re; "ARKANSAS PROGRESSION"

[tomjr]

I got curious about using an all Arkansas progression a little while back. So i decided to give it a go. i aquired an ebay razor as my first victim. i started out with a soft arki as my bevel setter using mineral oil on all these arki's. it was a little slow but effective IMO. once the bevel was set i moved to an lily white washita, i thought it did a quite admirable job as a mid-range stone ( i quite like this stone). then i moved to my translucent arki i have used 4 quite some time. after reaching the point of the razors submission, i stropped on vintage canvas hose type linen component. it's very vintage with holes worn on both edges huge stains but it is my favorite of many i own (& apparently someones elses fav many years ago too). then 40 or 50 laps (guess, i don't count) on vintage horse.i then took it out for a dance that evening. a dance for which i was very pleasantly rewarded with a very nice shave. plenty keen and very, very smooth. i imagine the day long ago when someone in the USA might have had only these available to him for his razors. which by the way is what got me started on this particular journey. just thought i would pass this little tidbit on. thanks guys, tom

 

[CharlieFoxtrot]

Thanks for sharing. I have a soft and a hard arkie that does a awesome job on my knives. I have been kicking around getting a true hard and putting a razor through the progression. Looks like I'll have to start shopping around.

 

[kirk 988]

thanks for sharing one of my favourite stones is a novarculite stone that is like a NY ark i think the blokes on razor and stones said and its great if i was careful i think i could use it a a finisher but currently i use it like a jnat with different slurry stones.

 

[CharlieFoxtrot]

Ok, so there I was stuffing myself full of holiday goodness. All the while I'm mulling over trying out the arkies on a W&B that needed a bevel set. I decided to be antisocial and break out the rocks. I endured some looks from SWMBO, but I needed to see results. I ran 40-50 laps and 30 circles on the soft. I went to check the bevel and it was set. It was much more refined than I'm accustomed to from the DMT 1200.

I moved on to the hard arkie for another 30 laps with some pressure on oil and 30 on lather. At this point I had hair flying off my arm. I was pretty surprised with result. I don't know if that's because I didn't know what to expect or didn't expect that much refinement. Now I'm sorry I don't have a translucent or SB on hand, but I'm going to chance it tomorrow anyway. I stropped on CrOx embedded in balsa and leather. Shave test tomorrow morning.

 

[kirk 988]

very cool whats the HHT ? and is it a true hard?

 

[CharlieFoxtrot]

I didn't attempt an HHT because it wasn't there yet. I didn't progress past the hard arkie so I could feel where it was at shaving wise.

The shave test went well. It wasn't shave ready but I wasn't exactly expecting it to be. There was slight pulling but it wasn't to terrible. I'll have to spend some more time on the hard.

My take away was that there is a lot of potential in this progression. A buddy of mine has a SB that I'll have to borrow this weekend. I'm pretty interested to see what a full arkie progression is capable of.