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Stone ID please

M

Mr.B

Member
Hello everybody,

I would like to use my first post to thank everyone on this forum for the wealth of information available here.

On my journey through straight razor shaving, I came to the point where honing my razors is a challenge I want to face.
Through another forum I found coticule.be, and the idea of using one natural stone for the entire progress pleased me, so last week I purchased a coticule, locally in Switzerland.

I started with the Dillucot procedure on three razors, and got, obviously, mixed results. However, I was able to take a completely dull razor from bevel setting to a shave this morning, using only the coticule. Maybe it could be a bit keener, but the smoothness was fantastic! After that experience I’ll go back to the resisting blades….

Since no information came with my coticule, I would like to ask if someone would be so nice and try to identify what vein this stone comes from.

Many thanks in advance!

Mr. B
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dry

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wet

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side view
 
You well come my friend Well done for the beginning. I let the Id to Bart.
Best regards
Emmanuel
 
Welcome,

It's difficult to discern from these pictures, but I think the hone is either a La Grise or a La Verte. Both have a "grainy" appearance, albeit they're completely smooth to the touch of course. I would have expected to see a more pronounced structure, but pictures have been known to disguise it. Can you confirm that the stone has a surface resembling the grain of wood?
The slurry stone looks to be a La Petite Blanche.

Having trouble with Dilucot in the beginning is not uncommon. The best thing you can do when that happens, is to continue with the final steps of the Unicot method, from step 5 and onwards. That should normally give you a great keen edge.

Kind regards,
Bart
 
Welcome

As Bart said, Unicot is more straightforward to find by yourself what to expect from your coticule.
I am not one of the brighter pupil in the class and I go on struggling to get extra keeness on some blades with dilucot.
Hope you'll enjoy your coticule journey

Regards

Laurent
 
Thank you, Emmanuel, Bart and Laurent for the welcome and your replies.

I tried to take some better pictures of the stone, maybe it will be easier to ID it with some close ups.
Hmm, grain of wood? Thought about that for quite a while, and yes, one could say that it has an appearance close to Teak.

I might try the Unicot method, if I start to get frustrated with the results from my Dilucot attempts, but for now I don’t mind the beginning to be not that easy.
For no apparent reason, I am somewhat reluctant to put a double bevel on my blades, but I might be completely wrong….

Kind regards,

Mr. B
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Thank you Bart.

After your first reply, I kept watching the Images in the Coticule vault, and was comparing entre La Grise et La Verte. And even though the colour seems closer to La Verte, you, with your experience, might be right, as to ID it as La Grise.

Anyhow, I had my third honing session today (four hours of it), and must say it was a lot of fun. Going back an forth, trying again and again, until I started to have the impression that I was at the beginning of hearing and feeling what was going on. I really enjoyed it, in plus there’s another blade that seems to be quite ready, tomorrow’s shave will tell.

One last question for this thread:
The stone wasn’t quite flat, so I lapped it with a 800 grit wet/dry sandpaper on a granite desktop. Is that ok, or should the lapping be finished with a finer grit?

Kind regards,

Mr.B
 
800 grit is plenty fine for lapping. :thumbup:

Great to hear you're enjoying the work on the stone. I believe that is important.

Kind regards,
Bart.
 
Mr.B said:
I might try the Unicot method, if I start to get frustrated with the results from my Dilucot attempts, but for now I don’t mind the beginning to be not that easy.
For no apparent reason, I am somewhat reluctant to put a double bevel on my blades, but I might be completely wrong…
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Well, well. Not minding the difficulties is a very good approach indeed! But as for reluctance for "double bevel", you might read my old post (you can skip to the part after ----- line). Please do realize, that Unicot doesn't yield a full blown double bevel, rather a second micro bevel. A set of halfstrokes on milky slurry renders it non-existent in no time.

Of course, you're most welcome to go and try it with single bevel. But I beg, don't let the frustration kick in. :) It's like a young kid learning to ride a bike with his/her dad holding a bike by a piece of stick. A kid is having fun in the first place. And that's the fastest way to start riding without noticing your dad is no longer right behind you (I still remember this moment and the place where it was). :thumbup:

good luck,
Matt
 
Matt, thank you for the encouraging words.

It’s not that I was getting frustrated, but one of my razors, a Fritz Bracht Dovo, really was resisting all my attempts to get it to a shave ready state.
So, and before reading your post, I thought, well, let’s try unicot….
The result was very good indeed! Finally!

And, as you say, with a loupe I could see that there’s not a real double bevel.

Anyhow, I’m so stubborn, that I already know that I won’t be really happy until I’ll manage to successfully sharpen that particular razor through dilucot.
And I’ll even call that fun!

Kind regards,

Mr.B
 
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