Last night I was honing on a Vintage Coticule I have here at home. It is a natural combo and the coticule half is a dark brownish Orange color. The lines between the two sides are very wavy like waves of water, inside the BBW half on the sides of the stone are bright blue balls of lighter BBW. The Back half of the stone with Belgian blue is a uniform dark purple color.

This stone is slow, even on slurry, and doesn't darken all that fast. When I first received the hone I found the honing sensation on water to be very smooth and mellow feeling, like butter. Last night I decided to rub a BBW slurry stone on the coticule side to see if it would make a difference.

Immediately after using the slurry stone on the surface and rinsing the stone everything felt different. The hone had this weird magnetic draw to it and the razor undercut the water a lot easier than better.

I have never felt such a big change on a coticule from just refreshing the surface with a BBW slurry stone. The shave this morning was the most mellow I have gotten from a coticule before, it felt like I was shaving with a spoon or something dull and harmless. I have used Mellow finishing coticules before, such as La Nouvelle Veine, but never like this before. When I first used the stone the finished results weren't nearly as nice, but acceptable.


Has anyone else had such a difference after refreshing the surface with a slurry stone?
I highly recommend it.


Nick

Could you post pictures of the stone? I'm curious because of your description.

Also, are you saying that rubbing a coticule slurry stone on the coticule seemed to have a different effect from rubbing a BBW slurry stone on it?

When the camera battery is charged I will post pictures of the stone.

The BBW stone seems to impact the surface more than just a coticule slurry stone but I think that's because the BBW slurry stone I have is a lot harder than the coticule slurries I own.


Nick

Emmanuel was mentioning that several times and I noticed this difference, too. If you give your coticule several rubs with another coticule and rinse it, before proceeding on only water, it gets a little refreshed. Surely provides a better feedback and Emmanuel also claims it improves the ability to squeeze more from the stone during the final laps.

cheers,
Matt

its it worth a try

I've only started with with the coticule but I also do the same when it gets to the finishing stages, except I grab my BBW hone and lap the surface with that to get rid of any swarf and clean the surface up. I've been wondering why it takes me so long to finish on water, 100 laps or more x stroke and thats the way I've best found to finish on my stone as its slow on water... or maybe its medium on water and the BBW is mellowing the stone out, either way its bloomin loverly.

regards Alex

Disburden:

Last night I was honing on a Vintage Coticule I have here at home. It is a natural combo and the coticule half is a dark brownish Orange color. The lines between the two sides are very wavy like waves of water, inside the BBW half on the sides of the stone are bright blue balls of lighter BBW. The Back half of the stone with Belgian blue is a uniform dark purple color.

This stone is slow, even on slurry, and doesn't darken all that fast. When I first received the hone I found the honing sensation on water to be very smooth and mellow feeling, like butter. Last night I decided to rub a BBW slurry stone on the coticule side to see if it would make a difference.

Immediately after using the slurry stone on the surface and rinsing the stone everything felt different. The hone had this weird magnetic draw to it and the razor undercut the water a lot easier than better.

I have never felt such a big change on a coticule from just refreshing the surface with a BBW slurry stone. The shave this morning was the most mellow I have gotten from a coticule before, it felt like I was shaving with a spoon or something dull and harmless. I have used Mellow finishing coticules before, such as La Nouvelle Veine, but never like this before. When I first used the stone the finished results weren't nearly as nice, but acceptable.


Has anyone else had such a difference after refreshing the surface with a slurry stone?
I highly recommend it.


Nick

i've just got a lv, from jarrad, I have a inox puma, that i have never realy got a nice shave from it, Its a nos and it cost me $400 dollars from bonkeyes, nice looking razor, infact bart seen it, he tightend pin for me, Now i sent this razor to sham, he said you never get agood shave from this razor, he was right it did'nt shave well. I sent it to bob keyes, he rehoned it, he said he shaves lovely. I tested it, and it was not smooth and did not shave as good as my low end razor. So i decided to hone this razor again, on my new lv. the first honing, i got a grat smooth shave, nice and mellowish. Just so i new it was'nt a fluke, i rehoned again, the shave was beautiful,not magical, i don't get that often all though that what i aim for.

After reading your post, i redulled the razor , dilucoted on my LV which is a gem. I realy had to work with my strop and stone to get a good hht, which beleive me is not easy on this inox puma. Once i got that, I refreshed the surface with bbw slurry stone, rinsed hone, Did 50 laps on water, the surface did feel nicer?. now i repeated this 5x refresh and 50 laps on water, i also hit linen/leather in between tested hht, still all good.

I have two days stubble which is rear for me, I have strong stubble. had my shower prepost porraso, shaving cream.

Now here comes the shave and i swear, it was the most mellowist shave i have had in a while. absalutley like butter, absalutley no alum block sting, and i mean none. i did against the grain with and across the grain.

This edge easily surpast crox and even my j nat, which i absalutley love.

This is what i say about highs and lows, just latley i've more highs. This is what i describe as a magical shave. nothing has ever compared to this, i wished i could match this every time. this razor is not getting rehoned. good tip nick and maybe thats what made the differance, every thing is worth trying, glad i did.

gary

Fascinating discovery; I'll have to try it some time.

I've noticed that the BBW slurry lasts a little longer, while the feedback is mellow/gentle.

Disburden, would you say that the edge was mellower than your LNV?

Maybe it's the BBW garnets working with the garnets on the yellow side resulting in somewhat 'in between' finishing qualities, speeding up the BBW qualities and smoothing out the yellow qualities, who knows.

I might of course be completely wrong. Which is not wholely unfathomable.

tzee:

Fascinating discovery; I'll have to try it some time.

I've noticed that the BBW slurry lasts a little longer, while the feedback is mellow/gentle.

Disburden, would you say that the edge was mellower than your LNV?

i have a la grosse blanch on the way , I will add this to my edge with water, and see if there is any differance .

Pithor:

Maybe it's the BBW garnets working with the garnets on the yellow side resulting in somewhat 'in between' finishing qualities, speeding up the BBW qualities and smoothing out the yellow qualities, who knows.

I might of course be completely wrong. Which is not wholely unfathomable.

i think its a good thing to do , because it cleans and freshens up the surface. which is what you want for finishing. Like emanuel says you ae also waking up the garnets again, which will pretude for a little longer, which gives the coti on water a boost, but with garnets in slurry that can set edge back. Just a guess, i maybe wrong, still no harm trying.

gary

Gary, if I only lived in the UK

I unsuccessfully, albeit hastily, searched for a LGB. I'd be satisfied with a bout

tzee:

Gary, if I only lived in the UK

I unsuccessfully, albeit hastily, searched for a LGB. I'd be satisfied with a bout

it was black tan that spotted it for me, i wanted one , and bill spotted this one on badger and blade. so thanxs to him I ended up buying it.

gary

Gary, What about refreshing with the BBW, then after your 5 rounds of finishing add on another 50 laps but refresh with your jnat?

I've been refreshing with a BBW for the last couple weeks, but I tried your 5x refresh and it was easier to get a really strong hht off the hone, gave me more feedback as well as more suction to the coti. I'm wondering if the ozuku would make it even smoother...

garyhaywood:

I have a inox puma, that i have never realy got a nice shave from it,

Hi Gary,
this is interesting since I have too a Puma Inox NOS with which I have been struggling.
By inspecting the edge with a microscope I discovered that as soon as you try to push the sharpness beyond a certain level, the edge starts flexing, probably because of the type of steel and acute bevel angle (16°). It's note really like a burr or a false edge, the bent part does not break apart, but it stays flexed so it can't cut well.
As for now I have solved by using crox on balsa with some pressure, creating a convex bevel that doesn't bend.

I'll try again with one of my coticules and with refreshing the surface with a BBW.