Thread: Finally pregressing - but which stone now?

I have been straight shavnig for about 6-7 months now, and a while ago I had purchased a Norton 4k/8k to learn to hone. Currently I'm doing fine with this and am getting comfortable shaves, however I would like it to be smoother. As such I want to purchase a finishing hone. I am looking at the Shapton 16k, but I don't know if I can go right from an 8k Norton to a 16k Shapton, or if I will need a grit somewhere in the middle. Any suggestions?

I use a Chinese 12K on occasion. I think you could go to 16K. Either way you're increasing your stroke count and using a slow/slower hone. I believe you'll save money with a 12K Chinese.

I don't know of any reason why you can't go to the 16k shapton. I use a 12k naniwa in my arsonal of stones but don't seem to need it when doing a full hoaning. I get it out to touch up a blade that can't seem to get a smooth edge after going from chromium oxide to linen to leather. At that point I will give the blade 10 or 15 strokes on the 12k then work it on the pasted strop the linen and then the leather. I tried the 12k twice after the 8k and didn't seem to feel any difference in the finish after shaving with it, but that's just mho. For me the smoothness seems to come from the stropping sequence and not the hoaning alone.

According to Shapton USA doubling the grit size is the way to go when moving up in the progression. Then again you would pay substantially less for the Chinese 12K or the Naniwa 12K than for the glass stone. Many members here use the 12 to follow the 8 with satisfactory results.

I'm very negative towards the Chinese 12K. It's so hard, it took hours and hours of backbreaking work to lap it and the results didn't justify the effort. I also like to hold the hone in my hand and the 12K is just too heavy. Why don't you make your life easy by using some chromium oxide on a paddle strop? I think you'll get your biggest bang for the buck that way.

I'm not commenting on the Shapton because I don't have one.

With the chinese 12k it's a "Pay me now or pay me later" type of dilemma. Some people have a hard time flattening them, as Chimensch did, and others find it to take a while, but not be so bad, as I did. When I first got my chinese 12k I flattened it on a granite tile with wet/dry sandpaper, starting with a coarse grit first then progressing through a finer grit. No real need to go beyond 1000 on the 12k in my book.

I have since flattened the other side and edges with DMT diamond stones, and that went reasonably well for me.

So, it is hard(er) to flatten, but the upside of the 12k is that it's so hard that it doesn't need flattening for quite a while. In the real world this just means that you don't have to whip out your flattening materials when you just want a routine maintenance touch up on a razor.

On many of my razors, the 12k leaves a great edge if you use good form and enough strokes. On some of my razors I don't even feel the need to go to chromium oxide or a finer stone - the resultant shave is very smooth and comfortable. On others, the 12k needs a few laps on chromium oxide, but then the shave is super smooth.

I have a shapton 16k and really enjoy it, but if I only had a chinese 12k to finish on, I don't think that I'd be upset about that.


Concerning the Norton 8k--> shapton 16k progression: absolutely. Honestly, you could go from the 4k to 16k if you wanted to, it would just take quite a few more strokes. Heck, for that matter you can take a rectangular bar of heat treated steel and MAKE a wedge straight razor on the 16k if you had enough time (and enough 16k!). It just takes more strokes (and time).

The reason we use stones in the progressions we do is all about the balancing of several factors: hone wear rate, speed of sharpening, ease of achieving desired results, etc.

There's a guy on knifeforums who has been told that you can't go from a DMT 325 straight to a King 6000. He made a video of it, and it worked great. Here it is.