Upgrading from King - Bester/Rika or JNS or Other?

I started sharpening a couple months ago and am looking to upgrade from my current setup.

What I have currently:
-Suehiro Stone Holder (so glad I got this)
-Atoma Diamond 400 (also love this)

-King 1000
-King 6000

I have been reading around a bit and seems like the Bester 1200 and Rika 5000 are the general recommendations. I was looking around on JNS and curious how others have found those compare to the standard recommendation of Bester/Rika? Any other recommendations whether it be to add an additional coarser stone of some sort or other stones generally to check out.

Cheers,
Michael

Compared to the King 800 i still like, i find the JNS 1k faster, harder, clogs less, and dishes less also. Never used the Bester 1200, though. Recently, tried the Takenoko 8k and i'm glad i did. Leaves a great edge, seemed toothier and faster than my 5k Mizuyama.

I started the Bestor/Rika lineup, 500, 1.2K, 5K, and it served me well. Later wanted to try something different and went with G400, G2K, G4K and a nat to finish. Always liked the mirror finish I got from the Bestor line but preferred the Gesshin line for sharpening. I've since added a couple of JNS stones, the 300 for coarse and the 800 for surface finish. I've tried the King 800 and never found the love but it works for others. Same with Bestor (Beston?) 500.

Suggest that the Bestor lineup is a great value if cost is a big consideration. If you can reach a little deeper then the JNS 300, G2K, G4K or G6K and JNat is ideal. If you're making a long term investment in stones then the JNS 300, G1K and G6K plates (my current 1st lineup) are the answer.

"Extra" stones like a King or JNS 800, for the blade, Aoto for a perfect Gyuto edge and assorted JNats all have a place on the bench and can be added as you develop preferences. I generally like soakers for stones I use frequently and S&G for those that come out less often. YMMV.

daveb said:

I started the Bestor/Rika lineup, 500, 1.2K, 5K, and it served me well. Later wanted to try something different and went with G400, G2K, G4K and a nat to finish. Always liked the mirror finish I got from the Bestor line but preferred the Gesshin line for sharpening. I've since added a couple of JNS stones, the 300 for coarse and the 800 for surface finish. I've tried the King 800 and never found the love but it works for others. Same with Bestor (Beston?) 500.

Suggest that the Bestor lineup is a great value if cost is a big consideration. If you can reach a little deeper then the JNS 300, G2K, G4K or G6K and JNat is ideal. If you're making a long term investment in stones then the JNS 300, G1K and G6K plates (my current 1st lineup) are the answer.

"Extra" stones like a King or JNS 800, for the blade, Aoto for a perfect Gyuto edge and assorted JNats all have a place on the bench and can be added as you develop preferences. I generally like soakers for stones I use frequently and S&G for those that come out less often. YMMV.

Click to expand...

Thank you for the amazingly detailed response.

Couple questions come from this, if I was to go with the Bester/Rika would you suggest adding a 500 or is the 1.2k to 5k enough?

Then I guess from there if a 500/rougher grit stone would be helpful the options I would be considering/comparing would be:
Beston 500/Bester 1.2k/Rika 5k - ~$140-$150
vs.
G400/G2K/G6k - $210 (seems like the jump from 400 to 2k would be fine is Jon is suggesting it) - $210 for the Set - seems like a worthy upgrade for about 50% more

Cheers,
Michael

If you elect to go the 1.2K and 5K route I would still suggest the G400 (soaker) or JNS 300 (S&G). As noted above I could not get the B500 to work for me - too much water then not enough water then too much again. Dishes like a bastard. More curves than my last two girlfriends. I finally gave mine to Knerd's PIF project so someone else can hate it. :cool2:

I would drop the extra coin for the Gesshin lineup without hesitation but everyone's circumstances are different. The Bestor stuff will get the job done, the Gesshin (for me) does it gooder. But it's certainly a case where it's more about the carpenter than about the hammer (and I need all the help I can get).

Id like to be the voice of reason here and pose a question... you've been sharpening for a few months you said?

I started with the same stones as you and while I vastly prefer the tactile feedback of the rika as compared to the king 6k... I'd say actually I preferred my king 1200 to the bester 1k. I say voice of reason because in my opinion, I "upgraded" for no reason and to no real end.

What issues have you identified with your stones? I find it very hard to believe you could have even worn through the smaller king combo in that amount of time...

Do you need to replace them, or are you looking for "better stones to get a better edge," if it is the latter I think your money may be better spent on some cheaper knives to practice sharpening with... I don't think stones have much to do with the final edge, I have seen Murray Carter push cut (toilet paper? paper towel?) using the same stones as you I believe...

Why do you need a coarse stone, at the moment...

Interesting points, actually makes me think about not upgrading.

The reason I am thinking about upgrading is that I found with my j-knives in White #2 and Blue #2 I find sharpening quite enjoyable and relatively easy, while when I love to the forgecraft butcher knife I got as a project knife (this steel has some mild deep pitting I believe though) it does not feel nearly as good. I also find it particularly difficult to get a good sharpen on my roommates stainless steel knives (e.g. Victorinox etc) though in that case I may just need a generally coarser stone to start the process?

So I'd say in a nutshell its not so much about getting a better edge (I'm happy enough with the edges I get, though could always and is getting better) as much as it is about the feel and speed of cutting that leads to a more enjoyable/easier to reach similar edge.

Well used stainless knives of western manufacture often require quite a bit of work to get really sharp and to cut well, mostly because they will need some serious thinning and/or decent bevels re-ground, neither of which is gonna happen very fast on a 1000 grit stone. The steel also feels very different on the stones, and that will be true no matter what stones you are using.

If you do not currently have a good flattening system for your stones, get that before you change stones. King stones work pretty well when flat and used with very light pressure, but if you use heavy pressure they dish astonishingly fast, and hence you will get goofy edges. Stainless seems to roll grit off faster than carbon steel in my limited experience.

I'd have to look at the knives in question, but I'd bet you really don't need new medium and fine grit stones as much as you need a good coarse one. I have a King Deluxe 300 grit (not at all like the King medium grit clay binder stones) and a Beston 700, which I find is very much like the 1200. Don't know about the 500 grit one, but I'd guess it's similar, fairly hard, wears reasonably slowly, and cuts fast. Always possible to get a dud, though -- they are fired in large batches and the stones in the center of the kiln are often softer that the ones on the outside I have heard. Also have to grind off the surface, it's harder than the rest of the stone.

A magnifier will help quite a bit, too -- I'd bet if you look at the stainless knives at 20x you will immediately see why they don't feel as sharp as the carbon steel ones.

Peter

I would agree with everything psfred says.

In my limited experience with carbon, generally I found both king stones to be preferable to the bester 1k/rika 5k progression. I would agree the king are not the best in the world for abrading stainless, however, in my opinion this could be more cheaply fixed by purchasing a good low grit stone to do grunt work with. Just don't get a king 800, the difference between the 800 and 1000 isn't going to save you any arm fatigue.

Although a loupe doesn't immediately help you get a better edge it can be quite a bit more informative than the marker trick..

But at the end of the day - in retrospect - I found my king stones more than adequate to sharpen henckel 4 star knives and victorinox knives. If you like to apply pressure and don't care for the muddiness of the red king stones then the bester 1k may indeed be an upgrade for you- it is also a stone which works better with more pressure on the knife so if you are heavy handed again, might be right up your alley.

I cannot recommend low grit stones to use as I do not own one.

But again as a caveat to my comments about the bester 1k being an upgrade, I prefer to sharpen carbon knives on my king stones, so if you are primarily sharpening carbon knives then I think your king 1k is your friend. You didnt seem to express any real complaints about the stone other than its ineffectiveness at abrading cheaper stainless.

Great tips guys! Really appreciate it. =)

I already have an Atoma 400 which I absolutely love for flattening.

The tip around using light pressure is a great one as I think when I work on my westerns/stainless I apply more pressure thinking that would help. Will have to revisit this weekend or next week on those knives with lighter pressure.

Lol, nothing "helps" with stainless, you have to take it for what it is.

The swarf from sharpening on a King stone should be mostly black -- if it's not, lighten up. On some other harder stones a heavy pass or two will refresh the surface as the grit doesn't roll off very easily, but a King will release more grit than you want even with light pressure.

Stainless works differently than carbon steel, for starters it is much more abrasion resistant -- the carbides, which are typically rather large in Western stainless steel cutlery are similar in hardness to the aluminum oxide grit and won't grind off very easily, so the knife seems to "skate" across the stone. You must learn to tell when it's cutting well and when it's not, the feel is quite different than carbon steel, where the carbides are quite small. It can take much longer to get a western stainless knife truely sharp for this reason. Many people feel that stainless is "gummy", too, probably due to the softer matrix and machining properties of chromium along with the carbides "grabbing" the grit in the stone but not scratching off.

Another issue is that polishing a softer stainless steel knife to a high finish can tear those large carbides out of the steel matrix, which itself is rather soft, resulting in a "swiss cheese" edge that fails very very fast in use and cannot be restored by steeling. Better to stop with a coarser stone followed by light stropping on newspaper or half micron chromium oxide. This progression will leave those carbide particles embedded in the steel -- no as sharp to start with, but highly abrasion resistant and the edge can be easily "wiped back up" with the steel when it folds over in use.

Peter

Yeah I wouldn't recommend the king 6k for victorinox, most stainless doesn't benefit from refinement like that.

I finish western stainless knives on a synthetic blue aoto (the Naniwa one, I think). Seems to leave and very aggressive slightly toothy edge that holds up well. Interestingly, the same stone leaves are really dull feeling edge on my tojiros and hard carbon steel knives, have to finish them with a finer stone to get a good edge.

This has been noted several places by several people, and I suspect the phenomenon is due to the soft aoto leaving the carbides in place on soft stainless.

Peter