Indonesian natural stones.....

[Taurahe]

I have been wanting to try natural stones, and bernal cutlery has some Indonesian stones for some very good prices...... but I have questions.......

!. what are natural stones potentially going to give me over my Shapton kuromaku pro?
2. Are the Indonesian stones a good starting point, without committing to really expensive stones?
3. they basically have Coarse medium and fine..... Would a medium grit be the best starting point ?

I have been wanting to try a natural stone, and at $32 bucks its pretty hard to say no, if I don't like it I'm not out much.

 

[Koop]

I have all three of the Indo stones Bernal offers. I find them very useful for my kitchen knives - I've used them on white #1 & #2 and on Blue #2. I don't consider the fine a finisher - I usually follow with something else to finish the edge and none of them are polishers if you're interested in that.

The coarse and the medium are most useful. The coarse will self slurry some, but I use a nagura on it. For the fine I raise a slurry with a Tsushima nagura. The coarse cuts well, the other two are fairly slow. I like them.

 

[HumbleHomeCook]

Your first question:

!. what are natural stones potentially going to give me over my Shapton kuromaku pro?

Is somewhat flawed. Natural stones are widely varied. A soft Arkansas is a natural stone but it will perform very differently than a hard Japanese natural and both will perform differently than a Belgian Blue. And there's tons of others.

In the most general terms, for sharpening, synthetics will do just fine. Again, in the most general of terms, naturals, at least the Japanese variety are more about polishing.

A lot of this is about the experience you want to have over significant tangible differences. For sure there are differences here but I'm just saying that naturals in general don't offer a revelation.

I have a pile of Arkansas stones. Don't use them as much any more but still love them. I often finish on a Belgian Blue but could live with Shapton Glass 4k too.

Now, in the polishing world, it is a very different thing.

 

[Rangen]

In the normal world, synthetics overtook naturals a while ago. Stones like your Kuromakus, or my favored Shapton Glass stones, took over long ago. I think it all started with the King stones.

But if you are here, you are not quite normal, and the trick is to figure out just how.

My particular quirk is that it really matters to me how it feels to sharpen an edge on a stone. So I will happily ignore the highly experienced people here who say that most JNats are really only worth it for polishing, and get my jollies sharpening on JNats. Sharpening on a Washita or soft Arkansas is a very different experience, but still special. I sharpen on these stones, and the whole thing makes me happy. I sharpen on, say, a Shapton Glass 2000, and I just say "yes, that is sharp now." A little bit of joy there, the SG stones have some tactile qualities I enjoy, but nothing that would equal putting an edge on with a suita, or a good tomae.

Given that there is no practical reason for you to consider naturals, or almost no practical reason, considering that some pros here favor the natural edges, I would choose a natural based on less practical considerations. That is, I would buy something awesome, without spending too much. Some would say BBW, but those are just a bit slippery to sharpen on, so for me they take a bit of a back seat, despite the awesome results.

So if you want to have a really excellent first naturals experience, I would suggest one of these two stone types:

1) A vintage Washita from an auction site
2) If that is beyond your budget, or too uncertain, then get a soft Arkansas stone from Dan's Whetstones. Do not get one from any other supplier; I can't vouch for those. I can vouch for Dan's Soft Arks being the best sure-thing bargain in the natural stone world. Soft arks are sort of out of fashion, so the price is very reasonable.

 

[captaincaed]

I have been wanting to try a natural stone, and at $32 bucks it’s pretty hard to say no, if I don't like it I'm not out much.

Let curiosity be your muse. I know there are a few comments scattered around this forum and others to give you a sense of how they work.

Natural stones are for fun, and for the most part don’t give much advantage to edges over good synths IMO, with a couple exceptions. Most washita and some cotis and aizu give really nice kitchen edges. But nice AlOx synths are honestly my top pick for simple performance.

But have fun. $32 is a cheap experiment, then you can be the new expert and tell us all about it.

 

[Taurahe]

Let curiosity be your muse. I know there are a few comments scattered around this forum and others to give you a sense of how they work.

Natural stones are for fun, and for the most part don’t give much advantage to edges over good synths IMO, with a couple exceptions. Most washita and some cotis and aizu give really nice kitchen edges. But nice AlOx synths are honestly my top pick for simple performance.

But have fun. $32 is a cheap experiment, then you can be the new expert and tell us all about it.

I agree ...... I ordered the red / medium Indonesian stone . It should be here soon lol.

 

[mengwong]

This video shows some Indonesian stones mounted over a really big sink bridge over a really big sink

 

[Tapio]

Lately I bought a bunch of natural stones from a bazaar in Sumatra. They are really roughly finished but that just fine for the price I paid for them. I really like the small black “14 000” stone at the top. You just can’t beat it as a finishing stone at that price range. The biggest of them is just huge. The red stone is a standard-sized Naniwa Pro.