Thread: Nortons not cutting it

The Norton Flattenin stone....ah yes.....IIRC, I had to flatten my flattening stone before I could flatten any of my other stones. After a long time, everything was flat!

Time is money: and a DMT D8C (325 grit) will save you a lot of time! They are wonderful.

I am by no means an expert on honing, but I can give you two tips that have helped me no end. First, if you try the magic marker trick, use a red marker pen, not black. When you are looking at the edge very closely black can be very hard to distinguish against the bright fresh steel. Red marker stands out really well.

Second, of all the various ways to test the I find that just looking at the edge under a cheap usb microscope works best for me. If the bevel isn't set it is plain to see.

Good luck with your honing. It is so satisfying shaving with a razor that you have honed yourself.

Originally Posted by salazch

While we're in the topic of nortons, I can't seem to get my 8k completely flat. I make a grid and use the flattening stone that came with the kit but it's still not evenly taking off the grid. Does anybody have problems with the flattening stone that comes with the kit. I'm sure I just need to lap it for a while longer. If I do end up wanting to try a different stone for lapping, what's a good stone to get? I see a lot of people using DMT's.

yes the norton flattening stone needs to be flattened more frequently than it is worth. get the dmt d8c (325 grit) plate much easier. but since you have the norton get a granite or marble tile 12x12 and some coarse wet dry sandpaper and lap it flat. if the flattening stone is not flat no amount of lapping with it will make another stone flat

I don't have one of the Norton flattening stones, so I can't state this with 100% certainty, but I think they're pretty slow. Your flattening stone may already be flat enough, it'll just take a while to lap the 8k side. IIRC, it took me nearly 30 minutes with the DMT325 to get mine flat. You might be in for a couple of hours with the norton flattener.