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Les lat trouble

deighaingeal

Well-Known Member
I cannot say that I am apt to learn quickly, but I had a baseline on my la dressante and my BBW in no time. I figured as I continued to learn more hones I would have less trouble. I spent all day tuesday with my new les latneuses. I had the standard side working consistently in about two razors, but after 6 razors on the hybrid side I gave up for the day. I continued for the rest of last week working on two razors each time and at least two sessions per day. Here I am after this whole weekend with no finished razors off of this side.
I worry about two things: first there are some lines in this stone, that can be seen in the thread which I introduced her, I don't recognize, but these could be the edges of mica despite the rest of the mica running parallel to the hone face. The second worry is that I am hitting the voids in the surface, but cannot feel this as I hone.

Would you gentleman suggest lapping further to try to get past the voids or will this just expose more voids?
 
Voids shouldn't be a problem. I'd like to know how you're using the hybrid side, though. Are you trying to do a dilucot or unicot with it, or are you trying to use it after a dilution phase? Or are you doing something else?
 
I'm thinking it is microchipping, but I cannot be sure. If it was a fresh honing and I just came off the 1k I get a better edge, but not shaveable. If I'm coming off of the BBW I get pulling and fairly random areas that are significantly duller than the rest. I just took a great shaving razor to it with just water and had the same problems.
 
How much pressure are you using on it? It should be very light pressure. Do you have a loupe or hand microscope with which you can inspect the edge?
 
Ok, I honed one more blade after that then shaved. I got one descent blade off of that stone. I don't know why I had so much trouble. I did get a good shave with it somewhere between a dull BBW edge and the fresh la dressante edge that I finished my shave with. I think it was microchipping from too much pressure like you said (even if I didn't see it on my loupe).
The silver lining here is that I just got the best shave of my life off of my la dressante on one side and the standard side of my les lat on the other side of my face.
 
deighaingeal said:
I worry about two things: first there are some lines in this stone, that can be seen in the thread which I introduced her, I don't recognize, but these could be the edges of mica despite the rest of the mica running parallel to the hone face.
Linky? I couldn't find it.
 
Looks like the stone was cut on a shallow bias with many thin strata exposed. I would make sure it is really lapped well with as fine a stone as you have. Just as a test, you might want to see if there is any detectable difference if you hone in one direction vs. the other.

Still a beautiful stone, I say...
 
Thanks Steve I thought about that after I had posted my last comment. I noticed on the razor that I got a good edge on I had the thin exposures towards the front (away from me) where the blade missed most of them as I honed, but I do not remember what orientation I had the stone when I honed the other blades, I will work on it again soon and pay closer attention to that.
 
I'm linking the picture to here for our convenience:
IMG01187-20101109-1547.jpg


That looks to me as a pretty clean hybrid side. I've used and seen them with much more foreign inclusions.
I believe we should realize that it's only very recently that people started using this side for honing. Priorly it was considered a contaminated sort of Coticule. It was Gary who discovered that the hybrid side of his Les Latneuses had actually very sweet finishing properties. It was only at that point that I started testing them as thoroughly as the creamy side. So far, I have been surprised that even the ugliest looking inclusions were not causing trouble, although some of them can be felt as a different kind of surface, while the edge glides over it. I am talking about mean looking cracks filled with coarse looking dull gray rock. The stone in the picture doesn't show it.
We can see some of that stuff on this next picture (the hyrid side of n°51), notably a few small filled cracks and a larger one in the upper right corner of the picture:
[img=800]http://www.coticule.be/tl_files/barts_pics/n°51-hybrid.jpg[/img]
So far, it always turned out harmless, even on the one I'm currently testing that has a much larger affected area.

But I am not saying that trouble is impossible, as this relatively unknown type of hybrid Coticule rock surely resuires that the owner does some personal figuring out. When in doubt, the first thing you should do, is to take a perfectly fine razor that shaves well, and rub it over the hybrid side for, let's say, 50 laps. Inspect the edge with a good stereo microscope every 10 laps. In absense of such a device, try to get local assistance from someone who has. I am sure most members of Coticule.be with access to a microscope are willing to help you out with that. I'll do it, but shipping a stone back and forth between continents, dealing with possible Custom affairs, is not worth the hassle if you have someone in your country that's willing to take a look.
If the stone causes havoc, it will show up at 40X magnification. If not, then I'm confident that it will function like the rest of these hybrids. The easiest way get a very good idea of its capabilities is to do a "mixed Unicot": initial steps on the creamy side, taped steps on the hybrid side. If Unicot works on your other Coticules, then there should not be any reason (short of a defect stone) that it wouldn't work on this one. Of course, if Unicot doesn't work consistently on your other Coticules either, then we really must -respectfully- consider some kind of operator error.

Kind regards,
Bart.
 
Actually Bart it does have them. It is in the darker section of that picture. I forgot to post another photo, photo bucket deleted it. I think that you are right though. I do not have the most stable hand yet and despite the repetitive motion of honing I have other motions that are similar and repeat more often. (get out of the gutter) I just found it strange that it happened on this hone, but not the others and even more surprised that it happened on this side and not the other. There is another explanation that I just got from my wife. This hone is not parallel from face to face. in person there is one side that is definitely thicker than the other and there is a chance that this is throwing off my stroke.
 
It's indeed a beautiful stone. I would hate to learn that there was some kind of problem with it.:-/

Please keep us posted.

Kind regards,
Bart.
 
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