Advice needed: Shapton vs. Diamond Stones

T

tallyram

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Dec 16, 2012
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I own a few knives and use all of them. I'm trying to add as many different steels as possible to my collection. So far I have knives with M4, S30v, 8Cr13MoV, AUS8, and 1095 steels. I'll be adding more steels like M390, S90v, and Elmax in the near future. I need advice for a free hand stone purchase. I think that I'm gonna grab some DMT stones, but I'm not really sure if this is the way I should go. I have been reading about Shapton stones and I like that they cut fast and are available in several different grits. My only concern is maintenance. I know that diamond stones don't require much, if any maintenance. How much maintenance do Shapton stones require? Thanks in advance!
 
My 1000 grit stone requires very little maintenence, the shaptons above 400 grit or so are very hard for a japanese waterstone, you can sharpen alot of knives on the 1000 before you need to flatten it. Flattening waterstones is really easy, diamond stones work great, but you can also get away with things like relatively flat paving bricks or rough (but flat) concrete unless you're super picky about having a perfectly flat stone. The cutting speed on my 1000 is similar to an interrupted surface DMT coarse, if you do get the diamond plates either for sharpening or stone flattening, get the continuous surface diasharp plates.
 
I use both. The DMT and ATOMA diamond stones for rough repair re-bevelling and shaping, up to 1200 grit. Then Shaptons from 1K on up, depending on the knife.

If I could only have one stone, it would be a 1000 grit Shapton Glass Stone.

Naniwa Choceras are excellent as well. I have a couple and like them as well as the Shaptons
 
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