Thread: Would a Norton 4/8K and 0.5 chromium be enough?

IMO you have all that you need for a great shave for years to come.

Enjoy

Yes, in fact you can probably do without the CrO paste and go directly to an unpasted strop.

Another vote for it being enough. Matter of fact when I first started honing my own I had the 4/8 and a Swaty. At that time the word on the forum was that the Swaty was equal to a 12k grit and I would do the 4/8 and finish on the Swaty with water as if it were a regular hone. This was working well.

Shortly thereafter I got quite a bit of help from Randydance through PMs and over the phone. He advised me to shave test after the 4/8 for a more accurate assessement of my razor's sharpness and my honing skills. I began to do that and I was surprised at what a smooth and comfortable shave can be got from the 4/8 and the strop all by themselves. The chrom ox came later for me and was icing on the cake.

I still shave off of the 4/8 before moving up the ladder to assess the edge. Randy also said,"Do not be surprised if the razor is not quite perfect. Just go back and perform a conservative pyramid then strop and test shave again. It is not unusual for me to take 2-3-4 honing sessions to dial in an edge".So as my Mom used to say, if at first you don't succeed try and try again.

I like this method coming off the 4/8K Norton stone, move to a multi sided strop with pastes 3.0/1.0/.50 before moving to the canvass/leather strop. I believe the 3.0/1.0/.50 have a similar performance to a 10K - 12K+ finishing stone.

Pabster

Okay. My Norton kit arrived today. So I have the 220/1000, 4000/8000 Nortons and the 500/1000/4000/8000/16000 Shaptons. I'm not having any luck with the Shaptons, that's why I just bought the Nortons and a couple of nice (read: Greaves, Torrey, etc.) vintage razors to practice on. I personally think I'm overhoning, so I'm going to try both the aggressive and conservative pyramids. My guess is that the Norton series is better for practicing on than the Shaptons.

My failure to hone properly I blame on being new to it, however after reading this thread I'm wondering if I can go from the 8k Norton to the 16k Shapton then linen and leather without the CrO2 strop. Has anyone tried this and had any luck?

I'm also wondering if I need to buy a couple of other strops. Do I need to keep the strops separate, i.e., CrO2 for one, diamond paste for the other, etc? I'm tired of spending money already

Originally Posted by CableDawg

Okay. My Norton kit arrived today. So I have the 220/1000, 4000/8000 Nortons and the 500/1000/4000/8000/16000 Shaptons. I'm not having any luck with the Shaptons, that's why I just bought the Nortons and a couple of nice (read: Greaves, Torrey, etc.) vintage razors to practice on. I personally think I'm overhoning, so I'm going to try both the aggressive and conservative pyramids. My guess is that the Norton series is better for practicing on than the Shaptons.

My failure to hone properly I blame on being new to it, however after reading this thread I'm wondering if I can go from the 8k Norton to the 16k Shapton then linen and leather without the CrO2 strop. Has anyone tried this and had any luck?

I'm also wondering if I need to buy a couple of other strops. Do I need to keep the strops separate, i.e., CrO2 for one, diamond paste for the other, etc? I'm tired of spending money already

I don't have any of the Shaptons, but I've read of people using the Shapton 16k after the Norton 8k, so it should work just fine.

You most definitely need seperate strops for different pastes. You don't want to go mixing pastes on strops, generally a bad idea. So would need a seperate stropping surface for each type of paste. That's the reason why people like Tony Miller manufacture the 4-sided paddle strop, so you can have 4 different types of pastes used more conveniently.

Originally Posted by CableDawg

Okay. My Norton kit arrived today. So I have the 220/1000, 4000/8000 Nortons and the 500/1000/4000/8000/16000 Shaptons. I'm not having any luck with the Shaptons, that's why I just bought the Nortons and a couple of nice (read: Greaves, Torrey, etc.) vintage razors to practice on. I personally think I'm overhoning, so I'm going to try both the aggressive and conservative pyramids. My guess is that the Norton series is better for practicing on than the Shaptons.

My failure to hone properly I blame on being new to it, however after reading this thread I'm wondering if I can go from the 8k Norton to the 16k Shapton then linen and leather without the CrO2 strop. Has anyone tried this and had any luck?

I'm also wondering if I need to buy a couple of other strops. Do I need to keep the strops separate, i.e., CrO2 for one, diamond paste for the other, etc? I'm tired of spending money already

Did you lap your stones?

A newbs vote for a newbs new honing kit:

1. A DMT8C for lapping other stones

2. A 1K stone of your choice. Norton, Shapton, Naniwa.. whatever fits your budget.

3. A 4k stone of your choice

4. A 8k stone of your choice

5. Pasted strop with either chrome ox or .50 diamond on it.

6. A combo webbed fabric and red latigo leather strop. The fabric really helps to touch up any honing inadequacies, and the extra draw of a latigo strop is easier (IMO) to learn to strop on without making stropping mistakes.

More stones is certainly more fun, but the above should be enough to get a guy comfortably started, in this newbs opinion.

Originally Posted by Bladerunner

Did you lap your stones?

I didn't bother with the Shaptons because they were brand new. The lapping plate is about $279, so I might purchase that next month.

The Nortons came with a resurfacing stone, but I'm hoping I don't have to resurface a new stone right out of the box. Not a biggie if that's what someone would recommend.

I remember reading somewhere that it wasn't a necessity to have the lapping plate for the Shaptons and that something else could be used. They looked great right out of the box.

Originally Posted by CableDawg

I didn't bother with the Shaptons because they were brand new. The lapping plate is about $279, so I might purchase that next month.

The Nortons came with a resurfacing stone, but I'm hoping I don't have to resurface a new stone right out of the box. Not a biggie if that's what someone would recommend.

I remember reading somewhere that it wasn't a necessity to have the lapping plate for the Shaptons and that something else could be used. They looked great right out of the box.

I would say that your problem is that you did not lap your stones. Even though they are new, there are imperfections. Try it and let us know how you do.