This one might be a 'special stone- for good razors only'. Crazy looking rocks. I like the weird ones.
Natural Stone Haul, Knowns and Unknowns
- Thread starter cotedupy
- Start date
- Thread starter
- #22
Ah interesting! Yeah I need to read up about the various different Purple/Red/Brown + Green stones. It's certainly so markedly different from the earlier one I posted that I'm sure they can't be the same thing.
That's really good! Thanks for posting up all of the photos. Those are some really fine looking rocks you've got. I enjoyed having a look at them. Good stuff!
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- #24
Trying a few out in earnest yesterday evening:
No.1 Washita - This feels like it's going to be toward the faster / coarser end of the spectrum, though it was a surface that had been coarsely lapped, and probably needs a little more work to get a better idea.
Turkish - I'm pretty stoked about this one; it's very fine for a Turkish, and though it can't do the heavy lifting of some of my others, it's going to be a lovely finishing / touch-up stone. Very cool to have one that's a bit different.
Charnleys - My first time using CFs, so nothing to compare them to apart from what I'd read about them / expected... they're not as slow as I was expecting from what some people say, at least not when used with oil. They feel a bit like arks, but with much nicer feedback. The Green/Red one seems a little softer and faster than the Green/Blue. The latter in particular puts seriously beautiful edge on a knife, which almost reminded me of a coti knife edge - seriously fine and sharp, but with some teeth still. In terms of grit level would happily finish a razor I think, but the surface may need to smooth out a bit from here to get the slickness and refinement for a razor, and the green/red may still be a bit too bite-y. They'd need to be extraordinarily good razor finishers to convince me to use them for that instead of knives, cos I was pretty impressed here tbh, but we'll see...
No.1 Washita - This feels like it's going to be toward the faster / coarser end of the spectrum, though it was a surface that had been coarsely lapped, and probably needs a little more work to get a better idea.
Turkish - I'm pretty stoked about this one; it's very fine for a Turkish, and though it can't do the heavy lifting of some of my others, it's going to be a lovely finishing / touch-up stone. Very cool to have one that's a bit different.
Charnleys - My first time using CFs, so nothing to compare them to apart from what I'd read about them / expected... they're not as slow as I was expecting from what some people say, at least not when used with oil. They feel a bit like arks, but with much nicer feedback. The Green/Red one seems a little softer and faster than the Green/Blue. The latter in particular puts seriously beautiful edge on a knife, which almost reminded me of a coti knife edge - seriously fine and sharp, but with some teeth still. In terms of grit level would happily finish a razor I think, but the surface may need to smooth out a bit from here to get the slickness and refinement for a razor, and the green/red may still be a bit too bite-y. They'd need to be extraordinarily good razor finishers to convince me to use them for that instead of knives, cos I was pretty impressed here tbh, but we'll see...
- Thread starter
- #25
Another big old hunk of mystery purple here (with one tiny green on the surface). This one's quite soft too, not as soft as the first purple, but far more so than the second. Like a lot of the pics in this thread the stone is wet here, so it's a bit more purple and less grey when dry. 230 x 50-70.
- Thread starter
- #26
The final ebay stones I think could all be classified as 'Misc. Slate'. I haven't tried them yet, so could possibly be very good, but difficult to ID I imagine, as they're all similar-looking grey stones in various sizes:
At the very least though they will enhance my knowledge and understanding of slate. Which can never be a bad thing.
At the very least though they will enhance my knowledge and understanding of slate. Which can never be a bad thing.
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- #27
And lastly one that's a bit special (for me)...
I've long been envious of the various people who own beautiful old Arkansas/Washitas/etc. belonging to their forebears and handed down through the generations, as I knew I'd never have anything similar.
My grandfather died almost 25 years ago, though my grandmother is still alive, and his workshop area in cellar has remained basically untouched since then. Though through laziness rather than sentimentality I expect; my grandfather was a 'difficult' man by all accounts. If it wasn't for the fact that everything's rusted, covered in spider webs, and the lights no longer work, it would appear as though he was in the middle of some project and had just popped out for a quick bowl.
Some investigating and rummaging around down there turned up a single 6x2 sharpening stone:
A slate, of course
.
I've long been envious of the various people who own beautiful old Arkansas/Washitas/etc. belonging to their forebears and handed down through the generations, as I knew I'd never have anything similar.
My grandfather died almost 25 years ago, though my grandmother is still alive, and his workshop area in cellar has remained basically untouched since then. Though through laziness rather than sentimentality I expect; my grandfather was a 'difficult' man by all accounts. If it wasn't for the fact that everything's rusted, covered in spider webs, and the lights no longer work, it would appear as though he was in the middle of some project and had just popped out for a quick bowl.
Some investigating and rummaging around down there turned up a single 6x2 sharpening stone:
A slate, of course
.Cherish that. I wish I had a stone or anything from my grandfather. The only thing I had was a .22 and I sold it at a time I was destitute and had a 7 month pregnant and I know my grandfather would mercilessly beat me of I was thinking of hanging on to a junk gun instead of putting groceries in the fridge so I sold it. Not a week goes by I don't regret it even thought I know my grandfather would call me an idiot for it. I miss that old man. He was made of boot leather.And lastly one that's a bit special (for me)...
I've long been envious of the various people who own beautiful old Arkansas/Washitas/etc. belonging to their forebears and handed down through the generations, as I knew I'd never have anything similar.
My grandfather died almost 25 years ago, though my grandmother is still alive, and his workshop area in cellar has remained basically untouched since then. Though through laziness rather than sentimentality I expect; my grandfather was a 'difficult' man by all accounts. If it wasn't for the fact that everything's rusted, covered in spider webs, and the lights no longer work, it would appear as though he was in the middle of some project and had just popped out for a quick bowl.
Some investigating and rummaging around down there turned up a single 6x2 sharpening stone:
View attachment 1360596
View attachment 1360595
A slate, of course
- Thread starter
- #29
Some more trials yesterday...
Coticule - This is a very quick coti, erring on the coarser side of medium. Shame it's not bigger as this is a feckin good knife stone. Could probably finish a razor with some slurry wizardry.
Goldfisch - Pretty nice stone, wasn't immediately blown away. Probably need to spend a bit more time with it.
Thuringian - I'm fairly certain now that this is a Thuri, what lovely feeling stones they are! Also managed to work the magic of producing a beautiful shaving edge despite my lack of ability, and the fact I was stropping on a pad of paper because I forgot my strop.
Left Purple - Hard and fine, but cuts quickly. This is a very high quality stone.
Middle Purple - Also quite fine, not the fastest stone in the world but does the job. Will probably polish nicely.
Right Purple - Soft stone that should be a very good polisher. Though there is a small inclusion on one part of the surface that worries me. Suppose I should just lap the bottom and use that instead.
Rozsutec - Nobody is going to accuse the Rozsutec stone of being fast. And it's very hard too, which probably means it's not necessarily a stone for beginners. Stones like this also tend to produce quite polished edges lacking in teeth, but that wasn't the case here. The Rozsutec edge was actually rather good; despite being worked hard it still had some bite. Interesting stone.
Then tried the three CFs again. Or rather two CFs and a mystery stone, as it was pointed out that stone 6 above was probably something else. The stone feels slightly finer than the two CFs and has quite interesting feedback that I can't really describe. Though it's very hard there's some impression of give or softness to it. The closest thing in terms of feedback would be maybe using a smooth, burnished Washita, even though they're entirely different stones.
Last up:
This is an absolute cracker of a stone; it's weird to use, and fast as hell. The surface is very bubbly in appearance and it actually feels like sharpening on bubbles. I still think it's probably some kind of Idwal, but it's not very fine, probably topping out around 3-4k, though I imagine you might be able to work it finer with super light pressure.
That big gauge btw makes no difference when sharpening a knife, that surface is perfectly usable. You just put it at the top or the bottom depending on where you want to do your tip work. Probably better at the top, as in my pic above, but doesn't really matter.
Coticule - This is a very quick coti, erring on the coarser side of medium. Shame it's not bigger as this is a feckin good knife stone. Could probably finish a razor with some slurry wizardry.
Goldfisch - Pretty nice stone, wasn't immediately blown away. Probably need to spend a bit more time with it.
Thuringian - I'm fairly certain now that this is a Thuri, what lovely feeling stones they are! Also managed to work the magic of producing a beautiful shaving edge despite my lack of ability, and the fact I was stropping on a pad of paper because I forgot my strop.
Left Purple - Hard and fine, but cuts quickly. This is a very high quality stone.
Middle Purple - Also quite fine, not the fastest stone in the world but does the job. Will probably polish nicely.
Right Purple - Soft stone that should be a very good polisher. Though there is a small inclusion on one part of the surface that worries me. Suppose I should just lap the bottom and use that instead.
Rozsutec - Nobody is going to accuse the Rozsutec stone of being fast. And it's very hard too, which probably means it's not necessarily a stone for beginners. Stones like this also tend to produce quite polished edges lacking in teeth, but that wasn't the case here. The Rozsutec edge was actually rather good; despite being worked hard it still had some bite. Interesting stone.
Then tried the three CFs again. Or rather two CFs and a mystery stone, as it was pointed out that stone 6 above was probably something else. The stone feels slightly finer than the two CFs and has quite interesting feedback that I can't really describe. Though it's very hard there's some impression of give or softness to it. The closest thing in terms of feedback would be maybe using a smooth, burnished Washita, even though they're entirely different stones.
Last up:
This is an absolute cracker of a stone; it's weird to use, and fast as hell. The surface is very bubbly in appearance and it actually feels like sharpening on bubbles. I still think it's probably some kind of Idwal, but it's not very fine, probably topping out around 3-4k, though I imagine you might be able to work it finer with super light pressure.
That big gauge btw makes no difference when sharpening a knife, that surface is perfectly usable. You just put it at the top or the bottom depending on where you want to do your tip work. Probably better at the top, as in my pic above, but doesn't really matter.
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