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Am I mad, or could these be turned into a honing system if they were attached to a paddle, say?
If so, would you use the forward honing motion or the reverse stropping motion?
At the least I think I've found a source for finishing sand paper for blade restoration.
X
Damn, nice find xman! I was at Lee Valley no more than a week ago, wish I would have seen this stuff, I prolly would have picked up some. I'm not sure if I'd use it for honing, I've always been much more comfortable with a stone (speaking mostly from my experience with knives). But, it looks pretty good for polishing.
Yep, and you can also use this:
http://www.handamerican.com/scpaper.html
I have one question though. To anyone who's used them or not; but, would I be making some grave error if I were to use them for lapping? they sound, at the very least, good for that.
I've posted about these grades of micro abrasives from Lee Valley before. I use these grades from Lee Valley in final finishing on my brushes. While it is true that they provide a great finish, they don't stand up very well, and seem to degrade quickly. If you could use them on a paddle in a situation where the sheets could be swapped in and out easily, they could work. Also, they are very thin plastic paper. They could be easily sliced apart if the blade caught at all.
I think they would be fine for lapping, but does your final lapping material have to be equal or similar to your hone? The 15 micron (1000 grit) and the 5 micron (2500 grit) are available with adhesive backing, so they could be mounted on a sheet of glass for lapping.
A note on the Lee Valley paper. Of the three grits, the green is the finest, the two grey's are the second and third finest. The greys are made up of a different material than the green and is prone to shedding, not like a typical sandpaper, but the entire abrasive will come off of the paper, leaving the clear plastic backing. It seems to happen under high friction areas, like edges more than open flats. The grey abrasive can stain and is best removed with acetone. This is my experience on wood and metal doesn't have the open grain of wood so this may not be a problem.
Also, the 15 micron paper is quite rough, only about 1000grit, so it's a bit rough for finish honing. Pricewise though, not a bad product at all and the 0.5 micron provides an excellent finish.
Thanks for the info. I just picked up 5 sheets of the 5µ today at lee valley (there were out of the 0.5µ :(). Now I just need some stuff to play with it on :)
I also have one of those .5 micron sheets.
Glued it to a rectangular piece of styro foam which gives me a pasted strop in the format of a barber hone.
I tried it on wood first but didn't like its rigid nature. I believe that a strop needs some give, possibly to create a micro-bevel.
You can 'forward' hone on this thing, and as long as you're careful, the edge will not dig in. Hasn't happened to me, at least. I use it like a strop mostly, though. Gives a nice and sharp edge to my Dovo.
Redwoood