Thread: heavy duty progression

I watched heavy duties progression basicly 1 k 4k 8k and the polishing stages by using bbw with slurry and belgium yellow with water then strop. Im just finishing coming of my 8k and just about to try blue with slurry then yelow with water. But not sure if the blue with slurry may dull the edge a little may be bart could give me advice on this one or any one else that as tried this and had good results or not.I have tryed blu slurry and yellow slurry then water and as been pritty good results but i must admit it has also not been so good in some cases.

Gary,

I presume with 4K and 8K, you're talking about the Norton.
You can go Norton 4K, Blue with slurry, Coticule with water.
You can also go: Norton 4K, Norton 8K, Coticule with water.
I don't know which would be sharper, since I don't own a Norton.

Not all razors respond equally well to a given honing method. Sometimes, it comes apparent during the first shave that the razor lacks on the keenness front, although you're positive that you had a perfect, very sharp bevel after the 4K. In such stubborn cases I try the double bevel method.
To do it, add two layers of electrical insulation tape to the spine. Hone 20 extremely light laps on the coticule with water. This creates a nice and clean microbevel at the edge, and a whole new shot at achieving the sharpness you were after in the first place.

best regards,
Bart.

Hi Gary.
When you come upon one of those " notsogoods; What do you do?

I'm not too sure about the blue. I didn't see it in the lineup using a 1/5/8 thousands synthetic progression when the coticule side of the stone was so amazing for the finish. So whichever was left, the cot removes it.

my piece is small and thin so i like to keep the blue for backing I tell myself. From all the tales it sounds like the bbw is an interesting stone to study.

I think your not so good likely need another xx on your finish hone. If 10 or 20 don't nail the next shave, try again. 2 or 3 trips back is standard procedure for me.

In practice from my experience it really should not matter if you use slurry on the Blue or not. I have consistently got great edges from the progression with slurry and without slurry on the blue, you just might have to do a little more work on the blue without the slurry in order to remove the scratch pattern left from the preceding grit. If you finish the progression and don't have a good edge then it is because you did not finish setting the bevel properly on the earlier stages, not because you used or failed to use slurry on the blue. I have also got great edges going straight from the 1K or 4K to the yellow (skipping the blue completely) and just doing more work on the yellow but YMMV.

Gary,

I presume with 4K and 8K, you're talking about the Norton.
You can go Norton 4K, Blue with slurry, Coticule with water.
You can also go: Norton 4K, Norton 8K, Coticule with water.
I don't know which would be sharper, since I don't own a Norton.

I agree. The Norton 4K, Blue with slurry, Coticlue with water is what I prefer to use. Sometimes I wash the slurry off the blue and do a few more passes before moving on to the coticlue with water but I don't really think that it makes a difference.

Not all razors respond equally well to a given honing method. Sometimes, it comes apparent during the first shave that the razor lacks on the keenness front, although you're positive that you had a perfect, very sharp bevel after the 4K. In such stubborn cases I try the double bevel method.
To do it, add two layers of electrical insulation tape to the spine. Hone 20 extremely light laps on the coticule with water. This creates a nice and clean microbevel at the edge, and a whole new shot at achieving the sharpness you were after in the first place.

I personally don't like to do the double tape method because then I have to match the bevel on later touch ups, but it will work as you said.

best regards,
Bart

Always nice to hear from you Bart

I have used the blue with light slurry and yellow with light slurry then water and i did give the the bevel stage a realy good going over and the razor has turned out real fine i was just worried about undoing previous stages as i read about slurry rounding the edge so much which realy can make me paranoid about slurry honing even though i don't see the the p[oint in have natural belgiums if you carn't use the slurry as this is how there suposed to work.i no certain honmeisters actualy shave straight of the blue and say it is as good as you will get.

Originally Posted by gary haywood

I have used the blue with light slurry and yellow with light slurry then water and i did give the the bevel stage a realy good going over and the razor has turned out real fine i was just worried about undoing previous stages as i read about slurry rounding the edge so much which realy can make me paranoid about slurry honing even though i don't see the the p[oint in have natural belgiums if you carn't use the slurry as this is how there suposed to work.i no certain honmeisters actualy shave straight of the blue and say it is as good as you will get.

Don't worry about the slurry rounding the edge, in my experience it won't do so. In my view the slurry just makes the stone a little more aggressive. A belgian blue used with slurry certainly leaves a much finer edge than a DMT 1200 or Norton 4K, and leaves the edge ready for the yellow to work its magic.

heavyduty is the master at this, i learned a lot from reading his articles and watching the videos also, id try the 1k then 4k then belgian blue with slurry then without then go straight to the couticle with slurry and finish on the couticle with water, it seems like a lot of hones but you wont spend a lot of time on each of them this way it is a step progression that will save wear on your belgium hones

Hey David, great to see you resurfacing again. I often miss the times when you (and Josh) ruled the honing dungeons of SRP, sharing your insights and experience.

Originally Posted by heavydutysg135

Gary,
Don't worry about the slurry rounding the edge, in my experience it won't do so. In my view the slurry just makes the stone a little more aggressive. A belgian blue used with slurry certainly leaves a much finer edge than a DMT 1200 or Norton 4K, and leaves the edge ready for the yellow to work its magic.

I don't think we are in complete agreement on the slurry issue. Maybe there's a difference between the stones we use. With naturals, one can never be sure. Either way, I have done double blind experiments on it, testing three coticules and one blue. Very distinct differences showed up between edges finished on slurry and on water. That's why I always tell people to be careful with slurry. Not that slurry has no place in honing. I hardly ever use my DMT 1200 anymore, but a coticule with slurry instead. No way a Blue without slurry is going to refine that bevel to the keeness level I prefer for a decent shave. If other gentlemen's mileage varies, that's fine with me. Everyone can do a simple test: take a razor that shaves you very well, finished on a coticule. Get a slurry on the same coticule and do about 20 laps. Shave with it. I know that I was not pleased when I tried this, and I have, on almost every coticule lying around here. Next, try to revive that edge on the same coticule, now with water only. I can't do it, but that is not important. Everyone can easily find his own answer. Allow me to assume some people would actually share my outcome. Those can now take their still not satisfactory edge to a Blue with a light slurry for about 40 laps (let's stay on the safe side). Next to the Coticule with water, or even to the Blue with water. (I believe I stopped caring ). At this point I shave and rest my case.

Originally Posted by heavydutysg135

Not all razors respond equally well to a given honing method. Sometimes, it comes apparent during the first shave that the razor lacks on the keenness front, although you're positive that you had a perfect, very sharp bevel after the 4K. In such stubborn cases I try the double bevel method.
To do it, add two layers of electrical insulation tape to the spine. Hone 20 extremely light laps on the coticule with water. This creates a nice and clean microbevel at the edge, and a whole new shot at achieving the sharpness you were after in the first place.

I personally don't like to do the double tape method because then I have to match the bevel on later touch ups, but it will work as you said.

Sometimes I meet a razor that doesn't respond well to my general honing methods. For a few of them, the creation of a secondary bevel solved the problem. I don't really know why. But for the sake of speculation: I always repeatedly check the edge under the stereo microscope while honing. Sometimes, for no apparent reason, during finishing on a Coticule, the thinest part of the bevel (maybe 1/10th of its total width or so) becomes out of true. Maybe there's too much suction on the bevel during the honing stroke causing that 1/10th to flutter a bit, I don't know. I have started over, on such razors, thinking that it was residual roundness that I neglected to deal with during the bevel correction stage. But I ended up at witnessing the same problem all over again. After pondering about what could be happening, I decided to give it a try to tape the spine, speculating that it circumvents the possible suction issue (if such thing exists). It solved the problem and turned a poor performer into a fine performer. Two razors in my current rotation of 16 have such a double bevel.
Apart from that all I find the double bevel method very reliable to compare hones, because the resulting edge is build by nothing else than the hone that created the second bevel. The odd thing is, that you can polish edges with a Coticule that are keener than what you can get from an edge that was created by nothing more than that coticule. But that's a different story.

I realize only now, before hitting submit, that I am actually posting this in the basic honing section.

For those that need a basic honing routine for use with Belgian Blue and Coticule, it's really better to stick with A simple honing method with DMT-E , Belgian Blue Whetstone and Coticule - Straight Razor Place Wiki

Bart.

There are so many stones out there these days and a lot of methods that are successful for different people. I have never been a fan of the DMT's other than for lapping or the Belgium Blue slurried or not.

If I have an ebay type razor or beat up wedge, I have had the most success with the Norton 220 then to the 1000 and then the 4K, 8K and on to the Escher or Nakayama. Sometimes a few finishing strokes with either a .5 diamond or Chromium Oxide too. As an alternative, lately I have been playing with the Shapton 500K and 1000K as well as their 4K, 8K, 16K and 30K. Not the cheapest set up, but very reliable with very consistent results. I do interchange the 16K with the Escher or Nakayama here too. Cotcules are nice, but I have gotten away from using them lately. I stopped doing slurry with them quite some time ago as I felt this was more agressive and I really was looking for more polishing than cutting.

It is rare when I will tape a razor as personally I prefer a single bevel. Normally, if I tape, it is to repair an edge that needs a fair amount of metal removal and I try to limit the wear on the spine. This seems to work pretty well and I can normally get the double bevel out after the initial heavy treatment.

With approximately 15,000 razors honed so far, I really look for consistency and repeatability when honing and the stones described above have worked really well on virtually all the razors that I hone. Yes, some are still stubborn, but varying between the pyramid and circles usually takes care of that. The adventure remains fun and I'm always looking to try new methods and stones although I think I have enough stones now to build a small fireplace.......

Have fun.

Lynn