Thread: help me decide on a workhorse

howdy, fellow honer-sapiens !!

i dont have a decent bevel setter anymore (thats another tale).....only a 100year old coticule combo ( 10$ antique store find !! yay for me!!) , a newer one and a chinese 12k. the old combo is pretty soft and the other is quite hard...ive tried setting bevels with the soft coticule ,and done a decent job on some razors that werent that far off to begin with, but i can see myself losing patience with a heavy wedge or something that has some meat on its bones. i need to make my life a little easier.
sooooooo, i just found these cool lookin' and inexpensive japanese combo waterstones at woodcraft ( i cant afford a norton 1k/4k at the moment, which i guess would be ideal ) one was a 800/4k and the other is a 1k/6k. so what one do you good folks think would be better for doing the actual work, as ive got polishing covered . im still kinda new at this and am scared that 800 grit would be too rough, and with the 6k id be stuck there sharpening twice as long as id actually need to!
im thinking the 6k in cahoots with the bbw side of my combo, or is that an unnecessary step on the "ladder"? or, are these japanese waterstones anything like novaculite that a ( for instance) 800 grit stone would perform like a 1200+ grit ?

any and all help would be appreciated, my friends !! thanks- smeg

Hey there,

So if you're ruling out the Norton 1k/4k combo, I would try to 800/4000 Japanese combo. The 800 is a little coarser than the 1000, but the only reason I would be a little hesitant with the 1k/6k combo is that going from 1k to 6k might be a bit of a jump. I'm sure it can be done, but I would be worried that I would be spending too much time on the 6k after the 1k. The 800 is a little coarse, but not much than the 1000, so I think that would be an ideal bevel setter granted you're not too heavy handed on it. I have the nortons for most of my honing, and I like the 4k for most of my sharpening, so my vote is for the 800/4000. I don't think you could go wrong with either, you mentioned having a belgian combo, so you could always get the 1k/6k, but use the blue side (which is about 4000) as an intermediate step.

I'm sure a good progression for you could be to use the 800 to set the bevel, 4000 to sharpen, then use your belgians (maybe blue w/slurry, coticule w/slurry then coticule w/just water) to put the final polish edge on it. Hope that helps!

Dave

P.S. I have never used the japanese naturals, so I'm only assuming that they perform similarily to the nortons of comparable grits. Hopefully other users who have used the japanese stones will pipe in...

thanks, dave...thats kinda what i was thinking...
perhaps someone will come along that knows something about the japanese stones...
-cheers !!

I have used the King 1000/6000 combo for quite a long time now, and find it very good. The 1000 side is fast and if you begin work with a thick slurry and progressively thin it until its just water, and do the same with the 6000 side, you lessen the jump. I haven't found it much of a jump, though - maybe the 6000 side is a bit less, maybe 5000 in reality. Indeed, each time I have tried to introduce an intermediate stone I have found that it is not necessary in any way.

My normal progression for a blade with a lot of damage is a DMT (the continuous coarse one - 325 grit?) diamond plate, the 1000/6000, coticule, chinese 12K. You could finish off with your soft coticule followed by the harder coticule with just water and no slurry, but you know that already!

Once the bevel is established on the lower grits, very little time is needed with the 6000, maybe 50 laps or so, give or take - it works fast - for me, at any rate.

The 1000/6000 requires frequent lapping - especially the 1000 side if you are removing minor notches, the 6000 side much less frequently. It's a quick and easy lapping job, though. The combo is cheap and it does a good job, so how bad is that?!

Regards,
Neil.