King H2O Stones

HeavyHanded

HeavyHanded

Joined
Jun 4, 2010
Messages
6,642
What's the general consensus on this manufacturer? I ask because I have two of them and they just don't seem to produce an edge anywhere near their stated grit value even with the differences in translation. Edges are clean and very burr free -characteristic of water stones in general. Stropped conservatively and they appear to produce fairly refined scratch patterns and good edges, just that they're about half the refinement you'd expect from the numbers printed on the box, if even. Any thoughts?
 
i have one, a 250/1000. works great but i found i get a better edge with no lube (water) then finish on the strop. I Only used water to clean it.
 
king stones produces quite a bit of mud, at the coarse and mid grit range, mud will produce a messy bevel, with a lot of random scratches, not as precise and parallel than a diamond stone, or a less muddy stone .... the scratch size is the same but it looks duller.

try finishing under running water, this will eliminate the mud and make a cleaner looking polish.
 
HeavyHanded said:
What's the general consensus on this manufacturer? I ask because I have two of them and they just don't seem to produce an edge anywhere near their stated grit value even with the differences in translation. Edges are clean and very burr free -characteristic of water stones in general. Stropped conservatively and they appear to produce fairly refined scratch patterns and good edges, just that they're about half the refinement you'd expect from the numbers printed on the box, if even. Any thoughts?
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which king stones do you have?
 
jimnolimit said:
which king stones do you have?
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I have the 1200 grit big reddish colored stone, and a 6000 grit one that's more of a tan color. Neither produce much of a slurry - just a bit, and both seem to make a respectable edge, but nothing worth talking about. The 6000 barely shaves arm hair. I'm thinking I just stink with water stones but can't imagine what I'm missing - Sharpie, raise burr, switch, repeat, remove. I can get a face-shaving edge from 800 grit sandpaper or a medium diamond stone. Heck I get a better edge from the fine side of a generic SiC stone....

HH
 
HeavyHanded said:
How nice of an edge to you get at 1000?

HH
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I take my time with nice smooth even strokes and I get a near hair popping edge. For my large camp knives I stop there since heavy camp chores don't call for a shaver. For the fine knives I finish on a double sided strop with black then green compound and I get a nice (almost factory looking) polished edge the shave the hair off my leg.
 
HeavyHanded said:
I have the 1200 grit big reddish colored stone, and a 6000 grit one that's more of a tan color. Neither produce much of a slurry - just a bit, and both seem to make a respectable edge, but nothing worth talking about. The 6000 barely shaves arm hair. I'm thinking I just stink with water stones but can't imagine what I'm missing - Sharpie, raise burr, switch, repeat, remove. I can get a face-shaving edge from 800 grit sandpaper or a medium diamond stone. Heck I get a better edge from the fine side of a generic SiC stone....

HH
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6000! Holy damn. Maybe its too large of a gap in grit? I don't know I never used any stone or sanding belt that fine except for my strops. I don't know what to say now since I have no experience with that grit size
 
clichtenwalner1 said:
I take my time with nice smooth even strokes and I get a near hair popping edge. For my large camp knives I stop there since heavy camp chores don't call for a shaver. For the fine knives I finish on a double sided strop with black then green compound and I get a nice (almost factory looking) polished edge the shave the hair off my leg.
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That's about what I'd expect - the grit charts put 1000-1200 grit JIS about 700 grit CAMI. On my stone all I get is what I would consider a mediocre 300 grit or so. Still think it must be me, I have no idea what I'm doing wrong. I can use sandpaper, diamonds, SiC, but cannot crack the language of the water stone.

6000! Holy damn. Maybe its too large of a gap in grit? I don't know I never used any stone or sanding belt that fine except for my strops. I don't know what to say now since I have no experience with that grit size
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I can't get good results at 1200, the 6000 will have to wait a bit. :confused:

Hard to muster up the desire to pursue this but i hate to admit defeat :mad:
 
I have a number of this kind water stones, ranging from 800 grit to 8000. I've ben able to get a nearly perfect mirror polish from the 4000 and 8000 grit. The thing is, their stones are fairly soft and they cut very quickly. It takes practice, but I can easily shave my face with my Buck 110 done on these stones.
 
HeavyHanded said:
I have the 1200 grit big reddish colored stone, and a 6000 grit one that's more of a tan color. Neither produce much of a slurry - just a bit, and both seem to make a respectable edge, but nothing worth talking about. The 6000 barely shaves arm hair. I'm thinking I just stink with water stones but can't imagine what I'm missing - Sharpie, raise burr, switch, repeat, remove. I can get a face-shaving edge from 800 grit sandpaper or a medium diamond stone. Heck I get a better edge from the fine side of a generic SiC stone....

HH
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Which knife/knives or type of steel/s are you having this trouble with? I have king 800, 1200, 4000 and 6000 stones and I get good results from them.
 
jimnolimit said:
Which knife/knives or type of steel/s are you having this trouble with? I have king 800, 1200, 4000 and 6000 stones and I get good results from them.
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I was working on an Al Mar eagle ultralight Aus8. With a DMT EF I can get a shaving edge with this knife and was also able to do so with the fine side of a generic SiC stone. The 1200 King produced a good utility edge but it would barely shave arm hair. I raised a burr twice, used a Sharpie to verify hitting the apex. Was coming off of a Spyderco fine ceramic, so I don't think the problem is/could be a lack of scratch pattern "overprint". I soaked the stone for an hour and kept just enough water on it to keep it from drying out. It formed a very, very slight slurry that was mostly suspended metal with just a hint of stone. Light touch, let the stone do the work. Edge was nice and shiny, but not very refined despite having a fairly tight scratch pattern - very similar to 800 grit wet/dry. I stropped off the residual burr and that's where the fun ended. It'll crosscut newspaper, but not much more than that, and as I said it won't even shave arm hair. I'm using a 12x loupe and the edge appears clean, burr free and as well joined as any. Any tips tips specific to water stones would be helpful. I almost wonder if I'm not going too light, but then I am raising a burr and these stones are supposed to cut well with a light touch. Like I said, it almost has to be me, but WTH is the problem I have no idea.

HH
 
Actually king stones are very slow and like most waterstones work best with carbon steels. It should work with AUS8 but maybe stop after your 1200 stone, when I sharpen AUS8 with waterstones I usually stop at my 1k stone unless the blade is thin then I might move to the 6k. Ceramics or diamonds will likely yield a better edge with that steel though.
 
HeavyHanded said:
I was working on an Al Mar eagle ultralight Aus8. With a DMT EF I can get a shaving edge with this knife and was also able to do so with the fine side of a generic SiC stone. The 1200 King produced a good utility edge but it would barely shave arm hair. I raised a burr twice, used a Sharpie to verify hitting the apex. Was coming off of a Spyderco fine ceramic, so I don't think the problem is/could be a lack of scratch pattern "overprint". I soaked the stone for an hour and kept just enough water on it to keep it from drying out. It formed a very, very slight slurry that was mostly suspended metal with just a hint of stone. Light touch, let the stone do the work. Edge was nice and shiny, but not very refined despite having a fairly tight scratch pattern - very similar to 800 grit wet/dry. I stropped off the residual burr and that's where the fun ended. It'll crosscut newspaper, but not much more than that, and as I said it won't even shave arm hair. I'm using a 12x loupe and the edge appears clean, burr free and as well joined as any. Any tips tips specific to water stones would be helpful. I almost wonder if I'm not going too light, but then I am raising a burr and these stones are supposed to cut well with a light touch. Like I said, it almost has to be me, but WTH is the problem I have no idea.

HH
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what did you use the fine ceramic for? are you only using the 1200 to sharpen the AUS-8?

diamond and SiC are more aggressive cutters than water stones, you could try adjusting your pressure. you should be able to shave arm hair right off of the 1200. if i get a chance later on today, i'll put some AUS-8 on my 800 or 1200 king stone and see how sharp i can get it right off the water stone.
 
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jimnolimit said:
what did you use the fine ceramic for? are you only using the 1200 to sharpen the AUS-8?

diamond and SiC are more aggressive cutters than water stones, you could try adjusting your pressure. you should be able to shave arm hair right off of the 1200. if i get a chance later on today, i'll put some AUS-8 on my 800 or 1200 king stone and see how sharp i can get it right off the water stone.
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Its a chronology thing - I recently bought a Spyderco fine benchstone and the Al Mar was kicking around in my collection. I used the DMT EF to makes sure the bevel was good (I haven't had this particular knife out in many months) and after checking to see how well that worked, I proceeded on to the Spyderco ceramic just to try it out. Produced a very nice tree-topping edge.

Well then I get it into my head to break out my old waterstones and give them a try again. I've owned them for over a decade now and never "figured them out" despite my successful use of everything else I have. Now here I am again and the results are very similar to what I get every time I give these puppies a soak. Should I consider these to be closer in function to Arkansas stones - slow, polished cutters? All the how-to for waterstones go on and on about what fast cutters they are and how little pressure they need I assumed they functioned more aggressively. Still not sure why that would make a difference - raise burr, flip, repeat, remove burr, repeat as needed. I have to say, the heat treat on this Aus8 is among the toughest I've come across - considerably harder than any of my other Aus8 blades.

HH
 
HeavyHanded said:
Its a chronology thing - I recently bought a Spyderco fine benchstone and the Al Mar was kicking around in my collection. I used the DMT EF to makes sure the bevel was good (I haven't had this particular knife out in many months) and after checking to see how well that worked, I proceeded on to the Spyderco ceramic just to try it out. Produced a very nice tree-topping edge.

Well then I get it into my head to break out my old waterstones and give them a try again. I've owned them for over a decade now and never "figured them out" despite my successful use of everything else I have. Now here I am again and the results are very similar to what I get every time I give these puppies a soak. Should I consider these to be closer in function to Arkansas stones - slow, polished cutters? All the how-to for waterstones go on and on about what fast cutters they are and how little pressure they need I assumed they functioned more aggressively. Still not sure why that would make a difference - raise burr, flip, repeat, remove burr, repeat as needed. I have to say, the heat treat on this Aus8 is among the toughest I've come across - considerably harder than any of my other Aus8 blades.

HH
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ok, so i soaked my 800 grit king stone and sharpened my kabar dozier folder (AUS-8). i see what you are talking about now. i sharpened it to about 15 degrees per side and even when the bevel looked excellent, it wasn't what i consider really sharp. just to keep my sanity, i grabbed my santoku knife with hitachi blue core and gave it a sharpen. in 30 seconds the knife was cleanly shaving my forearm stubble. for some reason AUS-8 doesn't like king stones. i then pulled out my 6000 grit king and tried to refine the AUS-8. the edge got better but still not what i consider really sharp. so i decided to try a different approach and use 600 grit diamond. the edge was cutting better than both the 800 and 6000 king. i pulled out my baystate combination stone and used the fine side (it's a hard ceramic) and gave it a few swipes. the edge was much sharper now then when i used the king stones. i decided to give the edge few swipes on my strop (loaded with ryobi white buffing compound) and the edge can now push cut bounty paper towel. the mystery continues.
 
I have a 250/1000 combo stone that I use for setting bevels before going to the Sharpmaker. I typically go slightly under the 20 degree setting on the Sharpmaker, so the triangles only have to make a micro-bevel. I have not tried their higher grit stones, but Murray Carter uses and sells them and gets rediculous edges with them.

The 1000 grit will give a hair whittling edge on my Griptillian if I hold my mouth just right and stand on the second toe of each foot. They do take a bit of practice if you're used to Norton stones or ceramic Spyderco stones. I'd say it took about 6 or 7 sessions before I got the hang of it. Some steels just don't react well to the 1000 grit, some do. My Food Network knife and my Rada Cutlery santoku will take a very aggressive, hair shaving edge off the 1000 grit side. My Faberware knives will not. My Delica and Griptillian will get crazy sharp off the 1000 grit. The 250 side is what I use for coarse grit work on my (now lost) Buck Scout Lite and Cold Steel Kudu. The Kudu will get a very sharp and extremely aggressive edge off this coarse water stone. For best results, I've found clean, low wear resistant stainless steels to work very well, which is good because that's what I prefer anyway. Steels like 425 M, 420HC, whatever Rada uses, the low end Cold Steel stainless, and the exceptions of VG-10 and 154CM. Keeping them clean and having a very light touch is key. I've also been known to raise a burr, then cut it off with 90 degree stokes (2 at most), the start over with very light strokes at a slightly (3-4 degrees) elevated angle. This is unique to the King water stones as compared to my Norton Coarse/Fine India stone, though with enough care, the water stone will produce an edge sharper than I could ever get on the Fine India. Why are all my replies to your posts walls o' text?
 
The king waterstones like your thinking HH, is the basic sharpening tool that you would find in the hardware in Japan like you would find a Arkansas or India stone in the US. They use a aluminum oxide abrasive in a clay binder most often and are a slow cutting and very muddy stone in lower grits.

They may be faster than a Ark but not by much and will have the same limitations as the Ark when it comes to steel.

Newer waterstones with harder ceramic binders and various types of carbide abrasives is like switching from Arkansas stones to diamond stones. The speed, ability of the stone to cut the steel, and finished edge quality will be a night and day difference.
 
Jimnolimit, me2, knifenut, thanks very much for the replies. I have now a slightly restored sense of sanity about this, but am far from finished. Might be time to check out the Norton waterstones and use the King ones on my wood chisels (like the cobbler's children having no shoes, my wood chisels are like butter knives). You learn something new all the time.

HH
 
HeavyHanded said:
Jimnolimit, me2, knifenut, thanks very much for the replies. I have now a slightly restored sense of sanity about this, but am far from finished. Might be time to check out the Norton waterstones and use the King ones on my wood chisels (like the cobbler's children having no shoes, my wood chisels are like butter knives). You learn something new all the time.

HH
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i also have a norton 1000 waterstone, if i get a chance either later today or tomorrow i'll run my AUS-8 on it and report back.
 
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