Thread: A Stone for the First Hone

I have been using my blade a little over a month and was thinking of buying a stone for its first hone in a month or two from now. Since its a new blade, a 5/8 Thiers-Issard Sheffield Silver Steel Fully Hollowed only shaved with every other day, should I go with the higher grit 10-12000 first because its not that used yet or go with a Norton 4/8 then go to the 10 or 12 ?

Should be buying a Norton 4/8 and a Belgian Yellow Coticule Stone to be my honing set?

You should be buying a barber hone such as a Swaty or Keen Kutter Kombo or any other good brand if you are just touching up, if you wish to get into edge restoration, get the others. Barber hones are cheap and will keep a blade sharp indefinately.

BTW there are a number of good barber hones listed for sale in the classifieds, especially those sold by hi bud gl. He is great to do business with, you wont be disappointed. Also, I tried to private message you and could not, there fore this is posted publicly.

+1 on a good barber hone.

A good barber hone is a fine thing. I have a Swaty and I like it. It was a bear to flatten though. If you buy one plan on lapping it or see if a forum member will sell you one already flattened. Also consider a Norton 4/8 if you plan on honing your own razors. A good proven workhorse for straight razors with a lot of tutorial info in the SRP Wiki.

barber hones are great for maintaining an edge so are couticles i like them both

If all you're doing is maintaining the edge of the razor, a fine polishing stone is all that you really need (i.e. barber hone, coticule, etc.). It's only when you want to sharpen your own razor will you really ever need something like a norton 4k/8k.