest of them. I feel like I hit a particularly hard piece of grit every now and then on the 8k even after lapping it. Don't know if this is expected behavior or caused by something else (such as an embedded diamond piece as some have pointed out). Anyway looks like progress, and feedback/suggestions are always appreciated

That is significant scratching coming off a 12K.

I wonder if some of those scratches are remnants from earlier honing. You should be able to get rid of most of them using the 4K as long as you stay with it long enough to do that.

It is possible you will need more time on the 4K to eliminate the 1K scratch pattern. You can also change the angle of your blade on the hone so that the 4K scratches are more easily differentiated from the previous scratches.

I suggest you take a picture at each stage of the honing progression. Use a magic marker to highlight a section of the bevel that you can reference at each stage. Choose a spot where you currently have lots of scratches.

Get a picture when you think you have set the bevel with the 1K, then take another when you think you have finished with the 4K. Post that picture before you go on to the 8K so the folks here can give you some advice.

That way you will know for sure if you’ve spent enough time on the 4K.