Anybody using waterstones dry?

Re: Anybody using waterstones dry?

David Miller from Iowa

>I love to challenge conventional wisdom - like when I learned in school that Viceroy Butterflies imitated Monarchs because they were poisonous to birds, then somebody showed that Monarchs were good eatin to birds.

I suppose as long as you can keep the filings from clogging the stone you are good - never tried though.

Re: Anybody using waterstones dry?

Chad Boehlke

>I have seen what happens to water stones used dryed. The stone will wear faster and groves will apear. I know this becouse Iam a museum director and I deal with a lot of old tools. I have seen many old stones that were not used right over the years. I would use water on the stone to keep it from wear, but use good water, not tap. Most tap water today has all kinds of "extra" stuff added to it that might were out the stone faster.

A bit on my rationale

WoodburnBob

>[Indulge me a little here while I over-state my case to see if I can provoke a little more reaction from the sleepy audience. I thought there would be more flames by now.]

Actually, my observations differ from what you are suggesting, Chad. Indeed, I'm kinda curious about the science you use to determine that historical waterstones in a museum had in their time been used with or without water.

Regardless, a major complaint by modern wet-waterstone users is rapid wear and the constant need to take out grooves and ledges and large scallops by grinding off large amounts of stone to get down to a new, hopefully flat strata. One motivation for my "experiment" on this sacrificed stone is to learn if I can slow rapid wear without giving up too much in the honing and polishing department!

Using water with the synthetic stones from King and Norton (except the 8000 Norton stone, which seems much more tightly bonded), I find that loose abrasive rapidly separates from the stone and makes an unwanted soup or paste that to my thinking serves no useful purpose. This can sort of be regulated by rate of evaporation, amount of added water, and how saturated the stone is originally.

The Law of Waterstones that I would offer is: the wetter the stone, the more rapid its disintegration in use. I understand this is to be considered the main rationale and traditional benefit of using wet waterstones: "fresh" abrasive is constantly being exposed. Fresh abrasive is great, if you can get to it. But my impression, particularly on coarse stones, is that you are constantly rolling the loose, "worn-out" abrasive under the iron and not doing much of anything... unless you keep most of the loose abrasive soup cleared off the stone face.

Using the dry stone I'm playing with, there is no obvious wear. Period. The only wear that occurs is when I use a diamond stone to rough the surface a little.

Finally...and I just can't pass this up...If I were a waterstone tycoon (sort of the Donald Trump of superduper wetstones) and selling what amounted to little bricks of dry clay at $80 a pop, I would encourage as much water use as possible, along with vigorous "flattening and dressing" after each use, if not after each blade/iron sharpened, if not each 30 seconds.

Re: Anybody using waterstones dry?

David Linnabary

>Yes, and I have a King 1K/4K combo stone that I do it with as well but only in a few situations. Basically when I think my stone needs to be reflattened and I can afford to wear down the ends of the stone I'll use it dry.

Usually I clamp the work and hold the stone like a file or a sanding block which works very nicely for maintianing a consistant angle freehand. Usually I do this on drawknifes and various other non-woodworking tools, basically I got the idea from the Lansky knife sharpening jig.

David

Re: Anybody using waterstones dry?

Bruce Norris

>The slurry or paste that forms when you use a waterstone helps to speed the sharpening process. Have you ever tumbled stones in a tumbler? You charge the tumbler with silicon carbide particles of a uniform grit, throw in the stones and off you go. Right? No. The old timers will all tell you, throw in some of the finer grit too, not just the grit of the finish you are trying to achieve. The paste that forms by throwing in the finer grit cuts faster, throw in just the one grit and it will take about twice as long.

I wish I could remember...

John Longwitz-Doraville, GA

>...where I saw a very well presented article for not wetting stones for sharpening. It was written about stones for knife sharpening but I would think the same rules apply for any tool. The gist of it was that the "slurry" actually dulled the leading edge you were trying to sharpen.

Re: I wish I could remember...

Carole in VA

>That's what I have been pondering, but figured there must be error in my logic. It seems to me that the proverbial "slurry", which is suppose to speed the sharpening, would "round over" the edge one is trying to sharpen since this edge is pushing it's way through a mini "wall" of particles (unless of course, one always draws the blade backwards thru the slurry.) But then I suppose the sharpening gurus know what they are talking about.

Re: I wish I could remember...

Rick Hoppe

>I have the video: "Chisel Sharpening with Harrelson Stanley"(japanesetools.com). Stanley says he studied WW and sharpening for years under masters in Japan. He says it's better to RINSE AWAY the slurry. Go figure...

Re: I wish I could remember...

Patrick from Europe

>Of course,

What's the point to "expose new sharp particles" (the mantra of the waterstone sellers) if you use the dull ones floating on the stone?

Wash&Go!