Belgian Blue Whetstone

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Chasingsharpness said:
Had anyone compared BBW to Arkansas stones?
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It really depends on the Ark. Translucent/vintage ‘hard’ Arks are basically just razor finishers. A coarse washita can set a bevel, and also refine the edge. It’s an odd duck kind of stone that can be both coarse and relatively fine, depending on pressure used. In between, soft arks can be good for deburring, or used as a sort of flat honing rod for touch ups. But they wouldn’t be my first choice to set a bevel. Modern ‘hard’ arks are basically soft arks with a +1 bonus. Very broad category of stones.
 
any good vendors for saliva? lots of flipping these days i hear.

i did receive a bbw yesterday – enabled by this thread. so far only did a light touch up on shriogami #2. not surprisingly with good results. crisp and super sharp, if less bitey than with SG4. guess i'm gonna experiment with preassure and stuff.

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sumis said:
any good vendors for saliva? lots of flipping these days i hear.

i did receive a bbw yesterday – enabled by this thread. so far only did a light touch up on shriogami #2. not surprisingly with good results. crisp and super sharp, if less bitey than with SG4. guess i'm gonna experiment with preassure and stuff.

.
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I'm not sure about saliva but I hear you can buy bathwater online these days
 
I really like the BBW combined with lower grits, in particular shapton glass 320 and shapton glass 500. I get amazing results with this combo. What I dislike about my BBW is that it gives too much polish to the edge. The stone I have that’s the most similar is the arashiyama 6000, so maybe my BBW is rather fine. The vendor claimed that is 5000 grit which I tend to agree. I was quite disappointed until I figured out that the BBW cleans very quickly any burr from coarser stones, so I use it a lot when I go lower in grit. I use the BBW in O2, 26C3, aogami 1, aogami 2 and 1.2419 knifes.

I do agree with previous claims that the BBW is good for kasumi. It’s amazing how easy is to polish with it.

My favorite stone for touch ups and to have a edge with a lasting bite is the Naniwa Pro 3000. I tried the Morihei 4000 and the BBW and neither really works as well. They have their place, but with my knifes and with my technique I can’t extract enough bite from them that would bring a knife with a slippery edge to an edge with bite and that that bite would last a full meal prep. This is more evident in my 26C3 and aogami 2 knifes. The others are different beasts, but still the chosera 3000 is the one that makes them sing the tune I like.
 
abarbosa said:
I really like the BBW combined with lower grits, in particular shapton glass 320 and shapton glass 500. I get amazing results with this combo. What I dislike about my BBW is that it gives too much polish to the edge. The stone I have that’s the most similar is the arashiyama 6000, so maybe my BBW is rather fine. The vendor claimed that is 5000 grit which I tend to agree. I was quite disappointed until I figured out that the BBW cleans very quickly any burr from coarser stones, so I use it a lot when I go lower in grit. I use the BBW in O2, 26C3, aogami 1, aogami 2 and 1.2419 knifes.

I do agree with previous claims that the BBW is good for kasumi. It’s amazing how easy is to polish with it.

My favorite stone for touch ups and to have a edge with a lasting bite is the Naniwa Pro 3000. I tried the Morihei 4000 and the BBW and neither really works as well. They have their place, but with my knifes and with my technique I can’t extract enough bite from them that would bring a knife with a slippery edge to an edge with bite and that that bite would last a full meal prep. This is more evident in my 26C3 and aogami 2 knifes. The others are different beasts, but still the chosera 3000 is the one that makes them sing the tune I like.
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Thanks allot for your insights. How do you find the BBW edge and sharpening experience compares to the Chosera 3000? I have thought about going to the BBW straight off a 1k stone, and using it for touch ups in place of my honing rod. Will give it a try when it arrives
 
Chasingsharpness said:
Thanks allot for your insights. How do you find the BBW edge and sharpening experience compares to the Chosera 3000? I have thought about going to the BBW straight off a 1k stone, and using it for touch ups in place of my honing rod. Will give it a try when it arrives
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The BBW for sure gives me pleasure to use, but at least my BBW in my hands removes too much of the bite of previous stone and adds almost none if the edge is already slippery. If I do big jumps like say from shapton glass 320 to BBW I absolutely love the edge and lasts for a while.

The NP/Chosera 3000 alone brings enough bite and it lasts. Picking an example, my kisuke manaka aogami 2 touched up with BBW or Morihei 4000 struggles to hold the bite during a full meal prep, in particular one that has tomatoes. While if I use the naniwa pro/chosera 3000 I have no problems, it will destroy all the tomatoes and anything I put in front of it.

I’m not sure this answers your question. I feel I more or less repeating what I wrote before.

I don’t recommend against the BBW, I just say a word of caution that either some BBWs or some bad techniques may render not so great results in terms of having a toothy edge that actually lasts long enough. As someone said in the past here in the forum, the drop of “fresh out of the stones” sharpness can be quite off putting. For me a knife that struggles to cut tomatoes is no longer sharp. It’s mostly tomatoes and paprika that are a problem, but I happen to use them quite a lot so I get seriously frustrated if the knife no longer can cut them smoothly.
 
Chasingsharpness said:
Thanks allot for your insights. How do you find the BBW edge and sharpening experience compares to the Chosera 3000? I have thought about going to the BBW straight off a 1k stone, and using it for touch ups in place of my honing rod. Will give it a try when it arrives
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Purely based on auditory vibes, the chosera 3k is nicer. The BBW takes a bit of getting used. The edge from chosera 3k to BBW is sweeeeeet though. A coticule is what really got me in to the "natural rocks feel better" camp though. Just creamy, cuts faster than BBW, softer, delightful experience all around. Not big for you I'm afraid, but worth checking out for your smaller knives.
 
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I think if you want real long lasting tooth, it's worth looking at a Natsuya. Good examples of them on the finer end are wonderful stones and you can get one that will last a lifetime in the 300 US range. I appreciate this is more than a BB runs for, but maybe that's what would float your boat best. Not that I think a BB is worse, just maybe too refined for folks who like the edge from a Cho 3K not even directly off the stone but in that post-sharpening period.
 
I've had a complicated relationship with this particular BBW. It took me a while to figure out and several rounds of diamond persuasion to get the surface finish to feel more natural and not so glassy. It sounds screechy and feels almost gravely, not an entirely pleasant stone to use compared to my creamier AC BBWs but man does put a mean toothy edge on a knife now.
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I took it to an AEB-L knife just messing around for a few passes, I've never sharpened that steel before, and it put a burr on it when I wasn't trying to. Turned it into a little touch up sharpening session and holy smokes am I pleased with the result. Happy to have some persistence pay off before just moving on to another stone.
 
SwampDonkey said:
I've had a complicated relationship with this particular BBW. It took me a while to figure out and several rounds of diamond persuasion to get the surface finish to feel more natural and not so glassy. It sounds screechy and feels almost gravely, not an entirely pleasant stone to use compared to my creamier AC BBWs but man does put a mean toothy edge on a knife now.
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I took it to an AEB-L knife just messing around for a few passes, I've never sharpened that steel before, and it put a burr on it when I wasn't trying to. Turned it into a little touch up sharpening session and holy smokes am I pleased with the result. Happy to have some persistence pay off before just moving on to another stone.
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What an interesting looking stone! Almost like a Tam.

I've had one or two grey BBWs. They didn't have spots like yours does, but behaved much like you describe - quite coarse, quite fast, slightly scratchy feeling. Very good for edges, not so much for polishes.

[EDIT - Are you certain it's not a Tam...?]
 
cotedupy said:
What an interesting looking stone! Almost like a Tam.

I've had one or two grey BBWs. They didn't have spots like yours does, but behaved much like you describe - quite coarse, quite fast, slightly scratchy feeling. Very good for edges, not so much for polishes.

[EDIT - Are you certain it's not a Tam...?]
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I don't even know what a Tam is! I got it from Sharpening Supplies new as a BBW so that's really as much as I know. Didn't come with the AC stamp. Here's a pic of it in natural (evening) lighting next to my big AC BBW. It was just my office lighting changing color. I haven't taken a diamond to the AC's surface yet, just a small BBW slurry stone and maybe a small coti. The phone camera lense has trouble focusing on all of the stone so the ends are kinda washed out looking

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JustAnotherJoe said:
I was under the impression that Ardenes Coticule was the only company quarrying coticules and coincidentally bbws. I would be suprised and suspicous of any other company claiming they were mining bbws.
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They're listed as AC ones now; I went and checked my receipt from June and it just said Belgian Blue Whetstone but was same product number. There was never any intimation on SS part that they were mining them. I did tell them I wanted a fast one so I guess they dug out the coarsest they had, still feels/smells enough like my others that I'm not terribly concerned I got swindled.

https://www.sharpeningsupplies.com/Ardennes-Coticule-Belgian-Blue-Whetstones-P1534.aspx
 
You may want to take a diamond stone to create a slight slurry on the BBW to crack the garnets. I wasn’t very impressed with my BBW nor my coticule until I did this.
SwampDonkey said:
I don't even know what a Tam is! I got it from Sharpening Supplies new as a BBW so that's really as much as I know. Didn't come with the AC stamp. Here's a pic of it in natural (evening) lighting next to my big AC BBW. It was just my office lighting changing color. I haven't taken a diamond to that surface yet, just a small BBW slurry stone and maybe a small coti. …
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@hendrix I updated for clarification. I haven't taken my diamond plate to the big AC one so the surface isn't 100% apples to apples, though it didn't need it from start. Pretty easy to release and a bit softer.

The smaller spotted stone has had several rounds of diamond plate and finally got where I like it with that tooooth.
 
SwampDonkey said:
I don't even know what a Tam is! I got it from Sharpening Supplies new as a BBW so that's really as much as I know. Didn't come with the AC stamp. Here's a pic of it in natural (evening) lighting next to my big AC BBW. It was just my office lighting changing color. I haven't taken a diamond to the AC's surface yet, just a small BBW slurry stone and maybe a small coti. The phone camera lense has trouble focusing on all of the stone so the ends are kinda washed out looking

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Ah yeah it's certainly a BBW, just that the first pic made it look dark grey rather than purple. (Tam O'Shanters are a highly regarded Scottish natural stone, they also have speckles, and are normally grey).

Belgian Blue doesn't have anything like the amount of variation that yellow coticule does, though as you've seen - there is a bit. Cool that you've got a couple with slightly different characteristics. :)
 
sumis said:
any good vendors for saliva? lots of flipping these days i hear.

i did receive a bbw yesterday – enabled by this thread. so far only did a light touch up on shriogami #2. not surprisingly with good results. crisp and super sharp, if less bitey than with SG4. guess i'm gonna experiment with preassure and stuff.

.
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Days o Work, comes in a plug, about a five minute soak time. I gar-on-tee....
 
As a firm beliver in rocks in boxes, I made a box for my blue rocks. I figure some folks might enjoy it.
Laser cutter + masonite + ai generated filigree+oil based polyurthane.

I don't think I would have ever tought to try what is now my favorite finishing stone if it was not for this wonderful thread. Thanks!
 

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JustAnotherJoe said:
As a firm beliver in rocks in boxes, I made a box for my blue rocks. I figure some folks might enjoy it.
Laser cutter + masonite + ai generated filigree+oil based polyurthane.

I don't think I would have ever tought to try what is now my favorite finishing stone if it was not for this wonderful thread. Thanks!
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Well sh*t that just puts my homemade ones to shame.🤣🥲 Nicely done.
 
JustAnotherJoe said:
As a firm beliver in rocks in boxes, I made a box for my blue rocks. I figure some folks might enjoy it.
Laser cutter + masonite + ai generated filigree+oil based polyurthane.

I don't think I would have ever tought to try what is now my favorite finishing stone if it was not for this wonderful thread. Thanks!
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I thought Masonite was taken off the market? My siding when it got wet turned into wet cardboard. Had to replace most of the siding over the years.
 
Rideon66 said:
I thought Masonite was taken off the market? My siding when it got wet turned into wet cardboard. Had to replace most of the siding over the years.
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As I understand it mosonit/harboard/pressboard/eco-whateverthehellthisboard is all the same material made by steaming woodfibers and pressing them in in big ironing set up. Which I recently learned doesn't have any glues, which makes for a great material to laser cut as no toxic gasses are produced (check the sds).
This stuff will 10/10 disentigrates if exposed to rain. I can't imagine anyone using it for siding, but maybe I am confused on the name/product.

Skylar303 said:
Well sh*t that just puts my homemade ones to shame.🤣🥲 Nicely done.
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Hey now, don't look to closely at this one and you WON'T notice that the bandsaw cut to seperat the lid is off by 3 degrees :p
Have you posted any pictures of your work on the forum? I am still learning my way around here and am wonderning where sillyness like this should go.
 
That was my concern with it being used with a water stone. Make sure it doesn’t get wet.
 
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