- Joined
- Nov 5, 2009
- Messages
- 1,711
So my 2 new DMT Aligner stones arrived today. I have tried them out on one of my knives and thought I'd share my view for those that haven't tried these yet.
I now have 7 hones and a rod - the Aligner cost $46 with 4 hones (Coarse, Fine, E Fine & a bonus EE Fine) and a rod, which I think is pretty good value. I see that now the one I bought comes with a serrated sharpener instead of the EE Fine stone.
So I now have: XX Coarse, X Coarse, Coarse, Fine, E Fine, EE Fine & a convex stone for recurve blades as well as the diamond conical rod for serration sharpening.
My opinion of the X Coarse & XX Coarse for sharpening:
Don't do it! These are NOT sharpening stones!
My opinion of the X Coarse & XX Coarse for reprofiling the bevel:
These are the way to go! Seriously - you can grind off the metal with these stones sooooooo fast - bevel reground in a couple of minutes! Also for a serious ding or chip repair - these are the stones you would look to for fixing your blade.
There is no way that these stones are needed to sharpen a blade - they grind off the metal many times faster than the coarse stone and you don't need that to sharpen a blade. But to reprofile the bevel where you need to remove a decent bit of steel - what takes 10 minutes with the coarse stone would take only a couple of minutes with the X Coarse stone! I don't know that I really need the XX Coarse - but when you are paying $35 in shipping you tend to order what you think you might need rather than put another order in later if you decide you do want it.
The X Coarse stone should be enough to reprofile most knives and it can get that bevel down to the angle you want pretty fast. I think that the metal removal between the Coarse & X Coarse is quite a big jump - much more than the 325 mesh vs 220 would suggest, but maybe my coarse stone is more broken in than I realise because the 120 mesh of the XX Coarse stone doesn't seem all THAT much more coarse than the 220 mesh of the X Coarse stone.
I now have 7 hones and a rod - the Aligner cost $46 with 4 hones (Coarse, Fine, E Fine & a bonus EE Fine) and a rod, which I think is pretty good value. I see that now the one I bought comes with a serrated sharpener instead of the EE Fine stone.
So I now have: XX Coarse, X Coarse, Coarse, Fine, E Fine, EE Fine & a convex stone for recurve blades as well as the diamond conical rod for serration sharpening.
My opinion of the X Coarse & XX Coarse for sharpening:
Don't do it! These are NOT sharpening stones!
My opinion of the X Coarse & XX Coarse for reprofiling the bevel:
These are the way to go! Seriously - you can grind off the metal with these stones sooooooo fast - bevel reground in a couple of minutes! Also for a serious ding or chip repair - these are the stones you would look to for fixing your blade.
There is no way that these stones are needed to sharpen a blade - they grind off the metal many times faster than the coarse stone and you don't need that to sharpen a blade. But to reprofile the bevel where you need to remove a decent bit of steel - what takes 10 minutes with the coarse stone would take only a couple of minutes with the X Coarse stone! I don't know that I really need the XX Coarse - but when you are paying $35 in shipping you tend to order what you think you might need rather than put another order in later if you decide you do want it.
The X Coarse stone should be enough to reprofile most knives and it can get that bevel down to the angle you want pretty fast. I think that the metal removal between the Coarse & X Coarse is quite a big jump - much more than the 325 mesh vs 220 would suggest, but maybe my coarse stone is more broken in than I realise because the 120 mesh of the XX Coarse stone doesn't seem all THAT much more coarse than the 220 mesh of the X Coarse stone.
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