Initial review of Martin Piller's home-made waterstone

T

thombrogan

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Nov 16, 2002
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The Chief of Futamaki mailed me one of his home-made waterstones right before he went on his vacation. During the time of its arrival, I developed a lovely case of tendonitis and had already sharpened my favorite knives (weird how those occurred so close like that ;) ). So, :( . I have this most generous gesture and no real need or ability to try it out right away. Martin returns home from d'Isle d'Hispanola (the side with the Dominican Republic) and asks my opinions of his waterstone. I'm ashamed that it hadn't been used.

During this time, I received a small pocketknife with a thin blade, but a thick edge. Since it was ZDP-189, I didn't try a natural waterstone on it (I will soon, though!), and went to my normal sharpening gear (D8XX, D8C, 1K/2K/4K/8K Glasstones, 1 micron AO polishing paper, 0.5 micron diamond paste on computer paper, and 0.3 micron AO lapping film - the necessities ;) ) with abysmal results. So I thought about when I used to use sharpening jigs and the consistant good results they gave me and my hesitance to use the ones I had with high-end Japanese-style cutlery* and remembered I have a Panavise and a stone holder! And then I followed Q_Egg's lead and got a Wixey gauge.

So, I took my trusty Sigma Power 1K and Martin's home made waterstone and soaked them in my bukkit:
soakin1.jpg


Here's Martin's waterstone after a luxurious soak in the bukkit:
MartinsStone.jpg


Here's the Takeda which finally got dull enough to need some edge touchup:
dullTak.jpg


More in my next posty post post!
 
Continued:

Microbevelling here to preserve what little is left of March. Here's the Sigma Power's microbevel setting:
sigmalvl.jpg


My last micro was set freehand and I assumed it to be 12 or so degrees per side. Might have been as the Sigma Power 1K took about 7 or 8 passes to develop the start of its own microbevel. Deburred the best I could** and set a high microbevel angle for Martin's stone:
martnlvl.jpg


Martin's waterstone produced a slurry and raised a burr on the first pass for each side and I carefully reduced, refined, and removed what I could to leave a straight, sharp edge. The ease and cleanliness with which my Takeda sliced through a paper towel suggested the luck of the Irish was on my edge.

Here's Martin's stone basking in its sharpening success in the Panavise:
panaMartin.jpg


Hey! This was too quick! Set a steeper angle for Martin's waterstone to microbevel my Swamp Rat brand Howling Rat Little Mischief pocketknife:
microb.jpg


Oh look at me! I'm sharpzors!
microbrat2.jpg
 
Continued:

No extra pics, but I wasn't done. Took the tinier blade on my Victorinox Super-Tinker and sharpened it with the same angle that microbevelled my pocketknife and then set the stone to just over 12 degrees and did the same with my Masahiro MV-H. It was too awesome!

* = Insofar as French-pattern cooking knives with octagonal handles added to hide their Gaul ancestry can be Japanese-style.

** = If you ever want to get into trouble, suggest that the sharp edge, no matter how strong, straight, and durable is a burr. Darned facts ruining wa-gyutos and edges again!

Well, Martin's stone is a very fast cutter on fine-grained carbon and stainless steels with low carbide volume and may act likewise on other steels (will find out soon). I do know he found Norton waterstones to cut quicker, but man is a stone that cuts fast and raises a slurry on pass number one a lot of fun!
 
Both stones in the red bukkit were waterstones. The one with the lumpy back was cut by my pal, Martin Piller of the Netherlands. The other waterstone is a Sigma Power 1000 grit waterstone and you can order them from Koki Iwahara or So Yamashita. Every stone that uses water as a lubricant is a waterstone.
 
The natural waterstone put a very sharp and slightly toothy edge on my Shun Elite Paring knife. Very psyched!
 
Great review, but what would Curtis say about such a horrifying fat angle on a Takeda Gyuto? :D Well, it sure cuts down on the sharpening time when not having to sharpen a bevel that seems like it's an inch wide at under 5 per side, doesn't it? I know mine sharpens up really quick on the Glasstones with a similar microbevel, but that 1 pass per side trick with the natural stone is real nice. Any estimate on what the grit rating is on the natural stone?

Mike

P.S. I'm hoping your tendonitis goes away soon so you can get back to your normal assembly line sharpening endurance without pain.
 
I think Curtis is too busy to say anything these days.

Used the Takeda pictured about to make some stir-fry yesterday and wish that I needed crates of bell peppers and dozens of onions instead of the few of need that were actually needed. That knife flew and flew and flew. The edge, well, maybe it needed a higher finishing polish, thicker microbevel, or both, but it made everything effortless from start until finish. The microbevels on the HRLM and SuperTinker are strong, so yay Pillerstone!

The tendonitis is starting to clear up, thanks.
 
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