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Arkansas Love...Let's see those Arks!

Know an underrated bad lap, hard cotis that have a thinner layer and are humped vs dished. You have to be so careful as you set your nice flat to work out from.
 

timwcic

"Look what I found"
After seeing a stone so large you need to pay property tax on it, I am embarrassed to post only a 6 inch stone. A mid century “happy bear” Norton translucent. A beauty HB6 with full translucency. Scored last week from one of my pickers

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timwcic

"Look what I found"
Nice stone Tim, I swear I can see halfway through on the top!
To be fair, yours is way more exciting on a price per sq ft though right?

Thanks you, all. I am going to give it a gentle hand cleaning. Want to protect the logo as much I can

Well, to be honest, when figuring the price/inch on my wild stones, the symbol that get used most is (¢) not ($). No charge for the wood case. I love a motivated seller
 
Thanks you, all. I am going to give it a gentle hand cleaning. Want to protect the logo as much I can

Well, to be honest, when figuring the price/inch on my wild stones, the symbol that get used most is (¢) not ($). No charge for the wood case. I love a motivated seller
If you want to protect the label maybe a coat of epoxy over it to seal it?
 
My first Arkansas landed this afternoon (it is also my first natural stone) - a 6" x 2" x 0.5" hard black from Sharpening Supplies (apparently, produced by Dan's).

I decided to first turn the stone lose on my new Gold Dollar P81/1996. Out of the box, the GD would slice a tomato but barely pass the HHT, so I took the GD to my Naniwa 12k and then the Arkansas. Having never used an Arkansas, I first tried water, then water with a drop of Dawn, then water with a few drops of glycerin, then food-grade mineral oil, and finally mineral oil with Everclear. I liked each of the different solutions for different reasons. When I was done honing, I washed the stone in the sink with Dawn.

The 6" length is a bit short and the 2" width a bit narrow but what the heck! Bottom line is I really enjoyed the honing and the razor felt reasonably smooth when I used it afterward.

I obviously have a lot to learn and experience but what I blast! And I wouldn't be surprised if there are more Arks in my future. Next up for the Arkansas is my new Dovo Carre.

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So it arrived.

The bad... Not as big as I expected (surface-area wise) it's 12x8" if you take the LONGEST possible interior line and then a 65 or so degree intersecting line to get the longest possible "opposite" direction. In the picture below, black is how I believed the stone measured, red and blue are actual measurements.

Actual usable stone inside? Maybe 11x2.5" is the biggest. Then you've got maybe a 7x2" and 4x2" left. I would have called this a 9x7" (longest sides) stone. I suspect if Dan's were selling this piece as a primitive it'd be $250-300, not the $425 I paid... and it'd be lapped with at least one clean cut side (which it wasn't). That said... Dan's would probably never waste this much translucent black material selling this as a primitive. (They could get an 10x2x1" and an 8x3x0.5"... or five 6x2x1" out of it), so it is pretty unique.

It's basically a 7x5" rectangle with a 7x4" right triangle on top of it, plus a few inches of scrap here and there.

The medium...
It's about 2.25-2" thick for 75% or so of it then it kind of scallops off on the one side.

The good...

It's almost all translucent black with that little skin (maybe 3oz worth) on two of the sides of regular (hard?) material.
It was flat... no light under my 11x4" dmt in any positioning. But there were DEEP scars that I suspect were circular saw marks. Took 2-3 hrs and about 7 full sheets of wet/dry (as well as a lot of DMT work) to get it to where it's mostly useable (a few light scratches in the side I'm not planning to test).

Because it's so thick I had to take a pic of translucence at the scalloped edge, but with my little USB flex-desk light it transmits through about an inch... so pretty translucent. My iphone flashlight gets through ~half an inch.

Weighs ~9lb 3oz. I have no easy way to get a SG reading.. but I suspect it's high. It feels quite heavy for its size.


Shave off it was one of the best shaves I've had in awhile... but I took a (well) finished razor to it... so I can only say it doesn't damage anything. I'll try an 8k finish to it next and see how well it refines.
 

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Lol. A few daylight pics. Silver scuffs in the corner are aluminum it took off my led light while looking at translucency. If you look close you can see at the far side there’s still some light circular lines from where I didn’t completely lap out the saw marks.

Ordered a 15kg scale so I can maybe get a SG reading when it gets here if I get creative with a vessel to use for displacement reading.

Next step is rigging up a stand... maybe 10x11" or so box and some kind of clay at the bottom I'm thinking.

Oh and the stuff on the end is slightly translucent... kinda like a white translucent with some impurities. Dan's would call that stuff "true hard" is my guess.
 

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timwcic

"Look what I found"
If you want to protect the label maybe a coat of epoxy over it to seal it?

Thanks for the advise. These mid century Norton’s have a very durable ink stamp for identification. Not to say a goon like myself can wash the stamps away
 
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Hopefully I can figure out a way to measure the displacement and get SG next week... but so far this is looking like a top notch stone. Getting good shaves off it and the HHT is up there with the sharpest edges I can manage. Feels like silk under the razor.

I know I'm being pretty fussy, mad that it's ONLY 9x7" and not 12x8"... it's still 9 freaking lbs of translucent black ark... but I'm at least glad it is looking like an amazing stone. I was worried it might get here and have flaws the pictures didn't show. Best as I can tell, it's incredibly pure right up to that edging of white material.
 
My first Arkansas landed this afternoon (it is also my first natural stone) - a 6" x 2" x 0.5" hard black from Sharpening Supplies (apparently, produced by Dan's).

I decided to first turn the stone lose on my new Gold Dollar P81/1996. Out of the box, the GD would slice a tomato but barely pass the HHT, so I took the GD to my Naniwa 12k and then the Arkansas. Having never used an Arkansas, I first tried water, then water with a drop of Dawn, then water with a few drops of glycerin, then food-grade mineral oil, and finally mineral oil with Everclear. I liked each of the different solutions for different reasons. When I was done honing, I washed the stone in the sink with Dawn.

The 6" length is a bit short and the 2" width a bit narrow but what the heck! Bottom line is I really enjoyed the honing and the razor felt reasonably smooth when I used it afterward.

I obviously have a lot to learn and experience but what I blast! And I wouldn't be surprised if there are more Arks in my future. Next up for the Arkansas is my new Dovo Carre.

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Yes for sure Dan’s . I thought about ordering the same stone last week as I don’t have a small black but found one on the bay that might be a translucent black. It’s harder to find vintage blacks than translucents so probably just a matter of time before I buy one also.
 
Yes for sure Dan’s . I thought about ordering the same stone last week as I don’t have a small black but found one on the bay that might be a translucent black. It’s harder to find vintage blacks than translucents so probably just a matter of time before I buy one also.

I have to say that I am really enjoying hand holding the 6" x 2" stone, and am contemplating buying a 6" x 2" x 1" soft and/or hard. But as a newcomer, I want to convince myself that I have developed enough control holding the razor with just one hand before pressing the buy button.

If you think about it, buying 12 cubic inch stones (6" x 2" x 1" or 8" x 3" x 0.5") is way cheaper than buying 24 cubic inch stones (8" x 3" x 1"), and becoming proficient on a 12 square inch surface (6" x 2") could result in more options when buying natural stones.
 
I have to say that I am really enjoying hand holding the 6" x 2" stone, and am contemplating buying a 6" x 2" x 1" soft and/or hard. But as a newcomer, I want to convince myself that I have developed enough control holding the razor with just one hand before pressing the buy button.

If you think about it, buying 12 cubic inch stones (6" x 2" x 1" or 8" x 3" x 0.5") is way cheaper than buying 24 cubic inch stones (8" x 3" x 1"), and becoming proficient on a 12 square inch surface (6" x 2") could result in more options when buying natural stones.

I like smaller stones, hand-held. If you want a further challenge, try one of Dan's 4" x 1-5/8" finishing stones (true hard, translucent, or black hard) once have your licks down with the 6" x 2" stone. My take is that with natural stones, the honing area can diminish as one advances in the honing progression, coinciding with longitudinally-biassed strokes leading to laterally-biassed strokes. For example, taking ~2.5:1 as an ideal surface ratio for honing in a three-step natural stone progression, one might start out with 6" x 2.5", followed by 5" x 2", ending with 4" x 1-5/8".

How did cutting the mineral with grain alcohol turn out? You might try odorless kerosene to cut the mineral oil, or Singer sewing machine oil, which is less viscous as sold.
 
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