Steve56
Ask me about shaving naked!
Hi, Im Steve and this is my first post in the honing forum.
Ive introduced myself in the Introductions section, but I am and have been a hone nerd for a long, long time, and Alx has gotten me interested in straight shaving again. Looking forward to interesting conversations.
I wanted the first post in the hones and honing forum to be fun and interesting, so here goes.
Whats an Easter Egg? To me, its a hone that surprises you with something extra or special you didnt count on when you bought it.
The first is a Nakayama sunashi suita. It has white splotches on the face and was described as pretty hard, which it is. It's a good razor hone. The white splotches only go about halfway through the stone. The back was mostly unlapped but quite flat. So I decided to lap the back with the results shown. No white at all, and its as soft as a Superstone except for the milk chocolate area in one corner which is hard as glass and has no grit. Its also as finer than the front, and raises a very black swarf very quickly, much more than the front. Two stones in one, and the back is better than the front.
The second is a piece of uchigumori hato, 3-1/2 long and about 2 wide. I had tried hato and jito fingerstones to raise a slurry on razor finishers and was intrigued enough by the results to look for a piece of hato or jito that was large, solid, and uniform enough to be used as a nagura. Why? Well I wanted to try a koma, but its quite expensive, relatively speaking. What is finer than koma (in general) and comes after koma in sword polishing? Uchigumori, hato and jito. And small pieces are much cheaper than koma.
The seller told me that if I wanted fingers stones from this piece Id probably have to saw it, it likely wouldnt split. So what I got was a piece of unlapped uchigumori thats darker than the other two pieces of hato I have, and after lapping its full of red lines and flecks throughout the stone, and it has tiny su. So far its been a great stone and a heck of a lot cheaper than koma. If you have some hato or jito finger stones lying around, try one as a nagura. I actually think this one is a chunk of what would be called uchigumori suita if it were larger and rectangular.
Cheers, Steve
Ive introduced myself in the Introductions section, but I am and have been a hone nerd for a long, long time, and Alx has gotten me interested in straight shaving again. Looking forward to interesting conversations.
I wanted the first post in the hones and honing forum to be fun and interesting, so here goes.
Whats an Easter Egg? To me, its a hone that surprises you with something extra or special you didnt count on when you bought it.
The first is a Nakayama sunashi suita. It has white splotches on the face and was described as pretty hard, which it is. It's a good razor hone. The white splotches only go about halfway through the stone. The back was mostly unlapped but quite flat. So I decided to lap the back with the results shown. No white at all, and its as soft as a Superstone except for the milk chocolate area in one corner which is hard as glass and has no grit. Its also as finer than the front, and raises a very black swarf very quickly, much more than the front. Two stones in one, and the back is better than the front.
The second is a piece of uchigumori hato, 3-1/2 long and about 2 wide. I had tried hato and jito fingerstones to raise a slurry on razor finishers and was intrigued enough by the results to look for a piece of hato or jito that was large, solid, and uniform enough to be used as a nagura. Why? Well I wanted to try a koma, but its quite expensive, relatively speaking. What is finer than koma (in general) and comes after koma in sword polishing? Uchigumori, hato and jito. And small pieces are much cheaper than koma.
The seller told me that if I wanted fingers stones from this piece Id probably have to saw it, it likely wouldnt split. So what I got was a piece of unlapped uchigumori thats darker than the other two pieces of hato I have, and after lapping its full of red lines and flecks throughout the stone, and it has tiny su. So far its been a great stone and a heck of a lot cheaper than koma. If you have some hato or jito finger stones lying around, try one as a nagura. I actually think this one is a chunk of what would be called uchigumori suita if it were larger and rectangular.
Cheers, Steve
