Venev Diamond Stones: what am I getting into?

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UHguy

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Hello all, looking for some help as I dip my feet into diamond stones for the first time. I’ve settled on the Venev 240/400 and 800/1200 Phoenix series, but what else do I need? My only current sharpening experience is with Shapton pro/glass stones. I’m unclear on what I should do to maintain them, or what the best approach is keep them clear of metal particles. Any guidance for this diamond newbie is appreciated.
 
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Little maintenance required. I have never had to flatten mine and I clean it every 5 or so knives with barkeepers friend. I have probably used it on about 50-75 knives.

I have the 800/1200 and use the 800 for everything at the moment - PM steel, carbon steel, even wusthof.
 
Oh, if you need to try to flatten the finisher, my thoughts are to use something like a shapton glass 500. Flatten the shapton first. The shapton can clean/refresh it too.
 
UHguy said:
Hello all, looking for some help as I dip my feet into diamond stones for the first time. I’ve settled on the Venev 240/400 and 800/1200 Phoenix series, but what else do I need? My only current sharpening experience is with Shapton pro/glass stones. I’m unclear on what I should do to maintain them, or what the best approach is keep them clear of metal particles. Any guidance for this diamond newbie is appreciated.
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are they in stock anywhere? couldn’t find
 
UHguy said:
Hello all, looking for some help as I dip my feet into diamond stones for the first time. I’ve settled on the Venev 240/400 and 800/1200 Phoenix series, but what else do I need? My only current sharpening experience is with Shapton pro/glass stones. I’m unclear on what I should do to maintain them, or what the best approach is keep them clear of metal particles. Any guidance for this diamond newbie is appreciated.
Click to expand...
 
I'm looking at these but not sure which grit I want...

I'm thinking one side around #320-400 for sharpening crappy stainless knives. No major repairs, just creating a burr and deburring. My SG500 feels too slow for this application.

And the other side around 800-1k as a midgrit for everything else.

Should I get the Phoenix 240 / 400? Or is that too coarse? Maybe 400 / 800? Can the 400 deal with the crappy stainless I mentioned?
 
Choppin said:
I'm looking at these but not sure which grit I want...

I'm thinking one side around #320-400 for sharpening crappy stainless knives. No major repairs, just creating a burr and deburring. My SG500 feels too slow for this application.

And the other side around 800-1k as a midgrit for everything else.

Should I get the Phoenix 240 / 400? Or is that too coarse? Maybe 400 / 800? Can the 400 deal with the crappy stainless I mentioned?
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The 400 is a great finisher for crappy stainless. In the Japanese grit it ends up being about 700-800 or so. The 800 is about 2k Japanese grit.
 
I think the 400/800 would be a great general purpose stone. I like the edge off the Venev 800 and its a one stone solution as long as its reasonably sharp. If its not so sharp something courser like the 400 should be good to start. If its dull, grab that SG320 instead. I doubt the venev 400 would be faster than a SG500 but I don’t have a Venev 400.

The grit scales between venev and shapton are quite different. My Venev 800 is listed as 6 micron. My SG4000 is listed as 3.68 micron particle size. So that would make the venev 800 about 2.5K on shapton’s scale.

The Venev 1200 is 2.5 micron.
 
For what its worth. My recommendation if someone is just buying one. Is get the 240/400.

The 400 is 600 jis, but to me it effectively finishes around the mid grit level. So 800-1.5k. from what i can tell.
 
Has anyone tried Venev stones on single bevel / double bevel knives? is the polish / scratch pattern ok (not too deep, etc)?

I'm thinking about ordering a 240/400 and use the 240 side (˜#320) to clean scratches from ˜#200 stones after thinning.

Milan in one of his lives was using a #400 diamond stone (Practical Sharpening) for this application - light shaping (removing the last high spots) and polishing out the coarser scratches. I liked the fact that these stones are hard and not muddy, so you can see precisely where you are hitting... sort of a sanity check / refinement of your #120-220 stone work.

I'm working on stainless-clad knives BTW...
 
I have just received the 80 + 150 plate from venev. That's seriously coarse 😅
I need to test more but I quite like it. 80 is very coarse, like an atoma 140, maybe coarser. The 150 is very nice, good feedback, good abrasion, feel like a tad coarser than a 200 grit. I don't know for other grit but I would say this one seems good to me for shaping the bevels. They are very hard, and that's a good thing, you can grind quite fast but still being very precise.
I will update my feedback after I have shaped few knives on it.
 
Choppin said:
Has anyone tried Venev stones on single bevel / double bevel knives? is the polish / scratch pattern ok (not too deep, etc)?

I'm thinking about ordering a 240/400 and use the 240 side (˜#320) to clean scratches from ˜#200 stones after thinning.

Milan in one of his lives was using a #400 diamond stone (Practical Sharpening) for this application - light shaping (removing the last high spots) and polishing out the coarser scratches. I liked the fact that these stones are hard and not muddy, so you can see precisely where you are hitting... sort of a sanity check / refinement of your #120-220 stone work.

I'm working on stainless-clad knives BTW...
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The scratch pattern on the 240/400 isnt bad. Let me dig up a test knife, and ill post a pic.

Or maybe my kiridashi

Also. I use my venevs for exactly that purpose on the knives i make. Plus because they still cut the wear resistant stuff i use well.
 
milangravier said:
I have just received the 80 + 150 plate from venev. That's seriously coarse 😅
I need to test more but I quite like it. 80 is very coarse, like an atoma 140, maybe coarser. The 150 is very nice, good feedback, good abrasion, feel like a tad coarser than a 200 grit. I don't know for other grit but I would say this one seems good to me for shaping the bevels. They are very hard, and that's a good thing, you can grind quite fast but still being very precise.
I will update my feedback after I have shaped few knives on it.
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Yeah. Id have to look at the conversion, but 80 should definitely be a good bit coarser than an atoma from what i recall the abrasive size being.

I actually have one of those on the way from the ukraine now to round out my progression. Currently ive got the 240/400, 1200/2000. Just want a super coarse one for the coarse work.

The 240 is a good speed for normal sharpening on something fairly dull though. And 400 is more than fast enough for a touch up. The 1200, could even be used for that likely. If you want a more polished edge.
 
Ok. So heres what they look like for thinning/polishing.

F240
IMG_20230313_205623487.jpg


This one isn't anything special. This is directly after surface conditioning with 60 grit sic also. So most likely it would normally not even be this coarse. I would say its a pretty average 300ish grit stone in person.

F400
IMG_20230313_210559114_HDR.jpg
IMG_20230313_210629495.jpg
IMG_20230313_210638096.jpg


I likely could have spent even more time and got an even better looking finish. You can see some random scratches and stuff from this being a quick and sloppy polish just to show it.

Also. I didnt have any knives that show better contrast than this. That I was willing to do a complete repolish on. Just to show the scratch pattern from this. So i hope the front of this tojiro vg10 nakiri is good enough.

As far as the finish. As you can see. For what it is, its really not bad. If someone wanted to. They can get decent contrast from this stone, and the scratches really aren't bad for something roughly 600 jis grit.
 
jwthaparc said:
Ok. So heres what they look like for thinning/polishing.

F240
View attachment 231235

This one isn't anything special. This is directly after surface conditioning with 60 grit sic also. So most likely it would normally not even be this coarse. I would say its a pretty average 300ish grit stone in person.

F400View attachment 231236View attachment 231237View attachment 231238

I likely could have spent even more time and got an even better looking finish. You can see some random scratches and stuff from this being a quick and sloppy polish just to show it.

Also. I didnt have any knives that show better contrast than this. That I was willing to do a complete repolish on. Just to show the scratch pattern from this. So i hope the front of this tojiro vg10 nakiri is good enough.

As far as the finish. As you can see. For what it is, its really not bad. If someone wanted to. They can get decent contrast from this stone, and the scratches really aren't bad for something roughly 600 jis grit.
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not bad indeed! this is really helpful

I like how uniform and clean the scratches look… it seems you can really see what you are doing in terms of polishing
 
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Choppin said:
not bad indeed! this is really helpful

I like how uniform and clean the scratches look… it seems you can really see what you are doing in terms of polishing
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Yeah. Its pretty good for checking your work. And having a flat stone to get out facets.

I would show the 1200 polish but i didnt feel like it tonight. Maybe tomorrow.

But basically its very brite. Not super good looking, but is a decent step you can take before a higher grit.
 
M1k3 said:
Venev 400 is slower than Glass 500 in my experience. It's not a huge difference but it's there.
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Venev plates don't follow the JIS grit rating. They use a FEPA standard. Gritomatic.com has a good grit chart comparison.
 
Just a little feedback. I have just worked a bevel, with a low spot to deal with, with the 150 from Venev. It was too long to work with in my opinion. The stone is very hard so it's difficult for it to deal with a big surface like a wide bevel. I should have try the 80 side but I did not try on the knife I was working on.
150 side will be slower than a atoma 140. Slower than a Debado 180 (mid soft ones). Faster than a SG220 I guess.
 
milangravier said:
Just a little feedback. I have just worked a bevel, with a low spot to deal with, with the 150 from Venev. It was too long to work with in my opinion. The stone is very hard so it's difficult for it to deal with a big surface like a wide bevel. I should have try the 80 side but I did not try on the knife I was working on.
150 side will be slower than a atoma 140. Slower than a Debado 180 (mid soft ones). Faster than a SG220 I guess.
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Fepa f150 is closer to 180 jis. But for a soft steel. If you're comparing it to conventional abrasives. Something thats soft and friable, with the same abrasive size will cut faster on normal/soft steel, like a san mai knife with soft cladding. Fepa f80, is equal to jis80 though. So likely it would be pretty fast still. Then you could use the 150 side to get those deep scratches out.
glgc.jpeg
 
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