How To Oil Based Diamond Paste (1 Micron)

Blues

Blues

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Quick question. I've not used diamond paste for stropping previously.
(Simply bare leather, 3M lapping film, or Chromium oxide on wood or leather in the past.)

I picked up some of the oil based Kent 1 micron paste and was wondering if there was a need to wait a certain amount of time for the product to sit on a basswood strop before putting it to use?

I put a small dab on and spread it with a paint scraper and have let it sit while awaiting info.

Thanks guys, appreciate it.
 
Blues said:
Quick question. I've not used diamond paste for stropping previously.
(Simply bare leather, 3M lapping film, or Chromium oxide on wood or leather in the past.)

I picked up some of the oil based Kent 1 micron paste and was wondering if there was a need to wait a certain amount of time for the product to sit on a basswood strop before putting it to use?

I put a small dab on and spread it with a paint scraper and have let it sit while awaiting info.

Thanks guys, appreciate it.
Click to expand...
I use the Kent stuff as well, however, with oak and MDF, and not with basswood specifically. I never found a need to let it sit. The format for mine was, like, a thick paste. I assume the nature of yours is the same, right? Ultimately, I figure if the compound is staying put, she's good to go
 
Thanks, B&C. Yep, it's a thick paste. I just took a small bit and spread it thin into the basswood.

(I had some on hand. One of these days I'll pick up some MDF.)
 
With paste (I've used DMT's Dia-Paste), the main thing to watch is how much is applied to the substrate. If it's too much, it's going to get scraped off by the blade regardless, whether it's still 'wet' or if it's been given time to dry. So long as it's not too heavy, go for it as soon as it's on there.

I think there is some improvement in how it works after letting it dry, so it more firmly clings to the wood and therefore begins to work more aggressively. But that's not saying it's not effective immediately; just that it'll get more so, after maybe a day or so. A little bit always comes off and gets the blade a little 'pasty' or oily on the bevels, when it's fresh. But that tendency diminishes after a day or so. Being that diamond compounds are relatively pricey for the volume, I'd prefer keeping as much of it on the strop as possible. I'm always looking for another usable stropping surface to which I can apply the excess stuff I've just wiped off the blade. A little goes a long way. :)
 
I noticed the effect you speak of, David, when I decided to test it with a recently touched up SAK I keep laying around for small utility jobs.

The bevel definitely picked up some of the paste and I tried swiping it back on to barer areas of the strop. The strop has a pretty decent (thin) coating of paste, but it is not completely covered.

This tendency was much more apparent than when stropping with chromium oxide applied with one of the bars purchased from Lee Valley a million years or so ago. But that would be expected.

I think I'll let it sit for a while since there's nothing I need to strop anyway.

Or maybe I should just buy that 6000 grit Shapton Glass bench stone to go with the recently acquired 500 and 2000. :p
 
The one thing you may find with some oil based paste's is that they can be a bit waxy and when I use them on leather I just use a hair drier to heat paste part in because the waxy stuff can be so bad that it almost seem's like you are stropping the waxy crap more then the knife unless you use lot's of pressure I have not used the Kent supply stuff but that's what I would try if you find more waxy and really thick and sticky.

I'm going to try making up some strop's out of Ash for my K02 because the Ash I harder I'm hoping it will work like the MDF witch allows me to push and pull the MDF strop when I strop the edge,I'm hoping the added benefit of Ash will be is that I can heat the waxy crap into the wood and that I can still push and pull when I strop to save time,I know I save a ton of time when I can push and pull with my MDF strop's but the problem there is that the waxy crap does not sink into the wood and the diamonds I don't think embed into the MDF the same way they will into the fibers of real will wood and stay on the strop like the do with leather.
 
I was thinking of trying some Persimmon wood I seen online but they were out of stock because I seen the hardness rating and it's something like 2800 on the Janka scale and Osage and Hickory are around the 2040 mark where as Oak I think is 1200 or so and then I got talking with them and their price's were all messed up from what they were saying online so I figured I'd just get some local Ash as I have access to a resaw at work and can cut an inch thick board into 2 1/2 boards and lane it myself and then cut it up.

Blues if you want to do a bit of research for fun try looking up this wood it's called lignum vitae the dam stuff is so dense it will sink like stone and is so hard and such a badass wood they used to bearing's out of it,lignum vitae is now a protected wood because it was cut down so much in the 1800 and early 1900's they almost killed them all off because they found lignum vitae was a better material then some metals for bearings back in the day,I remember seeing a tv show about this wood and they said it was hard that even steel chisel's were dulled very fast by it.

I think lignum vitae's hardness is around 4300 or something close to that.
 
Thanks, Wade. I don't think I'm going to overthink this too much.

I basically wanted to make sure I wasn't going to go off the rails right off the bat by using the paste prematurely...other than that I'm just going to try to have some fun, build my skill set and learn something along the way.

I'm never going to, or at least not very likely to produce the kinds of masterpieces I see here on a fairly regularly basis. But I think I can still up my game and get some satisfaction out of it without pulling out every last hair remaining on my head. :p
 
For me I just want to find something that is better then leather for cutting the metal faster when I strop and also something that will also allow me to get more then a few use's out of a strop then MDF wil before I need to apply more diamond paste because I can see where the MDF is so smooth and does not have any fibers to hold the paste for me that's my main reasons for wanting to find something better so I sharpen my wear resistant steels faster as that's my own self inflicted problem LOL I'm very fussy when it comes to steel and only really like M390 M4 and S110v and don't mind S35VN either.
 
I've tried all the Kent pastes and from what I can tell the THK and KENT brands are exactly the same paste just different labels. The colors are the same, smell exactly the same and even when I compared the two under magnification they performed basically the same. If it works well for you I'd recommend trying the THK brand as it's a bit cheaper. Just as when I apply to bare leather on balsa and basswood I generally apply a very thin coat using lots of pressure and wipe the excess of with a clean towel or it seems to leave a sticky residue on the edge. The water based doesn't seem to do that though.

https://imgur.com/RBbPO0n
 
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