Making sandpaper stones to see if I want higher grit

[KennyB]

I have a Norton 220/1000 and I'm not sure if I want to purchase a stone of a higher grit or not, so I figured I'd buy some sandpaper and see how the edge works on sandpaper that's equivalent to the grit of the stones I'm looking for.

So I want to match Norton's 4000/8000 grit combination stone, and so my plan was to get some sandpaper of that grit and one of those cheap alluminum oxide stones and just putting the sandpaper on the top of the stone with something.

Would that replicate the results closely enough to give me a good idea? I don't really see there being any problem except for maybe it not being flat after gluing the paper to the stone.

Any caveats to sharpening on paper?

 

[Mahoney]

Sharpening on sandpaper works fine, water will hold waterproof paper on a glass/marble/granite surface, a light misting of spray glue will hold paper on a chunk of MDF or steel. Any of these surfaces will be flat enough for a test, no need to glue paper on a cheap stone

The Caveats: Paper wears out fast in my experience, but it's cheap... and European paper "grit" is not the same as American paper grit, and neither is necessarily the same as stone "grit", so you should do some research, I've seen equivalency charts online.