Thread: slurry

I have just got my yellow coticule. I have just touched up a razor with slight slurry and finished with water razor feels sharp but does not shave as well as if i had of used my norton. What i have read on the net is that coticulr with a slurry will produce a keen edge but for a nife or normal wood working tool but won't produce a brilliant shaving edge this i carn't understand but is it true as i wanted to use just the coticule for rereshing all of my razors not just for finishing. i have performed more passes on my razor stropped and tested but no improve mant infact slightly worse. this result is the worse i have ever had i normally get good results with my norton set up . Now i 'm not sure wheather to use a slight slurry or not just in case i dull the other razors i own. I have spoke to the guy at invisable edge and he says you have to use a milky slurry because that is what makes the hone perform and he as never heard of the cticule causing dulling or rounding of the edge through the use of a slurry. any simple advice would be helpful for me to achieve agood edge just with the use of my belgium coticule.

When you use a slurry, you are driving your edge into hard particulate matter suspended in solution. When you do that, you are working on a very uneven/unstable surface and the edge suffers...regardless of hone (at least all the hones I have used thus far).

It does cut a lot faster, but it also rounds and/or dulls rather significantly. The thicker the slurry, the more intense the action. I think of it like honing (not stropping) on a piece of abrasive media charged felt, in a way.

Shoot, when I am truly finishing on my coticule, I do it under running water to make sure the garnets are swept away from the edge before the razor's edge bumps em.

I kind of figured that with a slurry i am pushing against particules and this would or could effect the very edge so why do people rave a bout a coticule when in actual fact it rounds the edge causing a non shaving edge. Do i just use with water and never slurry?

Gary,

If in a hurry use slurry. The slurry increase the efficiency of the coticule - it will sharpen an edge faster than without, but as noted earlier the use of slurry will not get you to the sharpest edge you can achieve on that stone. To get to the ultimate edge use the coticule with only water. I have finished with a dry coticule and think it may polish even better than with water, but I need to do some more trying and erroring before I shout that from the roof top.

good shaving,

I run a barbers shop and the guy that had the shop before me he used the coticule he is no w 77 he says they only used water and it took ours i have seen the hone and it is worn right down to the slate he said he never used a slurry stone so if i was to hone with slurry is ther any thing after that that would give a good edge.

After a slurry honing, rinse the stone and use water on the coticule for a final polish.

Bruce so basicly use slurry to achieve a realy good edge and then finish with water and that will give me a real sharp shaving edge is that right?

I'm a first time coticule user too. I just honed a resto after bevel setting on 1200 grit. Used a Belgian Blue in the middle then finally on the yellow. I only used water & the shave impressed me more than an 8K shave. Personally if I want faster cutting I use a lower grit.
Silly question but your stone is lapped flat ? Yes ?

The one time I dulled a razor off a high grit stone was similar to your experience...a new stone. I had lapped it and rounded the edges but after much head scratching I found that I hadn't done that good a job on the edges and there was a rough spot which was catching the blade. A little more smoothing work on the edges and all was well.

Some stones start a little "rough" and after they are used a bit they seem to smooth out. You might try sharpening a couple knifes or something to "break in" your stone and then lap and try the razor again.

Something else that might help is when you are doing your water only finish rinse the stone off every 10 laps to eliminate any slurry that might be forming just from the honing action.

Originally Posted by gary haywood

Bruce so basicly use slurry to achieve a realy good edge and then finish with water and that will give me a real sharp shaving edge is that right?

Yes. You can use a coticule both for honing and for finishing.
If you use a thick slurry, you remove a lot of metal.
Then you use a light slurry to make it sharper.
Then you use water only to polish.