Lapping a Spyderco Ultra-Fine ceramic

John Frankl said:
I know this is an UF stone, but under magnification even the DMT Course is laying down a much better and finer finish than the original one on the UF. Once it is dead flat, I may go over it with my XFine DMT of the same size.
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That's funny, but my DMT 8" XXC is also finer than my Spyderco UF at this point. Looks like the jokes on me.
 
I have no idea what this means. Are you saying that lapping the UF stone has made your XXC into an XXFine?
 
I gotta tell ya, there is such a wealth of information here on Bladeforums. Dang.

I was having a tough time sleeping as I'm still getting over Bronchitis and I wanted to do some reading. I love this place.

I didn't even know what lapping was until 3 minutes ago.
 
Over the last several days I've been lapping my Spyderco UF 2 X 8 benchstone with a 2 3/4 X 8 DMT extra-fine hone. I chose to do the side on the UF that had the most obvious imperfections, peaks and valleys that made sharpening annoying. I've been doing 5 minute little jaunts a few times a day and while the peaks went away quickly the valleys are taking much longer. The results are promising. Holding it at an angle I can see an almost glass-like surface, it throws a sharp reflection :cool: Since there is still only a few inches of perfect stone I tested it on a small knife, Bark River Little Creek in A2. I've never felt anything sharper, I can't even whittle a hair, the slightest touch just cuts it in half. It's too early for me to tell but I suspect lapping with a finer grit DMT improves performance.
 
theonew,

I'm with you. mostly. The changes I would suggest are starting with the flatter side of the stone, and going at it with something quite a bit coarser to get it dead flat. Once you are there, refining with a Fine or XFine Diasharp will be much easier, on both you and your stone.
 
Some time ago, HoB sent me a couple ceramic Bester (if I'm remembering the brand correctly) stones, and I had to lap them to get them flat. I also used a fine diamond. I noticed it left the surface of the ceramic almost glassy smooth, and it actually took a little while for them to start cutting good again. It's almost as though the diamond was actually polishing the grit in the ceramic, and the top layer had to wear away to expose fresh & sharp grit again. YMMV.
 
John Frankl said:
theonew,

I'm with you. mostly. The changes I would suggest are starting with the flatter side of the stone, and going at it with something quite a bit coarser to get it dead flat. Once you are there, refining with a Fine or XFine Diasharp will be much easier, on both you and your stone.
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The reason I started with the rougher side is because I wanted to have the two different polishing levels and since the rougher side wasn't very pleasant to use anyway I figured it made sense to flatten that side. It took a heck of a lot longer than I expected :eek: Originally I only wanted to ruin one DMT hone, an extra-fine one, but at some point I took your advice and used the coarse one and things went faster :thumbup:

This was an interesting finding for me, after I had flattened the stone with the coarse hone the grittiness seemed rougher over the finish on the un-lapped side. I tried it on a few knives and it seemed a good bit scratchier and gave me a less polished edge.

It took about 15 - 20 minutes of lapping with the extra-fine hone to polish it up. I still have a bit more work to do but I've tried it on a couple of knives and the polish it puts on an edge is better than anything I have ever seen. DMT Blue makes it worse, Red makes it better, and Green is the bee knees. Hmm, may have to spring for the Yellow soon. :D

I haven't really inspected the DMT hones yet, but I've used them intermittently during the lapping to sharpen a few knives and I don't think their performance has really been degraded much, if even at all. Need to look closer though.
 
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