I'm the proud owner of 2 Vintage Norton blacks that show translucency about .5 inches deep. Is this common with old Norton blacks?
Translucency in Vintage Black Norton Hard Arks
- Thread starter duke762
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Mine doesn’t
Some did, some did not.
They varied from translucent to black and most things in between them.
Depends on the era.
In my experience if you got back past a certain point pretty much anything black that Norton sold was also translucent. Sample size of maybe 10-15 stones though, so take that for what it's worth.
In my experience if you got back past a certain point pretty much anything black that Norton sold was also translucent. Sample size of maybe 10-15 stones though, so take that for what it's worth.
I've got a green label that's identical to my dans black arks.
Got pics of it? No translucency at all?
I have a few vintage norton black hard arkansas stones, they all have some amount of translucency. A hazy smokey light transmission of limited depth. I consider them my favorite arkansas razor finishers. Not as temperamental as a normal translucent but not as glazing prone as a pure black stone.
I've had translucent and top-tier opaque black Arks from Norton, Pike, Dans, NWS, Halls, Smiths, etc.
Have also had black Arks from those sources that were just plain Hard, regular hard I guess you could say - they were all were opaque.
I have had a lot of mid 40s to early 60s Norton black 'Hard Arkansas" that were also somewhat translucent, in varying degrees. Some were black/white with translucent black and a less translucent white. Sorta like a B&W cookie.
I think it's safe to say that, over the decades, a good bit of stone came out of those mines and a good variety of types of Hard Arks were sold.
Have also had black Arks from those sources that were just plain Hard, regular hard I guess you could say - they were all were opaque.
I have had a lot of mid 40s to early 60s Norton black 'Hard Arkansas" that were also somewhat translucent, in varying degrees. Some were black/white with translucent black and a less translucent white. Sorta like a B&W cookie.
I think it's safe to say that, over the decades, a good bit of stone came out of those mines and a good variety of types of Hard Arks were sold.
I checked three before I left this morning. Under light two were translucent to 3/8”-1/2”, the third let absolutely no light through.
Neat; Curious to see the old Notrans black Nortons. Like I said; I've owned a bunch of vintage Nortons, but certainly not a definitive sample (and no doubt my purchasing tends to favor translucents since I'm always looking for a "score", and translucent stones would be more recognizable in eBay listings that didn't show labels/etc). I've had a handful of Black arkansas with no translucency, but they were all later stones (a woodcraft, halls, etc).
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Dans has sold reg hard black Arks that were opaque. Their so called 'ultrafine' black Arks transmitted some light sometimes, but other Ultrafine black Arks were opaque.
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