Mystery hones... Let's see what you have

[SliceOfLife]

I basically never raise slurry on anything deliberately, but some of my Charnleys autoslurry a fair bit.


They vary a lot. Typically the razor/coffin cut ones are a good bit finer than this one. The big ones go two ways... Either bigger versions of the razor ones or beautiful soft stones that cut nearly as well as soft lily White washitas.

Used to use oil with Charnleys but mostly use detergent these days to make cleanup easier.

And yeah my finest LI that I was reasonably sure of the ID on was very dark. The darker ones do seem finer.

 

[cotedupy]

I basically never raise slurry on anything deliberately, but some of my Charnleys autoslurry a fair bit.


They vary a lot. Typically the razor/coffin cut ones are a good bit finer than this one. The big ones go two ways... Either bigger versions of the razor ones or beautiful soft stones that cut nearly as well as soft lily White washitas.

Used to use oil with Charnleys but mostly use detergent these days to make cleanup easier.

And yeah my finest LI that I was reasonably sure of the ID on was very dark. The darker ones do seem finer.

Sounds like I need to get my hands on one of these soft, fast CFs! The coarser of my two wouldn't be as low as 4-6k JIS, but not fine enough to get to SR finishing level (that've I managed anyway). And not all that quick - certainly nothing like a Washita - so is a slightly weird middle ground for me atm. I like my bigger one for razors though .

 

[rideon66]

Sounds like I need to get my hands on one of these soft, fast CFs! The coarser of my two wouldn't be as low as 4-6k JIS, but not fine enough to get to SR finishing level (that've I managed anyway). And not all that quick - certainly nothing like a Washita - so is a slightly weird middle ground for me atm. I like my bigger one for razors though .

It seems some are lucky at finding the softer ones and some are lucky at finding the hard razor ones. Maybe it is the visual characteristics we look for, but I don't know. I now wish I could find a soft knife one, but out of the 5 or so I have collected all are very hard razor grade and none would ever self slurry under knife pressure even. The problem here is the international shipping makes me sick now so rolling the dice to find a soft one is hard to stomach. I am still thinking on a Turkey stone for knives for the price might be a better choice.

 

[Empire straights]

Interesting one nonetheless! Did I read somewhere that this type of lighter CF without lots of noticeable red stripes tended to be older examples...?

I only have a couple of Charnleys; slightly annoyingly the smaller - just a smidge bigger than that one - is definitely a knife/tool type stone. And then a pretty large (11x2x1.5 ish) one which is a hard and fine razor-level affair. Be nice if it was the other way round .

And yeah - the Idwals I've had do seem to have a similar amount of variation. I really like them, but it's certainly a case of picking your battles and having the right stone for the right job. The very finest ones I've had have all been quite dark, and the coarsest quite light. Though possibly just coincidence. The lighter coloured ones are just excellent knife stones (imo) - the only other things I've tried that leave as fine but still bite-y edge on a kitchen knife are some cotis, and the occasional jnat.

I've read the same I believe. That the very light olive green one were some of the first put of the ground commercially. It's what I've got and it's an amazing razor finisher. My dark LI will leave a smooth razors edge but does the same with knives, it'll still bite. I adore my green stones.

 

[Empire straights]

It seems some are lucky at finding the softer ones and some are lucky at finding the hard razor ones. Maybe it is the visual characteristics we look for, but I don't know. I now wish I could find a soft knife one, but out of the 5 or so I have collected all are very hard razor grade and none would ever self slurry under knife pressure even. The problem here is the international shipping makes me sick now so rolling the dice to find a soft one is hard to stomach. I am still thinking on a Turkey stone for knives for the price might be a better choice.

Mine looks similar to that one and it's pretty soft but it finishes a razor as fine as my arks.

 

[rideon66]

Interesting one nonetheless! Did I read somewhere that this type of lighter CF without lots of noticeable red stripes tended to be older examples...?

I only have a couple of Charnleys; slightly annoyingly the smaller - just a smidge bigger than that one - is definitely a knife/tool type stone. And then a pretty large (11x2x1.5 ish) one which is a hard and fine razor-level affair. Be nice if it was the other way round .

And yeah - the Idwals I've had do seem to have a similar amount of variation. I really like them, but it's certainly a case of picking your battles and having the right stone for the right job. The very finest ones I've had have all been quite dark, and the coarsest quite light. Though possibly just coincidence. The lighter coloured ones are just excellent knife stones (imo) - the only other things I've tried that leave as fine but still bite-y edge on a kitchen knife are some cotis, and the occasional jnat.

I've read the same I believe. That the very light olive green one were some of the first put of the ground commercially. It's what I've got and it's an amazing razor finisher. My dark LI will leave a smooth razors edge but does the same with knives, it'll still bite. I adore my green stones.

Yes it is in G&H3
The oldest rocks exhibit a light khaki color light green with
small red and black spots.
The old stones are recognizable by their irregular shape and
are usually somewhat rounded at the bottom. This is
because they were moulded by a driver blade. These stones
are relatively soft and grind significantly better than the
younger rocks.

I think these were more prized back in the day due to speed, but usually not as fine as the harder darker ones.
Plus I have a super hard old dark one that was rounded on the bottom by a driver blade in a nice old box. I would put it up against a SBA.

 

[Empire straights]

Yes it is in G&H3
The oldest rocks exhibit a light khaki color light green with
small red and black spots.
The old stones are recognizable by their irregular shape and
are usually somewhat rounded at the bottom. This is
because they were moulded by a driver blade. These stones
are relatively soft and grind significantly better than the
younger rocks.

I think these were more prized back in the day due to speed, but usually not as fine as the harder darker ones.
Plus I have a super hard old dark one that was rounded on the bottom by a driver blade in a nice old box. I would put it up against a SBA.

My semi soft light olive/ greenish khaki one imparts an edge comparable to my black ark in sharpness but it's smoother.

 

[rideon66]

My semi soft light olive/ greenish khaki one imparts an edge comparable to my black ark in sharpness but it's smoother.

Yes that is what I find with the one I described that is darker and harder. So maybe soft and hard with the CF may not make that much of a difference it may have more to do with the make up of each stone. It maybe just that the majority of the softer ones are not as fine. Not sure there seems to be a good bit of variability in the CF that I have not experienced.

 

[Empire straights]

Yes that is what I find with the one I described that is darker and harder. So maybe soft and hard with the CF may not make that much of a difference it may have more to do with the make up of each stone. It maybe just that the majority of the softer ones are not as fine. Not sure there seems to be a good bit of variability in the CF that I have not experienced.

I've only ever seen the one I have. Never held or saw another in my life so I'm certainly no expert. What I do know is that after I finally got the geometry fixed on this new SR Droescher gold bug razor on a les lat I got yesterday that my charnwood put an amazing edge on it. I can finish on 30 laps on oil but 150s on it is the bee's knees, exactly like my black ark. My charnwood and ark are essentially interchangeable a far as keenness goes but the charnwood is a little faster, smoother and she doesn't bite just purrs. The feed back on it with just a little torque is awesome feeling and smooth. It looks a little darker in the picture than in sunlight. The sun brings the red out more. It's really my new favorite finisher. The hard side of that les lat was no slouch either. I almost left off the charnwood but I couldn't resist it, not after I got a half dozen shiner lime in me. My son can be scratched.i did a little on accident while getting squirrelly with my edc blade.

 

[cotedupy]

It seems some are lucky at finding the softer ones and some are lucky at finding the hard razor ones. Maybe it is the visual characteristics we look for, but I don't know. I now wish I could find a soft knife one, but out of the 5 or so I have collected all are very hard razor grade and none would ever self slurry under knife pressure even. The problem here is the international shipping makes me sick now so rolling the dice to find a soft one is hard to stomach. I am still thinking on a Turkey stone for knives for the price might be a better choice.

Ah, you know my thoughts on Turkish... single greatest whetstone ever quarried!

---

I just gave the smaller, less fine, of my two CFs a spin again. It's a pretty good knife stone, but not that fast. The edge on this nakiri is very keen indeed to go through cheap kitchen towel like that with no pressure (I'm not holding the handle there - the knife's just resting on my finger). But it's a little bit too good at that for what I'd normally want - the kind of edge I like probably wouldn't drop through in quite the same way.

 

[Empire straights]

Ah, you know my thoughts on Turkish... single greatest whetstone ever quarried!

---

I just gave the smaller, less fine, of my two CFs a spin again. It's a pretty good knife stone, but not that fast. The edge on this nakiri is very keen indeed to go through cheap kitchen towel like that with no pressure (I'm not holding the handle there - the knife's just resting on my finger). But it's a little bit too good at that for what I'd normally want - the kind of edge I like probably wouldn't drop through in quite the same way.

A Turkish is my next mission in the world of novaculite. I want two. i want softer fast one for knives and tools and a slower fine one for razors. Novaculite, in its many disguises, is amazing at what its been traditionally used for. Be it for making stone knives or sharpening steel knives it is, in my opinion, the top teir of honing mediums, but I've never used a jnat... so..

Edit: that may not be true, I have a stone I believe to be a budget jnat(possible a synth one) but I haven't played with it much.

 

[rideon66]

Hard to get a good pic to much reflection but this is the best CF I have. I bought it off a knife guy because he said it was too fine and probably to slow for knives too.

 

[cotedupy]

I've posted this on another thread a while back, but thought I'd ask here as I'm certainly now leaning toward thinking it's something particular...

When I first got this stone I thought it was probably a Thuri; it's green-grey, pretty fine, and a Thuri-type size at 130x50:

But it'd been used with oil, and when I started to clean it up the surface began to look a little speckly, not mega-speckly, just slightly. Here's a picture from today:

So is it a Tam?

Well it feels very fine compared to the other Tams I've had, but not quite as fine as my Thuris. Now here's an interesting thing that I just noticed on the bottom:

Those little lighter sections weren't there before, and they look very Tam-like. And almost like the 'real' surface of the stone is finally becoming visible through the decades of oil.

I assume this box might be original if that helps:

So what do we reckon? Is this a slightly strange, very fine, Tam? It'd be a bit of an odd size for a Tam though - they weren't often cut 2" wide I don't think. Or something else entirely...?

 

[RobbyC]

They look like tam spots, and the white bit is probably the edge of a different tam layer, there were loads of different shades of them and I’ve had a bunch that had two different colours in the same stone

Have you degreased it ?


They cut tams in every size going mate, I’ve seen them with every variation of dimensions you could imagine from 3 x 1” to 12 x 2.5

 

[cugel]

I think the real issue, @cotedupy, is can we see a pic of all your stones? Come clean already, we are here to support you.

The first step is to admit your powerlessness.!

 

[rideon66]

I've posted this on another thread a while back, but thought I'd ask here as I'm certainly now leaning toward thinking it's something particular...

When I first got this stone I thought it was probably a Thuri; it's green-grey, pretty fine, and a Thuri-type size at 130x50:

View attachment 1391568

But it'd been used with oil, and when I started to clean it up the surface began to look a little speckly, not mega-speckly, just slightly. Here's a picture from today:

View attachment 1391566

So is it a Tam?

Well it feels very fine compared to the other Tams I've had, but not quite as fine as my Thuris. Now here's an interesting thing that I just noticed on the bottom:

View attachment 1391565

Those little lighter sections weren't there before, and they look very Tam-like. And almost like the 'real' surface of the stone is finally becoming visible through the decades of oil.

I assume this box might be original if that helps:

View attachment 1391567

So what do we reckon? Is this a slightly strange, very fine, Tam? It'd be a bit of an odd size for a Tam though - they weren't often cut 2" wide I don't think. Or something else entirely...?

I don't know for sure, but the bottom spots sure lean that way. What I can say is the few I have had all have a feel unlike other stones under a blade if that helps any.

 

[cotedupy]

They look like tam spots, and the white bit is probably the edge of a different tam layer, there were loads of different shades of them and I’ve had a bunch that had two different colours in the same stone

Have you degreased it ?


They cut tams in every size going mate, I’ve seen them with every variation of dimensions you could imagine from 3 x 1” to 12 x 2.5

Ta!

I've degreased it a bit but it's been a slow process, though I haven't done any very long 24hr type soaks as I didn't know if they could damage this kind of thing. The more I degrease it though, the more Tam-like it's looking.

And as @rideon66 said - I'll give it another proper try this evening. When I got originally I had only used a couple of weird-size Tams, and didn't have much Thuri experience. But now have a few things I can compare it directly to, side by side (a couple of which obviously were courtesy of yourself ).

I'll be rather pleased if it is... dunno why but there's something about them that I've always rather liked. Maybe my Scottish heritage coming through!

 

[Empire straights]

Ta!

I've degreased it a bit but it's been a slow process, though I haven't done any very long 24hr type soaks as I didn't know if they could damage this kind of thing. The more I degrease it though, the more Tam-like it's looking.

And as @rideon66 said - I'll give it another proper try this evening. When I got originally I had only used a couple of weird-size Tams, and didn't have much Thuri experience. But now have a few things I can compare it directly to, side by side (a couple of which obviously were courtesy of yourself ).

I'll be rather pleased if it is... dunno why but there's something about them that I've always rather liked. Maybe my Scottish heritage coming through!

Once clean slurry a little on it and see what a knife feels like in the slurry. That usually helps some. The spots look similar to the tam I just got.

 

[cotedupy]

I think the real issue, @cotedupy, is can we see a pic of all your stones? Come clean already, we are here to support you.

The first step is to admit your powerlessness.!

Haha... yes it's getting a bit out of control! Here's an old pic of my sharpening cabinet back in Aus (that's about 2/3rds of the stones I have there):

Then this is in the UK, which I need to try to take on an aeroplane in a few days time :

The prospect of which slightly scared me, so I actually sold five of them yesterday to someone here. I don't often sell stones - as you can possibly guess I'm more of a hoarder - but there were a few good 'uns that I had more than one example of, so it'll be nice to see them go to a good home .

 

[cugel]

Haha... yes it's getting a bit out of control! Here's an old pic of my sharpening cabinet back in Aus (that's about 2/3rds of the stones I have there):



Then this is in the UK, which I need to try to take on an aeroplane in a few days time :



The prospect of which slightly scared me, so I actually sold five of them yesterday to someone here. I don't often sell stones - as you can possibly guess I'm more of a hoarder - but there were a few good 'uns that I had more than one example of, so it'll be nice to see them go to a good home .

You, my friend, have a problem. And the airlines are gonna love you...