rbscebu
Mr. Strop
As reported in the honing sub-forum, I returned to Australia from Japan with an unknown Jnat whetstone that an old Japanese man gave me. He told me that his grandfather use to use it to sharpen his kamisori.
A couple of weeks ago I decided to see how this stone went as a finisher. For this try I selected a factory-edged Gold Dollar 66 as I had an other with my normal diamond pasted balsa edge to compare it against. I flattened the Jnat on 600 grit W&D with ease as it is a rather soft stone. The GD66 was then through my normal Chinese synthetic whetstone progression;
I shaved half my face with the Jnat edge and the other half with the diamond pasted edge, alternating sides between each of my three passes. The result surprised me.
Over the years, other SR shavers had told me that an edge finished on a natural whetstone was more comfortable to shave with than a synthetic (or diamond paste) edge. Try as I might, I did not find a natural edge more comfortable. I tried vintage coticule, hard black Ark and Chinese natural. They all produced a very keen edge but none were noticeably more comfortable to shave with than a diamond pasted edge.
When comparing the shave between the Jnat and diamond pasted GD66s, for the first time in almost 5 years of SR shaving I experienced what was meant by a more comfortable shave. The keenness of each edge was compared performing the fool's pass (against the grain on the upper lip) and both edges were as good as identical. On all strokes, the Jnat edge was very noticeably more comfortable, even in the fool's pass.
Ok, I am convinced. A natural edge can be just as keen as a diamond pasted edge and yet be more comfortable to shave with.
I have now only been shaving with the Jnat edge for two weeks. All it gets is my normal clean-leather stropping between each daily shave. Tomorrow I will do another comparison shave between the Jnat GD66 and the diamond pasted GD66.
This unknown Jnat has be intrigued. Next I will see how it goes on my hardest stainless steel SR.
A couple of weeks ago I decided to see how this stone went as a finisher. For this try I selected a factory-edged Gold Dollar 66 as I had an other with my normal diamond pasted balsa edge to compare it against. I flattened the Jnat on 600 grit W&D with ease as it is a rather soft stone. The GD66 was then through my normal Chinese synthetic whetstone progression;
1k to near bevel set,
set bevel on 3k and
refined on 8k.
From there I moved on to finishing the bevel/edge on the Jnat. All went really well so all I needed was to perform a shave test.
Over the years, other SR shavers had told me that an edge finished on a natural whetstone was more comfortable to shave with than a synthetic (or diamond paste) edge. Try as I might, I did not find a natural edge more comfortable. I tried vintage coticule, hard black Ark and Chinese natural. They all produced a very keen edge but none were noticeably more comfortable to shave with than a diamond pasted edge.
When comparing the shave between the Jnat and diamond pasted GD66s, for the first time in almost 5 years of SR shaving I experienced what was meant by a more comfortable shave. The keenness of each edge was compared performing the fool's pass (against the grain on the upper lip) and both edges were as good as identical. On all strokes, the Jnat edge was very noticeably more comfortable, even in the fool's pass.
Ok, I am convinced. A natural edge can be just as keen as a diamond pasted edge and yet be more comfortable to shave with.
I have now only been shaving with the Jnat edge for two weeks. All it gets is my normal clean-leather stropping between each daily shave. Tomorrow I will do another comparison shave between the Jnat GD66 and the diamond pasted GD66.
This unknown Jnat has be intrigued. Next I will see how it goes on my hardest stainless steel SR.
