I’m hoping for some quick advice about waterstones. A while back, I purchased a
combination 1000/8000 Ohishi waterstone from Lie-Nielsen. I’m happy with it, but
I’m thinking of getting another stone with a grit somewhere in the middle. I’d
like to stick with Ohishi and therefore the options are 3000 or 6000 grit. Which
one would be better? Do I even need one in between the 1000/8000? Am I totally
overthinking this?

BTW - this would be for plane irons and chisels. 

Thanks!

-- 
I'm a simple man. I like pretty dark-haired women and breakfast food.

> I’m hoping for some quick advice about waterstones. A while back, I
purchased a
> combination 1000/8000 Ohishi waterstone from Lie-Nielsen. I’m happy with
it, but
> I’m thinking of getting another stone with a grit somewhere in the
middle....
If it works, why break it?
I use a 1000,4000,8000 grit series of waters-slipstones for carving gouges
because that's what Woodcraft sells and they work. I'm not entirely sure I
need the 4000 grit, but it works so I'm just going with it.

Dan, I use 2000, 5000, and 8000 Shapton water stones, and find the middle stone
quite useful.

John Johnston


John M. Johnston

“P.S. If you do not receive this, of course it must have been miscarried;
therefore I beg you to write and let me know.” - Sir Boyle Roche, M.P.


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Subject: [oldtools] Waterstone advice

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I’m hoping for some quick advice about waterstones. A while back, I purchased a
combination 1000/8000 Ohishi waterstone from Lie-Nielsen. I’m happy with it, but
I’m thinking of getting another stone with a grit somewhere in the middle. I’d
like to stick with Ohishi and therefore the options are 3000 or 6000 grit. Which
one would be better? Do I even need one in between the 1000/8000? Am I totally
overthinking this?

BTW - this would be for plane irons and chisels.

Thanks!

--
I'm a simple man. I like pretty dark-haired women and breakfast food.

Dan, the question is, are you able to achieve a sharp edge with your
1000/8000?   If you can sharpen a plane iron (one that is already in good
fettle, not a damaged flea market find) in a few minutes, then you don’t
need anything else.  If sharpening takes a long time (more than a few
minutes), then you probably won’t do it when you should.  Good work simply
isn’t possible or fun with a dull tool.  There are many ways to sharpen,
some quicker than others.  My long dead relative, a finish carpenter, used
nothing more than a two sided (coarse/fine) oil stone his whole life and
did excellent work.  It wasn’t even flat, in fact I’d call it a ‘sway back’
stone, but his irons and chisels were sharp and his cuts were crisp (I was
reminiscing last night looking at his work at my mother’s house,
remembering the day the work was done more than a half century ago).  All
his tools had a convex bevel (a section of an ellipse), not a flat bevel
(and certainly no secondary bevel).  But he had to earn his living, so
sharpening had to be quick and efficient.  I was fascinated by how he
removed the wire edge by stropping the blade on his rough palm, although I
had no idea what he was doing at the time.  It wasn’t until much later when
I had a sudden flash of understanding when I saw an impossibly thin wire
edge dangling from a plane blade in the raking light of a summer dawn.

  I know there are several people here who enjoy sharpening as an end unto
itself, and there’s nothing wrong with that either.  Some people like to
spend hours sharpening, probably enjoying it more than woodworking.  Brent
Beach (RIP) spent a lifetime of study learning about metallurgy, abrasives,
and sharpening, freely sharing his knowledge with all of us (I hope his
webpages have been archived for young galoots to learn from).  For others,
sharpening is simply something that has to be done in order to have fun
with wood.  So if you can get to sharp such that your tools are quickly fit
for purpose, it doesn’t matter what you use.

Unless that is, you are into the Zen of Sharpening.

Thanks for the thoughtful replies so far. I’m still a pretty novice tool
sharpener and I have to admit that I feel like my tools could be sharper. I’d
also say that while I do not mind the sharpening process, I don’t want to spend
more time then necessary sharpening. I like to keep things simple and spend my
time cutting, planing, and chopping rather than sharpening.

I don’t necessarily *want* to buy more stones, but if it will make the
sharpening process easier and better, I will.

It seems like the jump from 1000 to 8000 is pretty large, so I’m thinking a
stone somewhere in the middle would be beneficial. I’m just not sure if which
(3000 or 6000) would be better.

-- 
I'm a simple man. I like pretty dark-haired women and breakfast food.

The jump between 6000 and 8000 is minuscule.  I doubt you could detect the
difference in the cut.  You should only get an intermediate stone if you
have issues removing the scratches from the 1000 stone with the 8000.  If
you only use the 8k for a small microbevel, then I doubt that's the case?
If you are polishing the entire face, then the 3k might help as an
intermediate step.   The 'steps' between the effects of abrasives isn't
linear: the difference between 800 to 2000 is much greater than 4k to 8k
even though numerical difference (1200 between 0.8k to 2k is smaller than
4k between 4k and 8k).
Cheers
Claudio

It seems like the jump from 1000 to 8000 is pretty large, so I’m thinking a

Great info, Claudio. Thank you!

-- 
I'm a simple man. I like pretty dark-haired women and breakfast food.

Dan wrote:

>It seems like the jump from 1000 to 8000 is pretty large, so I'm 
>thinking a stone somewhere in the middle would be beneficial. I'm 
>just not sure if which (3000 or 6000) would be better.

My take is that the 3000 is the better choice here.  I'm trying to 
remember my waterstone numbers, but iirc my finest is around 8K and 
my middle one, which I often start with if I'm just touching up is a 
3K. I'm getting old enough that I would need to check the boxes which 
are not with the stones to be completely sure.  And I'm not sure 
where those are.

FWIW
- Mark

I think you've gotten some good advice here. A 3000-grit stone will make
sharpening quicker, and you won't dish out your finishing stone as quickly
because you won't need to use it as much.

You might find that the finish put on by a 3000-grit stone is quite good, better
than you might expect.

Don't get too hung up on brands. I've got Sigma 1000-grit, Naniwa 3000-grit, and
Shapton (whatever high number that one is)-grit stones. They all do the same
thing: sharpen tools.

Thanks for the advice, everyone. I’m going to order a 3000 grit stone today. 

Best,
Dan

-- 
I'm a simple man. I like pretty dark-haired women and breakfast food.

I also have Shapton stones , I have 1000 , 5000 and 8000 . I sometimes wish
I would have bought the 4000 instead of the 5000 for some of the harder
steels , especially when flattening backs . I have lots of planes and
chisels and it seems like when working on a project , I will just grab
another tool , I guess because I dont like to stop working when im on a
roll . When I sharpen I have  a sharpening marathon and sharpen everything
. I have been acused many times of having a "one track mind" and dont like
to be interupted with anything else when working on something . I just
ordered a Shapton 125 grit stone because Im putting a set of tools together
for the grandkids and its hours and hours of work getting backs flat ,
besides I needed another stone to add to the herd anyway .

James Rich wrote:

============
I also have Shapton stones , I have 1000 , 5000 and 8000 . I sometimes wish
I would have bought the 4000 instead of the 5000 for some of the harder
steels , especially when flattening backs .

... I just ordered a Shapton 125 grit stone because Im putting a set of tools
together
for the grandkids and its hours and hours of work getting backs flat ,
besides I needed another stone to add to the herd anyway.
=============

For edge maintenance, I typically go straight from 1000 to 8000. When I use an
intermediate stone, I like the Naniwa Aotoshi 2000 green brick to refine the
initial edge before jumping to an 8000 grit stone.

For new tools, or when the edge needs extra work, I start with a coarser grit
stone, either a Naniwa Omura 180  or an Imanishi Latte 400. Other brands are
good too.

For kitchen knives I usually go 400/1000/6000 and stop.

FWIW,
Chuck Taylor
north of Seattle USA

Yep for edges I'll go from 1000 strait to 8000 , or sometimes 5000 to 8000
. Its pretty easy when you hollow grind . Usually only have to flatten
backs 1 time , then its only 8000 on backs forever , unless something bad
happens .