Thread: What after the 4/8K ?

Now that MParker gave you all that great advice the honemiesters probably won't stop by . . . But, as a side note I have honed up several new razors with only the 8K side of a Norton alone, without even touching the 4K.

For the paddle to be effective you'll need to learn to get the razor very sharp on 8K alone. In otherwords, the .5 will only enhance a sharp razor. It should cut much slower than an 8K. Asking too much of it will lead you to think its not working. But again, 8K alone is fine, once you know what your doing.


I use a barber hone for quick touch ups at the sink, its convienent. Or I just grab a different blade. Honestly, this is a very rare need as razors rarely just suddenly go dull.

In the future try using a giant search light with an "H" and shine it against the highest cloud in the city sky, sometimes I can get a honemiester like that.

You can search the posts for good info about stones. The point is there is no standard set for those things. Honing depends on too many variables to be set in stone (pun there). Starting from your beard type across the honing abilities, to the stropping technique, there are different smoothness stages you can stop at. Alan was one time experimenting with the lower grit hones for final edge, and got interesting results. You can search for that too... Here's excellent and informative post Randy T. posted regarding hones:

http://straightrazorpalace.com/showt...ht=stones+info

My choice after the Norton would be the Shapton Pro series stone 15K grit. I have yet to try the .5 Chromium Oxide paste.

For fun, you can lay a piece of newspaper on flat surface and back hone for about 100 laps. You will polish the edge a bit more that way too...


cheers,
Nenad

I've got the shapton pro 15k, and like it for some razors but not others. The TI Pierre responds well to it, as do the friodurs, but most of my sheffield razors are kind of meh on it. It's a very fine hone but very aggressive. But the paddle is more convenient and works about as well most of the time.

Newsprint puts a very fine polish on the blade, I've used it several times and really like the edges it produces. But I don't get the daily paper, so its not something I use very often.

You can get a better deal for the Norton 4/8 from Vintage Blades:

http://www.vintagebladesllc.com/index.html

Great service too, very fast.

Originally Posted by superfly

For fun, you can lay a piece of newspaper on flat surface and back hone for about 100 laps. You will polish the edge a bit more that way too...

Do you just put down a single page thickness?

yes. You may be able to go two pages, but if it's too thick it will tend to round the edge.

Gary,

I have a Japanese 6000 waterstone which is fast cutting and very useful, a Norton 4000/8000 stone, a sharpton 16000 glass stone, a yellow coticule. I find the 4000 side of the Norton to be useless. The sharpton 16000 glass stone is no finer than the 8000 side of the norton. the yellow belgian stone is a bit finer than the 8K norton. If I were to choose again, I will keep the 6000 Japanese stone, and buy a 8K Norton instead of the 4/8K combination stone and forget the rest.

Hope this help.

Tom Tong

Originally Posted by tom tong

Gary,

I have a Japanese 6000 waterstone which is fast cutting and very useful, a Norton 4000/8000 stone, a sharpton 16000 glass stone, a yellow coticule. I find the 4000 side of the Norton to be useless. The sharpton 16000 glass stone is no finer than the 8000 side of the norton. the yellow belgian stone is a bit finer than the 8K norton. If I were to choose again, I will keep the 6000 Japanese stone, and buy a 8K Norton instead of the 4/8K combination stone and forget the rest.

Hope this help.

Tom Tong

Thanks Tom

Gary

Hey Gary,

Mparker gave you some good advice. The Norton 4/8 will be very useful to you especially since you work on some Ebay specials. The pasted paddle strop should do a fine job of finishing the razors edge. Do you need anything else? Perhaps some 1000 grit sandpaper to wear off the old oxidised edges and nicks from the Ebay razors. Then you will be set.
Anything else will simply be more toy's for us big boys!

Thanks Randy for the final confirmation. I only ever started with a 6000 waterstone and I think I created a rod for my own back.
My technique is reasonable and from what everyone says, the nortons + my paddle stropp should do the trick.
Cheers

Gary