Why Water Stones?

drail said:
I dearly love and use Japanese knives but I do not own a single water stone. The Japanese used them because for many years that was all they had and I would imagine everyone in Asia still uses them. I can get a scary sharp edge with just a couple of Arkansas stones and a little oil and the Arkansas stones rarely need to be flattened. Bonzai! or 'Murica!. You choose. (just kidding here)
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garry3 said:
You can't sharpen a Japanese knife on an ark. I know this to be fact because I read it. :confused:

I do have a knife in Aogami Super that doesn't respond well to the arks and I have come across some other steels that didn't respond well also but I suspect hard steel on hard slower stones tears a lot of sharpeners up. ;)
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To be clear, I've been using Arkansas stones for decades but they are no match for high-hardness steels, especially if they are high-vanadium steels. My days of that make-believe game are behind me. I love Arkansas stones but they are limited in use and that is just a fact. And the more I sharpen, and the more varied knives I get, the more I realize just how narrow their scope is.

I have diamonds for the high-vanadium stuff but those are all pocket knives. I have avoided most high-hardness kitchen cutlery, specifically Japanese knives, because of this.

The one I have in BD1N, while hard, is very sharpening friendly but many, are not. My primary point in starting this was the mental exercise and solicited feedback on if I had to wait to get a full line-up of water stones before delving in.

Also, when talking water stones, I'm specifically talking about man-made bonded ceramics, not natural stones.

I am aiming toward eventually getting something in say HAP40 or SG2/R2 and those require tools well beyond what I currently have.
 
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Some water stones for HAP40: Shapton Glass, Chosera/Naniwa Professional, King Hyper, Kohetsu, & Suehiro Debado.
The Kohetsu stones may actually be private labeled Suehiro Debados - they certainly feel the same.
I use the Kohetsu 2000 when I have time to soak stones, the Shapton Glass when I don't.
I generally have two parallel main sets of stones, splash & go and soakers. The exceptions being the 500 glass stone, which has no real soaking equivalent and my 220 where I use a soaking stone (Imanishi) and haven't bought a splash and go.
 
HeavyHanded said:
The finer mesh plates are a bit too tame for resurfacing stones, and the coarser ones tear up the outside edges of your harder ceramic stones.
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I'm flattening with the plates I have, but don't like the texture it leaves on my finer stones. Are the finer plates okay for just leaving a finer surface?
 
Ourorboros said:
I'm flattening with the plates I have, but don't like the texture it leaves on my finer stones. Are the finer plates okay for just leaving a finer surface?
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The 320 and finer take forever to lap anything. The 170 tends to leave faint scratch marks on stones finer than 1k, but is not an issue that I've seen in use. I give my 8k a rub afterward with a nagura, or not. The 170 is probably comparable to an XC DMT, certainly not as rough as an XXC.

Also since the plate is made for grinding and not sharpening it tends not to make deep scratches anyway compared to a sharpening plate of comparable grit. Side note, you can sharpen steels on these plates but they tend not to grind cleanly and leave large burrs behind.
 
Oh, if you get into the polishing end, you should know that the Grit Chart is wrong on the high end for Shapton.
The 10K Shapton Glass is 1.47 microns, not 1.74. It's labelled and in any case you can work it out from the 1K stone being 14.7 microns.
Also the Chosera 10K is in no way the same size, it is most definitely finer. Again, the 1K Chosera is universally acknowledged to be finer than the Shapton 1K.
 
Ourorboros said:
Oh, if you get into the polishing end, you should know that the Grit Chart is wrong on the high end for Shapton.
The 10K Shapton Glass is 1.47 microns, not 1.74. It's labelled and in any case you can work it out from the 1K stone being 14.7 microns.
Also the Chosera 10K is in no way the same size, it is most definitely finer. Again, the 1K Chosera is universally acknowledged to be finer than the Shapton 1K.
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Thank you.

The amount of variation in names, grades, performance, etc. is what makes this water stone endeavor so daunting in the beginning. At least for me. If a person just wants to garb some of the cheaper stones around $20, then I guess it isn't as much of an issue but when you start looking at the higher end stuff you want to be sure you're putting your dollars toward the best possible stuff for you and your knives. And man, you hear "this is marked as a 1k but acts like an 800" or "this is called a 1000 but behaves like a 3000" and so on and when you're new it's like holy smokes, I don't want to be spending hundreds of dollars experimenting!

That's why I appreciate all the folks who chime in on threads like this, as you guys provide options but good understandable explanations and recommendations as well. I don't mind having some choices, I just like having the field narrowed down a bit. Once I get going I can blow my money on experiments just fine. :D
 
Yeah, putting $70+ on a single stone can be much if you don't know what you are getting and don't already have a full line up.
That's my only solid reason for recommending a single line of stones to start with, if I ever do. At least the spacing is consistent within a company. Funny thing is that I read that Naniwa, Shapton, & King are owned by the same company now. Don't know if it is true.

That's before knowing a muddy stone can provide a variety of finishes depending on pressure and water/mud.
 
The Shapton Glass 2k arrived today and I might as well call this my epiphany stone. I now get "why water stones".

First, and again, than you to everyone who lent their expertise and advice to this thread and pushed me over the water stone hump. Especially HeavyHanded HeavyHanded and @Jason B. for recommending this exact stone/grit.

The first thing I did was grab a Wusthof 6" chef's knife that I use as a utility and for breaking down raw chickens.

Sink bridge? Naw, a quarter sheet pan on the cutting board.

New stone holder? Why? Just use the one you got knucklehead.

And off I went.

Although I've been trying for a little while now to adjust my technique on my oil stones, I still felt a lot like a baby giraffe. I've spent decades sharpening in what DeadboxHero DeadboxHero calls "grandpa style". Ya know, the long swoops, bent wrist, all that. But even at 51 I ain't too old to learn new tricks. :p Had to remind myself to slow down, but too slow was too wobbly. I need practice but I'll get it.

The edge this stone produced was, well, different and very nice. It might be the cleanest edge I've ever gotten off a single stone. In about ten minutes and a little stropping on bare leather and I was making cross-cuts in paper towels. Still a little ragged but I'm very pleased! That would normally take me a couple stones and a lot more stropping.

I know this is easy-to-sharpen steel and I'll need a lot of technique refinement before I go up into the challenging stuff but I've taken that first step and am super excited!

Now a few more stones and odds and ends to round things out. :)

BQmfsMr.jpg
 
Eli Chaps said:
The edge this stone produced was, well, different and very nice. It might be the cleanest edge I've ever gotten off a single stone.
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This is what waterstones tend to be better at than many other stone compositions at the same skill level and working time. Clean edges - a minimum of steel at the edge that is "unsupported" (free of burrs from pressure and draw-out), regardless of grit value, esp at the medium abrasive level.

Only wet/dry is easier in this respect, but it has other drawbacks in terms of substrate care, grind speed, applied pressure etc.
 
Eli Chaps said:
At the risk of causing some of my most respected members to perform a simultaneous face palm, I ask this question with sincerity but also with an admitted touch of "out loud thinking".

Long post, so if you don't feel like wading through it, why do you recommend water stones?

:)

As some of you will know, my Japanese knife desires have again been ignited. I've gone through this before but more or less shied away from it. As I'm want to do when I'm buying myself something, I got caught up in basically analysis paralysis and backed off. Between the knives themselves and the seemingly obligatory water stone sharpening, I've always found myself a bit overwhelmed and somewhat intimidated.

The first thing I needed to do was up my free hand game. With the help of so many of you folks, that has happened. I'm not a master sharpener by any stretch, but I am now confident in my edges and my depth of understanding.

So, I found myself in this circle of, I want more Japanese knives but I need water stones and I'm not sure I want water stones or am not sure I can adjust so I'm not getting more Japanese knives... and round and round...

But this time as I was thinking I had a bit of an epiphany... Japanese knives aren't somehow impervious to my current sharpening stones. I know that sounds stupid simple, but I just, I don't know, somehow thought, that maybe an India stone was just too, um crude maybe? I know... But, that's what has been in my brain. Like somehow there was this intrinsic bond between the knife and stone and to not use water stones would be somehow bad for the knife... I know, I know...

Then today I found myself engaged in a really, really good conversation with a dealer. They aren't a supporting vendor but they are a merchant of knives and sell a lot of Japanese blades and sharpening equipment. I explained all of this to them and to my surprise and relief, they agreed that oil stones and such are perfectly acceptable. In fact, they thought my oil stones and diamonds were a really good choice for course stones.

My thought was water stones bring more versatility and precision. They more or less agreed and really went into how water stones shine in consistency, range of grits, polishing, etc. In no way did they dismiss or diminish the allure of water stones, they simply affirmed my essentially irrational concern that they were necessary. We actually had a great talk about a good direction for me to take with water stones.

And as weird as it might seem, that assuaged my concerns. I bought a new knife and am now feeling much more confident not just in sharpening it, but in pursuing water stone sharpening.

And so, with that very wordy post, as I asked in the beginning, why water stones? Why do you like water stones?

I eventually want to get some more complex steels in Japanese knives like R2 or maybe HAP40, so I'm thinking medium to fine grits for polishing.
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I think for me it's two fold,
One, it's simple, I cut an apple in the kitchen, the texture is smoother, less cell damage, taste is better than if cut with an India stone edge.

Two, the actual cutting experience on the stone has been more enjoyable and a delightful experience. The tactical feedback, the cutting speed, splash and go is also a nice feature on some stones.

Current favorite stones are Vitrified Diamond Waterstones, it's like having your cake but also eating it at the same time.
 
DeadboxHero said:
Current favorite stones are Vitrified Diamond Waterstones, it's like having your cake but also eating it at the same time.
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Which ones do you like? I've been thinking of some SiC waterstones, but no reason not to go right to diamond.
I'm only aware of the Gesshin though and nothing for polishing.
 
Ourorboros said:
Which ones do you like? I've been thinking of some SiC waterstones, but no reason not to go right to diamond.
I'm only aware of the Gesshin though and nothing for polishing.
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I surely don't want to speak for Shawn, but I suspect he's going to say his own. :)

 
Spideyjg said:
Eeep! $400-450 each
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It's important to understand that it's all relative. Shawn plays in a world of exotic steels and uber hardnesses and pro-level operations. And there is a cost to play in that world. I doubt he thinks the average sharpener, even if they have some high hardness steels, is going to load up on his stones. But for those who can really benefit from those stones I'm sure the cost isn't as shocking as it is for us. :)
 
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