Thread: Shapton hones

Originally Posted by KristofferBodvin

Bart, would that be a hard or soft coticule? I'm abit confused as of the description of coticules...
Thanks

If it were that easy... I would give you a straight answer. But it isn't that easy.
Soft Coticules release garnets rapidly. On harder stones it can be more challenging to raise a decent slurry. That's the obvious difference between hard and soft, but it doesn't predict that much about the rate of steel removal. I have several Coticules that I'd qualify as medium hardness, and yet, their speed varies from very fast to very slow. I also have hard Coticules, among them is not a single fast one. (at least not on hard razor steel). I have one Coticule I'd qualify as soft (it raises slurry merely by honing on it). And yet it is not perculiarly fast.
The only thing I can tell, is that on a fast Coticule, the slurry will start to turn grayish within the first few honing strokes. With a (softer) kichen knife and a bit more pressure that will happen on almost any Coticule, but not with razors which have harder steel and are typically honed with less pressure.

Bart.

Am I wrong, or did you mention in some post that you could specify what kind of coticule you wanted somewhere?

Originally Posted by KristofferBodvin

Am I wrong, or did you mention in some post that you could specify what kind of coticule you wanted somewhere?

Rob Celis of Ardennes Coticule is extremely forthcoming to deal with. He's a member of SRP, and if you PM him about this, I'm sure he will help you in any way he can. Straight Razor Place Forums - View Profile: ArdennesCoticule
He mentioned taking a few days vacation between Christmas and New Year, so he may not respond immediately.

Best regards,
Bart.

+1 on Rob. He's been great to deal with. Along with Bart, an excellent resource on this list regarding Coticules.

Ok, while I'm at the belgian stones.If the yellow are as versatile as you guys say, would you really need a blue one? The reason I ask is that I think it would be really cool to have a complete natural setup aswell as a syntetic.

Thanks

Congrats on getting a nice finisher, it seems like you have gotten your honing to the next level.

If you plan on building a natural progression you should IMHO get the blue too, it's a inexpensive hone, and it does a good job in removing coarse scratch patterns.

I've been thinking about these coticules, Shaptons, ebay specials, bevel setting, honing, finishing with high grid stones vs pastes strops (or both) and strops... what I seem to gather is that you need to develop a "feel" for what's going on during honing, especially with the natural stones.

To get started, synthetic hones sound more straight-forward: do laps on the 1,000, then the 4,000, then the 8,000 and then the 16,000, then paste strop and strop. The more I read about the coticule, the less sure I am that I'd manage to do anything useful with it.

Originally Posted by KristofferBodvin

Ok, while I'm at the belgian stones.If the yellow are as versatile as you guys say, would you really need a blue one? The reason I ask is that I think it would be really cool to have a complete natural setup aswell as a syntetic.

Thanks

Between the Yellow-with-slurry as a bevel correction hone, and the Yellow-with-water as a finishing hone is a keenness gap, that can be very difficult, if not impossible (depending on the specimen in question) to overcome, without the use of other hones.
The Blue with slurry can boost the keenness of a bevel formed on a Yellow with slurry.
If you finish that on a Yellow with water, you 'll end up with a pretty shaveworthy edge.

But you could just as easily follow the Yellow with slurry by any other hone that makes the bevel sharper. I personally add a Chosera 10K after the Blue, and finish that edge on a Yellow with water.

The Belgian Blue is definitely a very pleasant stone in use, and often underestimated. I use mine a lot.

I read your review of the chosera line, seems like a really sweet hone. Wish I had em all! All in time I guess.The comfort is that I'm in this for life.
Thanks for all your knowledge and help guys, really appriciate it!