Creating an all purpose sharpening toolkit

[Emmett]

I was torn over whether to place this here or in the Str8 forum, so mods you can move it if you like.

I sharpen my kitchen knives with a 1000/4000 waterstone. This is the only sharpening implement I have at the moment. I have a straight that I am considering trying to restore, and I'm also going to try woodcarving this year. What do you guys and gals have in your multipurpose sharpening kits? I know I'm going to need a strop and a lap stone, but what else should I get to be able to sharpen everything? Paddle strop, finer grit stones? There's a lot out there and I'd like to minimize my purchases to what I really need.

 

[Fnord5]

If you are going to be doing woodcarving, you are going to need some slipstones. For a straight, a 4000/8000 stone, and a finishing stone, like a 12k Chinese, or you can use lapping film.

Woodcraft has a great selection of sharpening stuff, including DMT, Norton, Chinese 12k, Spyderco, and stropping supplies, and their prices are really reasonable too.
http://www.woodcraft.com/product.aspx?ProductID=835913&FamilyID=20254
http://www.woodcraft.com/search/search.aspx?query=lapping


Edit: You will want to keep your stones for razors separate from knife stones if you go the stone route. Knives will wear stones faster than a razor, and you will need to re-lap the stones often if you want to be able to do razors.

 

[gugi]

your stone should be good for the bulk of the work. hopefully it's not terribly slow, but if you have few razors only it doesn't matter.
so you'd want something in the 8000 grit level in addition to what you already have.
or you can use something even higher grit, but fast, or a paste and a lot of work.

if it were me i'd get a 8000 grit hone like the norton or the naniwa. learning to use it properly is the most important part.