crystolon vs. alum oxide

[Talley1013]

Hey guys. I have some money burning a hole in my pocket so I thought I would pick up some new stones to add to my collection. I already have water stones, ceramics and dmt diamond stones but the only oil stones I have are the $2 hardware store variety. I am looking at either norton 8x3 crystolon or aluminum oxide bench stones. What is the difference between the two? Is one better than the other. The website makes it sound like the crystolon cuts faster but the aluminum oxide produces a better edge. Speed really isn't an issue because if I really need to hog a lot of metal I will just pull out the diamonds. Also, can these stones be used with water instead of oil? Will these stones wear as quickly as waterstones and require frequent lapping?

I have kind of turned into a sharpening junkie and am looking forward to testing out some new stones but want to make an educated purchase before I pull the trigger. Thanks for the help guys

 

[THG]

I started a thread on the same topic a couple months back:
http://www.bladeforums.com/forums/showthread.php/856949-Norton-India-vs.-Crystolon

What was said was that the Crystolon stones are ultimately harder and will cut faster and possibly last longer. That doesn't mean that the India stones aren't good, though. I honestly don't know if I would have seen much difference. I ended up getting the SiC combo stone (silicon carbide, or what Norton calls "Crystolon.")

I really don't see any point in getting the full set of coarse/medium/fine since even their "fine" stone is so coarse. You're going to want to finish on something much finer, anyway, so just go for the combo stone. My opinion is that these stones work great as coarse stones for edge restoration (to get an edge back on a knife that has been dulled to death.)

I use mine dry, since I don't want to mess with oil. The stone does load up pretty quickly, so I have to rinse the stone often. Mine came pre-oiled. I guess it's not too big a deal; it helps the stone dry much quicker after a rinse since water can't get all the way through.

Now, since you say that you already have DMT stones and ceramics and all of that stuff... I'm just going to recommend that you save your money. If you already have sharpening gear, there's really no need to spend any money.

 

[Talley1013]

thanks for the link. I am buying the stones just to have something new to play around with! Just like I already have knives to cut things with but I constantly buy new ones just to try them out.