Bester 500 - initial report

[thombrogan]

Dave of D&R Sharpening recently mentioned his experiences with a Bester 500 grit ceramic waterstone. They intrigued me, so I bought one. Here's what they are:

It wasn't flat, but flattened quickly on the D8XX.

It cut faster than my D8XX while leaving a satin finish instead of large, prismatic scratches on my Nenox (always use you most expensive knife to try out a very fast-cutting stone! ).

It dished less than my 1K Glasstone despite seeing more grind time (and Glasstones take a lot of work to dish). I'm hamhanded and dish everything.

Finally, it took a really long time to saturate with water. It was actually still releasing bubbles when I finally got tired of reading and pacing and used it anyway.

The pricetag, $53.60 delivered, was a little steep, but it's less than a D8XX.

Here are some pics of it before being used. The lines on the last pic are pencil marks to make flattening easier:

 

[Lucky Bob]

That's pretty damn cool! Cuts faster than an XX you say...

 

[Lanza]

Where can we purchase one of these???

 

[thombrogan]

Right now, they're only available for JWW that I could find. I wish other stores (hint, hint Mike Dye and Dan O'Malley!) would carry them because although JWW has good service, they ship via FedEx who generally doesn't.

 

[yoda4561]

It wears slower than a 1k glasstone?? That's pretty amazing for such a fast cutting stone. I've been holding off on the really coarse waterstones due to how fast they dish, will have to give this one a try.

 

[gunmike1]

You talked me into it. I just phoned in the order and have it coming Priority mail next week. I did have to pay tax since they are in Cali, but faster cutting than the D8XX with slower dishing than the GS 1000, along with a decent finish on the edge was too much to resist.

Mike

 

[thombrogan]

Definitely slower dishing. Gunmike1, you'll need it for ripping new edges into S30V and S90V fillet knives for midnight sashimi in Monterey!