Ohishi Waterstones?

[Augusto Orosco]

My Lie-Nielsen newsletter arrived today, and they are offering the line of Ohishi waterstones. Apparently, these don't need soaking, just a spritz and are good to go. I think these stones have been around for awhile; since a Google search finds razor and knife aficionados discussing them (and some argue that they do need some light soaking, though... although the spritz/soak debate also applies to Shaptons, iirc)

Anyone has any experience with them? I looked at Stu's website and he doesn't carry them (at least my search didn't find them).

[Chris Griggs]

I saw that too and I was wondering when someone was going to post this. I tried them out at an LN show this fall. They're nice stones. Quite dense, smooth feeling and IIRC medium hardness. I think I liked the 10k pretty well, but that the 1k was a bit soft for my taste...don't get me wrong I liked it and its by no means soft, I just remember thinking that I would like it better if it was a bit harder. They had the 3k out to but I don't think I tried it which is too bad because a 3-4k stone is the one stone I could actually still use and $45 is a pretty good price for a thick good quality stone in tht grit range. I'd like to see what Stu knows about them. In my uneducated view from a brief trial they are another quite good option on the market, but not markedly better or worse then other good stones on the market (or as Stu would say "Meh", which loosely translates to "Perfectly good stone but he's used better" )

Anyway, again, I liked them and thought they seemed like a very good option, but I'm not going to run out and replace anything with them, as I liked my somewhat harder stones better.

(NOTE: take everything I just said with a grain of salt. It was October when I tried them out and it was only for 5-10 minutes so I may be remembering wrong)

[Augusto Orosco]

I saw that too and I was wondering when someone was going to post this. I tried them out at an LN show this fall. They're nice stones. Pretty smooth feeling and IIRC medium hardness. I think I liked the 10k pretty well, but that the 1k was a bit soft for my taste...still medium hard, I just like something harder. They had the 3k out to but I don't think I tried it which is too bad because a 3-4k stone is the one stone I could actually still use and $45 is a pretty good price for a thick good quality stone in tht grit range. I'd like to see what Stu knows about them. In my uneducated view from a brief trial they are another quite good option on the market, but not markedly better or worse then other good stones on the market (or as Stu would say "Meh", which loosely translates to "Perfectly good stone but he's used better" )

Anyway, again, I liked them and thought they seemed like a very ood option, but I'm not going to run out and replace anything with them.

Yeah, what caught my attention is that they don't require soaking, which immediately made me compare them to the Shaptons. I know is not quite an apples to apples comparison given that we are talking ceramic, and the grits might not correspond, etc., etc., but generally speaking, these Ohishi are ticker and wider than the Shaptons, while also cheaper (using Amazon prices for the Shapton Pros).

[David Weaver]

Dare I say it...like every accessory that LN carries, they are available more cheaply elsewhere.

Just eyeballing them (I got the same email blast as everyone else), they look like they might be magnesia binder stones. If they come with a warning that says they can be soaked but can't be soaked too long, that'd be strike one toward classifying them as a magnesia binder. It'd be interesting to know who makes them, or if they are instead just another of the billions of stones that imanishi makes and brands as something or other that isn't imanishi.

I doubt there are many stones that are 25mm thick that could match the life span of a shapton pro at 15mm thick. I can think of maybe one or two. Most of the 25 mm stones that are out there won't come close.

[Augusto Orosco]

Dare I say it...like every accessory that LN carries, they are available more cheaply elsewhere.

Just eyeballing them (I got the same email blast as everyone else), they look like they might be magnesia binder stones. If they come with a warning that says they can be soaked but can't be soaked too long, that'd be strike one toward classifying them as a magnesia binder. It'd be interesting to know who makes them, or if they are instead just another of the billions of stones that imanishi makes and brands as something or other that isn't imanishi.

I doubt there are many stones that are 25mm thick that could match the life span of a shapton pro at 15mm thick. I can think of maybe one or two. Most of the 25 mm stones that are out there won't come close.

Thanks for the clarification on the life span issue. A casual hobbyist like myself will probably not wear out either stone in many many years anyway, so I shouldn't have focused on that. And the price advantage compared to the Shaptons would make them very interesting only if their performance is also up to par. That's what I am most interested to know!

[David Weaver]

You're right. People wore out the old soft kings and people wore out the shapton 1000 glasstone, which is a softer stone than the pro stone and 5mm thick in abrasive. I have no clue what Shapton was thinking when they designed that one, the pros are a different animal.

A lot of the stones you see worn out are due to overzealous flattening that can be overcome by skill. We don't care so much now, we'd just buy another stone (I would), but you'll note literature from craftsmen and knife makers sometimes talking about how to sharpen sparingly with expensive stones so as not to waste them.

[David Weaver]

I haven't got a clue what the seller on amazon is thinking with their prices of shapton pros. They are about the same overall as those oshishis.

http://www.chefknivestogo.com/shaptonpro.html (no affiliation with this vendor, just using them as an example, and stu's also got them probably in the ballpark when shipping for two or three stones are considered, maybe cheaper)

Both types are fairly expensive compared to some stones and very inexpensive compared to others.

[Chris Griggs]

Like I said I am struggling to remember what they're like, but I do remember that they are a very very different animal than Shapton. I can't remember if I thought they might be magnesia or not, but they are definitely closer in feel to a magnesia stone than a Shapton. I remember them being dense and gritty. They would probably be preferable for someone just learning to freehand (or someone who doesn't like hard stones) in that (again IIRC) they are smoother, creamier/slurrier, softer (perhaps softer than I'm remembering) and more forgiving. I know I would have liked them better when I was learning to freehand, even though now I would prefer a Shapton. The Shaptons are like honing on a really hard piece of plastic/rubber...the water just sits on top. They are very smooth and slick but being a fairly impermeable stone there is a learning curve (short learning curve) to avoid aquaplaning.

Like I said, there is a lot I don't recall, but in terms of synthetic water stones, very different animal than a Shapton pro.

[Chris Griggs]

The description on this site refers to a "clay matrix", not sure what that means though or if its accurate.

http://www.epicedge.com/shopexd.asp?id=87550

[Stuart Tierney]

My Lie-Nielsen newsletter arrived today, and they are offering the line of Ohishi waterstones. Apparently, these don't need soaking, just a spritz and are good to go. I think these stones have been around for awhile; since a Google search finds razor and knife aficionados discussing them (and some argue that they do need some light soaking, though... although the spritz/soak debate also applies to Shaptons, iirc)

Anyone has any experience with them? I looked at Stu's website and he doesn't carry them (at least my search didn't find them).

Lets nip this in the bud nice and quick.

#1, I've never heard of them. I think I looked up who did actually make them, and found them, and it took me about an hour. Not Imanishi.

#2, I've never used them, so cannot comment on whether they'll be any good or not. I probably will not ever use one either, unless someone gives them to me (don't Dave) and I have absolutely ZERO interest in gaining first hand experience with them. And unless the folks who make them track me down and make me an offer I can't refuse, I'll not be having anything to do with them.

#3, Is soaking bad? Really? Bad enough to be avoided like the plague? I don't think so, and I think most folks who are convinced that 'no-soak' stones are essential and far better because of that have been reading too much and adopting the thoughts of others. There are very few stones that genuinely do not benefit from a soaking in some way, and all of them have that feature as a practical side effect/benefit, not a design point. If these stones do get some benefit from soaking, then they're not 'no-soak' at all...

#4, Because of #1, and because they're not available here in Japan, I must treat them as 'Ghosts' which are those things that do a big song and dance overseas, but are practically unknown in their country of origin. That does not, by definition, mean they're bad but I do have to wonder why a particular item might not be readily available where it's actually made...

(And by readily available I mean a Google search gets you a place to buy them in the first few hits and/or walking into a store and there's one there either in stock or not too far away. In other words, I wouldn't have to expend more than a token effort to get a hold of one, nor would anyone else actually living in Japan.)

So don't ask me about them. I don't know.

Stu.

[David Weaver]

Yeah, no worries on #2, I'm not going to buy any of them. I have seen enough different stones to guess that they're being sold because they're different and nobody else already has exclusive rights to sell or distribute them in the US. I doubt you need any stones, either.

[Stuart Tierney]

Yeah, no worries on #2, I'm not going to buy any of them. I have seen enough different stones to guess that they're being sold because they're different and nobody else already has exclusive rights to sell or distribute them in the US. I doubt you need any stones, either.

I'd bet that's most likely the case myself, and can't fault LN at all for scrounging up a source of sharpening stones they think are good, they can get reliably and are not another "me too!" kind of deal.

But there's also very little 'new' when it comes to these things. Most are variations on one of several common themes, the makers simply tweaking and tuning the ingredients and processes to get what they think is the best balance of performance and balancing of compromises.

That balancing act doesn't always work out though...

Stu.

[David Weaver]

They don't state what the binder is. That's kind of important.

It would be nice if makers would state what the binder is in a given stone and what type of abrasive material there is in it. Most places aren't looking for buyers who actually want to know that stuff.

I had asked a seller a question at one point on a new private label stone "what is the binder, is it resin, magnesia, ...?". After making grandiose claims about the stone in their advertising stuff, they told me that was proprietary information. That's sort of like telling you that you can't know whether the car you're buying is four cylinder or six cylinder.

As time has gone by, more comments have gotten attached to the advertisement where folks have posted reviews and said, "The stone is not as _____ (hard, fast, ....) as the seller says, but it's an OK stone". Yeah, what a surprise. They're all OK stones, if one had a secret none of the others did, we'd know about it by now.

That's not related to LN here, just a general annoyance with all of the stones that come out and get sold as "the best I've ever seen", especially when that comes along with comments like "is super hard, never goes out of flat, cuts super fast and never glazes". Yeah, OK....is it diamond? No? Sounds like overselling. Most users will have only one or two sets of stones and will just believe it.

[David Weaver]

I'd bet that's most likely the case myself, and can't fault LN at all for scrounging up a source of sharpening stones they think are good, they can get reliably and are not another "me too!" kind of deal.

But there's also very little 'new' when it comes to these things. Most are variations on one of several common themes, the makers simply tweaking and tuning the ingredients and processes to get what they think is the best balance of performance and balancing of compromises.

That balancing act doesn't always work out though...

Stu.

I didn't so much mean "me too" kind of thing, but more like "I'm allowed to sell these", perhaps without having to go through a million profit reducing exchanges between manufacturer, exporter/importer/distributor, etc.

[Steve Friedman]

I tried them when I was at Lie-Nielsen last summer, but that was only a couple of weeks after getting my Sigmas from Stu, so I definitely have no comment on the stones. I do have three possible explanations for why Lie-Nielsen may have started to sell something like these stones. First, their showroom and their Hand Tool events are not set up for stones that need soaking. Second, I think they needed to sell something with more panache than the Nortons. Nortons may be fine, but it's Lie-Nielsen. Not sure why they stopped selling Shaptons, but when you're selling $500 planes, your client base demands something more exclusive than Nortons. Third, I think they needed to keep the cost of the stones reasonable. If a new customer thinks they need to spend $500 on sharpening stones, plane sales could suffer. I have seen new customers in the Lie-Nielsen showroom drop over $1,000 on their first Lie-Nielsen planes, but be unwilling to spend more than $99 for the "starter" sharpening set. I'm not suggesting that everyone needs to spend as much as many of use do on sharpening equipment, but I think Lie-Nielsen needed to sell some mid-priced, no-soak, sharpening stones that had some panache.

Just my opinion.

Steve