Water stones? shapton glass?

Jason B.

Jason B.

Joined
Jun 13, 2007
Messages
11,143
I looking for a few good water stones again and was thinking of the shapton glass stones. They seem to get good reviews but in my searching I found that they make 3 types of glass stones, a standard set, a (HC) high carbon, and a (HR) high resistance set. Anyone have any info on these or personal experience? Any experiences with the regular glass stones is welcome too.
 
Tom from Jende Industries has experience with all of them.... here's a link to a couple of blogs HERE and HERE where he talks a little about them... he could probably answer all your questions

cbw
 
i have experience with the pro series (now called traditional). VERY good stones, probably as good as you can get. some will prefer chocera or even superstones (me)from naniwa, but if you want a no brainer full set from the same brand you can't go wrong with shapton.

the glass are supposed to "feel" a bit softer than the pros. and also supposed to work better on harder steel. they are still on the very hard side of waterstones, wich is good for you coming from diamond plates, i'll be easier to adapt than with naniwas SS for exemple.

imo that's your best bet. very fast cutting, slow wear, nice polish, they don't feel too soft and aren't too tricky to use (the edge won't dig into the stone easy like with"softer" stones) ... and cheaper than the pro because of the thickness.

EDIT.

if you want the best advises on waterstone choice and thei uses, try "in the kitchen" section of KF. the folks here are japanese kitchen knives geeks and they know a hell of a lot about japanese waterstones too.
 
Last edited:
Basically what I'm looking for is two good sets of stones that will complement each other. I have my diamond plates to cover all the high wear resistance steels and general work but there is a small percentage of steels where the diamonds simply become overkill. Carbon steels being the main issue along with various stainless steels usually non-PM though.

cbw, thanks for the links i'll check them out when I get to my home PC.

pwet, haven't heard that much good talk about the pro stones, mainly negative. Most comment suggest the glass stones being better.
 
I'm personally leaning more towards ceramic type stones now that I've practiced with the waterstones, mainly because I end up gouging them at one point or another which in addition to the constant need to flatten them out, makes it seem like diamonds and ceramics might last longer as well as being a little more novice-friendly.

Not sure how the glass stone would fair on carbon steels, but if they're anything like the Spyderco Ceramic bench stones, they might simply load up on metal faster.

The thing that spooked me about those glass stones is the price tag, which got increasingly ridiculous near the 2 final grits. I could easily buy another knife or two at that range.
 
knifenut1013 said:
pwet, haven't heard that much good talk about the pro stones, mainly negative. Most comment suggest the glass stones being better.
Click to expand...

what negative report did you hear ? the shapton pros are the slowest wearing waterstone availlable, cutting speed is on par with choceras, wich are probably the very best. just shap. pros dont have any feedback from the 5k to the 30k.

their main problem is that they are created for japanese carbon steels. they work weird on modern hard stainless. they cut the same but feel real weird and glaze. that's why i advised you the new HR glass stone wich are formulated for modern steels.

for me neither work i prefer softer stones for my use that's why i use naniwa SS. i mainly sharpen japanese kitchen knives with very low angles and very wide bevels, softness conform to the bevel and creat a slight convex, but they are less forgiving. you have to work your angle control or you'll gouge your stones.



noctis. if you gouge your stones it's because you are not consistant enough, working on that with your waterstone will improve your technique, switching to something that will hide this flaw is not the solution imho. instead of gouging your stone you'll create multi bevel or round your edge.
 
Basically what you said, They work best for carbon steels, higher grits have poor feedback, and some I've heard wear quickly. Though I'm looking for something that does carbon steels well I also need it to work on modern stainless like VG-10 or CPM154. Its what I call "softer" classes of steels, what I mean by this is not related to the steels actual hardness but how the abrasive digs at the steel. Diamonds are great for high hardness, high wear resistance, and general sharpening but for the "softer classes" its overkill and the diamonds dig too deep into the steel making final finishing a PITA.

I was thinking just the regular glass stones because I don't need the HR and the HC are only in a few grits.

Any other high quality stones worth suggesting? (tried the naniwa, don't like the feel)
 
knifenut1013 said:
I was thinking just the regular glass stones because I don't need the HR and the HC are only in a few grits.

Any other high quality stones worth suggesting? (tried the naniwa, don't like the feel)
Click to expand...

wich naniwa did you try ? superstones yield the finest finish you can reach on stones period. at 10k (if you have done your job correctly at coarser levels) you have to get the light at the right angle to see any scratch pattern.

chocera finish probably as good (haven't tried the 10k, 5k is slightly hazy compared to 5k SS.) but works way faster and is harder binding.

other than that you'll have to mix different grits from different brands. naniwa and shapton are the only two brands i'm aware of that are worth it from coarse to ultrafine.

once again i strongly advise you to register on KF and ask the very same question on the "in the kitchen" subforum.
 
I had a 12k and it was a very good stone but the final finish was not what I expected and the sticky feel because of its resin bond felt like crap IMO. I also disliked the fact that you let the stone build up creating more of a burnishing effect than actual sharpening.

I think I'm going to go with my original plan and complete the water stone set I told myself I was going to get. I have been doing a lot of reading and thinking and tonight I had a little breakthrough in my water stone usage. I have a large natural aoto stone (AKA blue stone) and decided to use it to finish a buck 110 for my neighbor. The results were the best I have ever had with this stone, it would clean shave arm hair and the edge feel was simply impressive.

I like the natural stones for their superior feel and their ability to effectively sharpen any steel. I sharpened both 420 HC and CPM-D2 tonight, the scratch pattern stayed the same and the difference in difficulty to sharpen was hardly noticed though the wear resistance and hardness of these steels is very different.

So I've decided to go with the Awase To finishing stone and call it a day. I just realized I would never be happy with a synthetic stone and after the success with the Aoto stone I'm a little excited to see what the finishing stone will do.

Thanks for all the good info and personal experience, though I've changed my mind on stones its helped me decide on what I really wanted.
 
The extra series of stones were created exactly for what you are looking for, engineered abrasives for carbon and stainless steels. So the answer from Shapton would be to get all three for the different classes of knives. That is a pricey proposition. Depending on where you get your natural stones & what kind, kiita, asagi, karasu, etc, it can get pricier (as in one stone costing as much as a set of Shaptons) I haven't been cruising the straight razor forums recently, but So and Old School are probably still good bets.

Have you ever tried Thuringians or Charnleys? AFAIK, all the natural stones outside of coticules are silica abrasives, just different densities and binders (straight novaculite, chalk, clay, etc holding radiolarians)
 
hardheart said:
The extra series of stones were created exactly for what you are looking for, engineered abrasives for carbon and stainless steels. So the answer from Shapton would be to get all three for the different classes of knives. That is a pricey proposition. Depending on where you get your natural stones & what kind, kiita, asagi, karasu, etc, it can get pricier (as in one stone costing as much as a set of Shaptons) I haven't been cruising the straight razor forums recently, but So and Old School are probably still good bets.

Have you ever tried Thuringians or Charnleys? AFAIK, all the natural stones outside of coticules are silica abrasives, just different densities and binders (straight novaculite, chalk, clay, etc holding radiolarians)
Click to expand...


This is the stone I have now and this is the stone I would like to add. I'll probably go with the grade 5 though for cost reasons. I'm not sure why its called a blue stone though, its very much brown when in use.

The glass stones sounded good for a moment but the allure of the natural stones pulled me back :D Its abilities are exactly what I was looking for and now I understand how to use it. (finally :o)

I want to move away from strops and micro compounds and at most just use a horse hide strop. Its the reason I'm looking for this second set of stones and if my guesses are correct this finishing stone will allow me to do just that.
 
No, you're just trying to make me jealous...:D

The fine finishing you are talking about is what I wonder about, but it is the hundreds of dollars in polishing stones that is keeping me from finding the answer.:D
 
Shapton 16K Glass came through on a razor of mine that the J-nats could never get as sharp as I wanted. I don't know what there is about that Shapton but it really works on the hard stuff.
 
natural stones have silica as the abrasive, which is essentially quartz and not all that hard relative to high alloy, high wear resistance martensitic steel. The glasstones use a ceramic abrasive that is much harder
 
True but not what I'm looking for, my diamonds are for all the hard steels and the water stones will be for everything that the diamonds don't do well with.

It a mixing of traditional and modern and more so for the appearance than just extreme polished sharpness. I've been refining my techniques with finishing with just stones and thus my reason for wanting a second stone set. The results I achieve on hard alloy steels with just the diamonds makes me feel bad at times for finishing with polishing compounds just to have that mirror look.

I guess what I'm trying to do is bring a little style into my sharpening. I want to give a modern look to modern steels and a traditional look to "traditional" steels. My biggest problem with this has been finding that second abrasive that would allow me to do so. Figuring out how to use this natural stone has "bridged the gap" and if my guess are correct the finishing stone will be just what I'm looking for in sharpness and finish.
 
i doubt a very fine j-nat will work great with VG10, 154cm and the like.

they work great with carbon steel for sure and their main advantage compared to synthetic is that they bring the pattern of a san mai or a hamon like no synthetic stone can do. other than that you won't find a natural stone that cut faster than a synthetic. just no way.

for me they shine with japanese single bevel kitchen knives and that's all. but if you get better results than with a modern synthetic, why not.

oh and a set of shapton or chocera WILL sharpen any production knife, ZDP, S90V included. just use the right grit. a 1000 grit is for routine maintenance not setting a bevel.

and there's nothing wrong in mixing diamond, synthetic and natural.I agree that diamond will always be better than a stone under say 500 grit because at this point waterstones tend to wear more than they cut, if you can deal with that okay, but diamonds are still superior, but on the sharpening and polishing stage there's not place for a diamond stone imo.

a good versatile set for me would be :

dmt XXC and XC, beston 500, 1k shapton or naniwa chocera, 5k naniwa chocera, 10k chocera and a fine nat for the special polish they produce on some blades.
 
So I changed my mind again (shocking I know) and lost interest in the naturals.

I've been looking at the stones on this page and now I'm really confused :o

I was thining a 4k and 8k stone for now and the Kitayama sounds really good but I don't know what to get with it.


Suggestions please!
 
You might want to read some of the descriptions that Dave gives in the stones he sells... Japanese Knife Sharpening Store. He spends a lot of time actually using them, and is very knowledgeable in what stones work best with each other, on different steels, types of finish, etc. Some of that can be found in the descriptions, and he's pretty helpful if you have specific questions.

cbw
 
knifenut1013 said:
So I changed my mind again (shocking I know) and lost interest in the naturals.

I've been looking at the stones on this page and now I'm really confused :o
Click to expand...

You are? I was looking at the Shapton Pro stones on that page and the prices here in Japan are about $20 less than they are selling them for!!!! That makes no sense at all! Usually everything is more expensive here, so why not these? :eek:

Stitchawl
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top