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Thread: Why don't you use ceramic stones?

  1. #121
    I think it's pretty much universal that if you sharpen your knives to a level where they shave hair easily, someone is going to have a problem with them. When my wife's friends come over, I usually put tape on the handle of any knife that's been recently sharpened, and they avoid them (so does my wife).

    I sharpen my wife's knives only with a 1k diamond hone and then steel them, but my wife's friends have problems with those, too.

    The spydercos seem pretty ideal for knife touch ups because they're hard enough to bend the bevel on a soft knife AND sharpen it (oilstones are nice to use, too). I'm cheap about some things and don't like stones that are designed to blast away a large part of the edge of a knife while sharpening it. Same with razors. I'd like to keep as much of the metal as possible, and the spydercos are definitely sparing on the metal.

  2. #122
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    I also bit on the Spyderco UF, received it a couple of days ago. Checked with a straight edge it seemed to not be really flat. I used the iWood 300 diamond with a little soapy water and it flattened each side in less than five minutes each. Worked a couple plane blades that needed freshening and they responded well. Nicely polished too. I'm impressed enough that I also ordered the medium stone which may arrive today. I also don't have a water supply in my shop. Thanks for the tip, George.

    Also thanks to David W. for explaining the virtues of free handing blades over the width of two-inch stones that actually helps prevent uneven wear. Once I started doing this it made perfect sense.

  3. #123
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    Quote Originally Posted by David Weaver View Post
    I got the 2x8 UF in the mail tonight, and it has only the tiniest lightest mill marks in it, nothing I'd be concerned about.

    And it's flat enough to use out of the box. I could lap it just to be sure, but after lapping the 8x3 before, I'll wait to see if I really need to do that.

    ...just went down to the shop after typing the above, can't do much with a baby asleep, but I did get to work an old pexto chisel on the brown then the UF and this one is not as aggressive out of the box as the 8x3 was, it's super fine, imparts a very bright polish (used dry) and with lifting the handle of the chisel a little bit (since it's a slow cutting stone), it works a lot like an oilstone would, but even slower, and finer than any of my oilstones.

    It's actually subjectively paring across the end of a board as sharp as anything I've used, and I've used a lot of things.
    David what did you use to lap the ceramic stone?
    Vijay

  4. #124
    Quote Originally Posted by Vijay Kumar View Post
    David what did you use to lap the ceramic stone?
    Vijay
    Atoma 400 - dry. Don't let too much swarf build up on the surface - brush it off before it adds up to much.
    Last edited by David Weaver; 09-04-2014 at 6:22 PM.

  5. #125
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    Thank you David. Just purchased the UF 3x8.
    Vijay

  6. #126
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    I was so curious about the ceramic stones, that I order the 3 stones (M, F and UF).
    I got Saturday 9/6 the M and F and what a surprise. I have to clarify that I had tried honing jigs for sharpening and I cannot make them work.
    I can get sharp, but I cannot feel it is a razor sharp. It doesn't last.
    I stick with what I know, free hand.

    I had a bad experience 2 weeks ago with a jig, so I decided free hand is the way to go for me.

    Well, back to the ceramic stones. It was so easy to sharp with the M and F. I was planning Ash and It was like butter. I could hear my stanley 5 ½ singing (shhshsh!!!). I got the UF today (Amazon delivers 7 days a week in Houston).
    I got the wire edge so easy.
    I have to say that If I have to reshape the angle, then I will go to my Diamond plate XC and C and then go back to the ceramic.

    I feel like I am in Nirvana.

    I read from David Weaver this it is the initial state of the stone, later they will settle down. He mentions that he used a stone to revive the ceramics.
    I wonder if I can use a some passes with my diamond coarse to do the same?
    How long will last this initial state before the settle down?

  7. Those magnification pictures are remarkable to me. I can get a clear polish with a Shapton 15 k almost instantaneously but yet can see scratches from 3 feet. I can not see any scratches on that Guan-xi honed razor under magnification.

    Where can one get the polycrystalline diamonds for lapping out pits or is the Eze-lap sufficient?
    Where can one get the Jasper? It seems like they cut in 1/4" thickness only.

  8. #128
    Quote Originally Posted by Fidel Fernandez View Post
    I read from David Weaver this it is the initial state of the stone, later they will settle down. He mentions that he used a stone to revive the ceramics.
    I wonder if I can use a some passes with my diamond coarse to do the same?
    How long will last this initial state before the settle down?
    You can use a diamond hone to keep it awake, a coarse one will just leave scratches further apart on the surface. Just experiment with the direction of the diamond stone scratches and see what you like (they won't help much in terms of cutting speed if they all run in the same direction you move the iron back and forth on the stone).

    How long the stone will stay active before it gets slow depends on how significant the milling marks are on the stone. If it looks like it has noticeable milling marks, it should stay lively longer than it would if it is perfectly smooth (a perfectly smooth stone will get tired and cut very fine but slowly in a matter of a few sessions in the shop).

  9. #129
    Quote Originally Posted by Noah Wagener View Post
    Those magnification pictures are remarkable to me. I can get a clear polish with a Shapton 15 k almost instantaneously but yet can see scratches from 3 feet. I can not see any scratches on that Guan-xi honed razor under magnification.

    Where can one get the polycrystalline diamonds for lapping out pits or is the Eze-lap sufficient?
    Where can one get the Jasper? It seems like they cut in 1/4" thickness only.
    Look for biggs or owyhee jasper slabs on ebay and find something stable to glue them to. You can use the word "large" in your search to try to find something good. What I've found is that something like a 6x3 or 7x4 slab will end up being about 10 bucks, but it might take a little time to find it. Dave Barnett's suggestion to find a plain looking stone and one with no cracks or holes in it is a good one, they are extremely hard stones and they lap about as fast as a spyderco (which is to say not very fast).

    You don't need loose polycrystalline diamonds, loose monocrystalline are fine. The yuri something or other seller on ebay is the best deal I've found, but you need a substrate to use them on, too (either a plane sole or a kanaban - i wouldn't buy an expensive kanaban for really coarse use (it does wear the kanaban), just one of the $20-$25 ones that must be imported by harima because they're everywhere).

  10. #130
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    What would you rate the Spyderco Medium, Fine and Ultra Fine stones in microns?

    Regards from Perth

    Derek

  11. #131
    The F and UF are 3 to 5 micron particles (spyderco says that right on their page, and I think in the paperwork that comes with the 2x8 stones). In actuality, they're very dense and initially they leave a finish like a king 8000 stone, but tend finer not long after that and they are at least the equal of the 1 micron stones, but take a little more finesse. The only thing I could liken them to is oilstones, where the level of polish doesn't match the particle size that well because the particles are in a dense matrix and there is never really a completely fresh layer of large particles available, and certainly none rolling around like you get with a waterstone.

    I've seen others say that the the particle size in the brown mediums is similar, but those brown stones have pores in them and the others do not, and since the binder itself is abrasive, the pores will cut some (like a washita). Figure the finish is equivalent to something from shapton that has 6 or 7 micron particles once the stone breaks in. It's very coarse at first, but not for long.

  12. #132
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    Thanks David. I've ordered the M and UF stones in 2 x8, plus Coarse and Fine Eze-laps in 3 x 8. It must be 10 years or more since I bought the 2 x 6 Fine, which is nicely broken in and a delight.

    Regards from Perth

    Derek

  13. #133
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    When I bought a couple Spyderco stones recently I saw a ceramic rod, looks like the Spyderco brown stone. It was $6 and I bought it to try on curved blades. I was using my scorp on a Windsor Chair seat last night and decided to touch it up. Between the brown rod and the elliptical Spyderdo I was able to get the curved blade sharp without much effort. I got thinking about some much duller curved blades I have and decided to check Amazon to see if Eze-Lap makes a 600 grit rod. Turns out that they do. so very soon I will have round & elliptical rods to match the 3 stone (Eze-Lap 600 grit>brown ceramic>fine/ultra fine white ceramic stone) system. I imagine the Eze-Lap rod will work well to touch up dull kitchen knives too. As David has mentioned the ceramics are not fast. I'm not sure if they still offer them but the original Spyderco Triangular rod system use to have a diamond rod option. I never ordered them as they were pricey and I usually do not need anything more.

  14. Informative read! However I am still unsure whether ceramics are the right way for me to go.

    I work as a restoration carpenter doing everything from sash and trim to timber framing and therefore I need to sharpen a big variety of tools. As of now I use a combo india followed by a Smith's black ark and green compound on leather. However the black ark doesn't do well on all my tools. So now I am in the market for a new no bs setup I can use in the shop as well as on the go and would therefore like to limit myself to three stones.

    Right now I am undecided between a 400 atoma + 1k and 8k shapton pro's or 400 atoma + M and UF spydercos. As the prices here in Europe are the same for either setups I am wondering which would be the most versatile?

  15. #135
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    I had missed this thread, or at least don't remember posting in it. I don't use ceramic stones because I don't like the lack of feel. My sharpening depends on stopping on a given stone when it feels like it's finished. I'm self-taught on sharpening with a set of Arkansas stones I ordered in 1974. The set was Washita, Soft, Hard, and Black. The Black turned out to be translucent, and it changed my life.

    I didn't know you were "supposed" to raise a burr on the backside, and somehow I developed the feel for when a stone is finished. When a stone has done enough, it feels like the cutting edge is cutting down into the stone. Hard stones, like ceramics and glass stones, and diamond stones never have this feel to me.

    These days, my preferred setup is a progression of Sigma stones-400, 1000, 3000. 6000, 10000, and 13000. Under running water, each stone gives me the feel when it's done. It might be as little as ten strokes until it can go to the next stone. They cut fast enough that I don't need to worry with micro-bevels, so I just do full bevels. No back bevels at all. Often, I don't go back coarser than the 6k stone to start with. I can never feel a burr, but I do hit the backs on the edges of the 10k, and 13k stone to make sure.
    Last edited by Tom M King; 07-25-2016 at 3:52 PM.

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