Norton Ascent CA Single Grit Benchstone

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Mr.Wizard

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Feb 28, 2015
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Norton has a new fine grit ceramic alumina bench stone called the Ascent CA. I have yet to find any reviews.

https://www.nortonabrasives.com/en-us/product/ascent-ca-single-grit-benchstone

https://www.nortonabrasives.com/sga...roducts-ceramicbenchstones-nortondiy-7437.pdf




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In the 1st link, the description says this stone can be used on 'spoke shave' blades.
What are those? DM
 
David Martin said:
In the 1st link, the description says this stone can be used on 'spoke shave' blades.
What are those? DM
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I had to look it up.
Looks like it's for shaping wood, with a planer type blade, but used like a draw knife.

The Ascent CA looks like another good option for fine ceramic sharpening. Unfortunately they don't offer it in my favorite hand held size.
 
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I just got one in the Norton Ascent fine grit, a 2X6” stone. This is the one that is designed to be comparable to a translucent Arkansas, and suitable for a range of tools and knives in hard steel. I have tried it on a couple of woodworking chisels, a Marples and a Taylor and it worked as described. I checked it for flatness. It is flatter than my Spyderco fine and ultrafine stones. The Spyderco ultrafine is far from flat, and their fine ceramic stone is better in this regard. Neither of the Spyderco ceramics that I have will work for woodworking tools, but are suitable for knives.

The Norton fine ceramic 2X6 seems excellent for woodworking tools. If I am going to sharpen a tool in O1 or another high carbon steel, then a Norton hard Arkansas will be flatter and may be more suitable for blades where a perfectly flat stone is more appropriate. However, if you want to sharpen a chisel in a steel with some vanadium or increased hardness, these will work for you. I confess that I haven’t had the stone long enough to try it out on something like S35V or XHP. I will probably continue to use my Spyderco ceramic bench stones for kitchen knives. I didn’t want the ultra fine Norton ceramic stone, since I use a strop (with 1-2 micron diamond paste) after the equivalent of a translucent hard Arkansas or a black hard Arkansas. I don’t bother with a strop for kitchen knives anymore, and generally finish with something like the Spyderco fine ceramic stone.

I can recommend the stone. I should mention that it came in a cardboard box, and so I will be making a stone case for it soon.
 
A arty , my Spyderco ceramic stone was as you describe. I leveled the side that was off and gave it a finer finish. Thus, mine now works like a 2 grit. This Norton stone looks thicker than the Spyderco stone. More stone material = more value. DM
 
David Martin said:
A arty , my Spyderco ceramic stone was as you describe. I leveled the side that was off and gave it a finer finish. Thus, mine now works like a 2 grit. This Norton stone looks thicker than the Spyderco stone. More stone material = more value. DM
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I checked and the Spyderco stones and the Nortons are the same thickness @ 1/2”. They are both hard and dense, and seem to be of similar sorts. The Norton is flat enough to sharpen woodworking tools, and the fine Ascent produces a very sharp edge. My subjective impression is that it is finer than the fine Spyderco ceramic stone. The advantage of the Spyderco system is that they come with cases, if that matters to you. I like to be able to use a stone dry, and so I like ceramics. Until now, I didn’t have one that would work well for woodworking tools.
I have not been happy with the ultrafine Spyderco, but the fine Spyderco works well on knives. I do think the Norton fine is superior and gives a sharper edge than the Spyderco fine.
David - How did you manage to level the Spyderco and what did you use?
 
I used a coarse Dia- diamond plate with water. I made diagonal lines across it and started rubbing. Then I finished it with a fine diamond plate. It came out very fine and level. DM
 
Artyh said:
I checked and the Spyderco stones and the Nortons are the same thickness @ 1/2”. They are both hard and dense, and seem to be of similar sorts. The Norton is flat enough to sharpen woodworking tools, and the fine Ascent produces a very sharp edge. My subjective impression is that it is finer than the fine Spyderco ceramic stone. The advantage of the Spyderco system is that they come with cases, if that matters to you. I like to be able to use a stone dry, and so I like ceramics. Until now, I didn’t have one that would work well for woodworking tools.
I have not been happy with the ultrafine Spyderco, but the fine Spyderco works well on knives. I do think the Norton fine is superior and gives a sharper edge than the Spyderco fine.
David - How did you manage to level the Spyderco and what did you use?
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Much of how sintered ceramics function is based on their surface finishing, and by lapping the surface to different degrees of refinement you can get different performance qualities out of them.

I would add, however, that you do want to use lubrication with them whenever possible even though you can use them dry. Dry use accelerates the wear on the abrasive grains on the surface, leading to their eventual blunting. Because sintered stones don't shed grit, you have to re-dress the surface to remove the blunt grains and expose fresh cutting surface. This is part of what led me to develop my Black Magic sintered silicon carbide plates, as they allow you to go longer between surface dressing periods and the more friable grain is more likely to fracture to expose fresh cutting surface in use even if the grit can't shed.

David Martin said:
I used a coarse Dia- diamond plate with water. I made diagonal lines across it and started rubbing. Then I finished it with a fine diamond plate. It came out very fine and level. DM
Click to expand...

While you can do this work using diamond plates, using cheap, loose lapidary diamond grit on a piece of plate glass or other flat surface works MUCH faster and leaves a nicer surface finish.
 
I used what I had at the time.
Cereal killer, did this as well and he used cheap China diamond plates. With good success. The ultra fine ceramic stone is around 70$. So, I achieved that stone for the cost of a worn diamond plate. I rarely use that grit except for my razor. DM
 
Oh, absolutely use what you have at your disposal. It's just good to plan with sintered stones if you need them ultra-flat (which even most woodworking tools don't actually need.)

Diamond lapidary grit is like $10 for a bag and about a pinch is all it takes to lap a sintered stone, usually. It's worth buying if investing in sintered ceramics and needing a surgically-flat stone. Diamond plates are best reserved for quick resurfacing of an already flattened sintered stone rather than for flattening one in the first place. They work astronomically slower and leave a finer texture to the surface finish than loose grit lapping does, even with extra coarse diamonds, because the hardness of the bond you're working with is so much harder and you're fighting that the whole time. A 5-gram $12 bag of 50-grit lapidary diamond powder will flatten several stones, and chews through sintered aluminum oxide or silicon carbide easily ten times as fast as a plate when you're doing flattening work.
 
Norton recommends using the stones dry. They also suggest cleaning them often. Care and use instructions are in the literature that they provide. They may want people to buy the stones more often, but I can vouch for the fact that they work well when used dry.
 
Sintered ceramic is non-porous and therefore easily cleaned when used with oil or water because they don't seep into the stone. You can use it dry, BUT it will lead to accelerated wear of the surface grit, leading to you needing to resurface the stone more often, and will also make the metal fines more difficult to remove from the surface.
 
I've preferred to use my ceramic stones with oil to keep them clean & cutting well for bigger jobs. If they're used dry and not cleaned frequently, they get loaded up with swarf which holds tenaciously and will be much more work to clean later. With oil, the swarf isn't as prone to clinging to the surface and is therefore easier to wipe away.

I do like the feedback on a clean ceramic, when it's used dry. And for the occasional light touchup in just a few passes, it's no big deal and adds a very nice bite to the edge. I use my Sharpmaker rods dry for light touchups only, after which I wipe them down with a pink eraser. But for anything requiring a little more work on the stone, like refining the scratch patterns or polishing bevels, I'd rather keep it oiled. It'll load up too quickly, otherwise.
 
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Artyh said:
I checked and the Spyderco stones and the Nortons are the same thickness @ 1/2”. They are both hard and dense, and seem to be of similar sorts. The Norton is flat enough to sharpen woodworking tools, and the fine Ascent produces a very sharp edge. My subjective impression is that it is finer than the fine Spyderco ceramic stone. The advantage of the Spyderco system is that they come with cases, if that matters to you. I like to be able to use a stone dry, and so I like ceramics. Until now, I didn’t have one that would work well for woodworking tools.
I have not been happy with the ultrafine Spyderco, but the fine Spyderco works well on knives. I do think the Norton fine is superior and gives a sharper edge than the Spyderco fine.
David - How did
Click to expand...

arty said:
I just got one in the Norton Ascent fine grit, a 2X6” stone. This is the one that is designed to be comparable to a translucent Arkansas, and suitable for a range of tools and knives in hard steel. I have tried it on a couple of woodworking chisels, a Marples and a Taylor and it worked as described. I checked it for flatness. It is flatter than my Spyderco fine and ultrafine stones. The Spyderco ultrafine is far from flat, and their fine ceramic stone is better in this regard. Neither of the Spyderco ceramics that I have will work for woodworking tools, but are suitable for knives.

The Norton fine ceramic 2X6 seems excellent for woodworking tools. If I am going to sharpen a tool in O1 or another high carbon steel, then a Norton hard Arkansas will be flatter and may be more suitable for blades where a perfectly flat stone is more appropriate. However, if you want to sharpen a chisel in a steel with some vanadium or increased hardness, these will work for you. I confess that I haven’t had the stone long enough to try it out on something like S35V or XHP. I will probably continue to use my Spyderco ceramic bench stones for kitchen knives. I didn’t want the ultra fine Norton ceramic stone, since I use a strop (with 1-2 micron diamond paste) after the equivalent of a translucent hard Arkansas or a black hard Arkansas. I don’t bother with a strop for kitchen knives anymore, and generally finish with something like the Spyderco fine ceramic stone.

I can recommend the stone. I should mention that it came in a cardboard box, and so I will be making a stone case for it soon.
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Why is this the case ? I am confused is it because Norton is harder then spyderco cermic stone or it due to the fine stone being finer if it the latter then how fast does it cut. So sorry replying late
 
My subjective impression is that the composition of the Spyderco and Norton stones is similar, but the fine Norton is a little finer than the fine Spyderco. I have used the Spyderco fine ceramic stone for knives and small carving tools, like small gouges and it works fine. The advantage of the Norton is that it is flatter than the Spyderco and this makes it more suitable for woodworking blades like wide chisels or plane irons. If you are going to sharpen a 2“ wide blade on a stone it needs to be flat, not concave. Norton is better here in my experience with the 2” wide stones. I haven’t tried the 3” wide stones so I can’t comment on them. A fine ceramic stone is a finishing stone, so you don’t get it for speed, but that is not a problem that I can see if a properly prepared blade is used on either the Spyderco or Norton stones. I am not a professional carpenter, so I don’t worry about stone wear and like to use the ceramics dry. I have an old black hard Arkansas that came to me used. I was heavily curved and convex from daily use by a violin maker. I have had that stone for more than 60 years, and it doesn’t get used - I have flat stones for my tools.

If you are sharpening knives, I don’t know if there is much to be gained by going to Norton ceramics over the Spyderco. Norton does not have a stone like the Spyderco medium ceramic. I confess that I obtained the ultra fine Norton Ascent stone, but haven’t had a chance to try it out yet. Most of what I use knives for does not require the finest possible finish, and I can provide that, if needed, with a strop. Flat stones are useful for spokeshave, wide chisel and plane blades, and I would recommend the Norton stones for woodworking tools. If you want really polished edges from a sharpening stone, and are working with high chromium steel, you can’t go wrong with one of the Norton ceramics. I use my Arkansas stones with water to avoid oil, just because I get dermatitis from some oils. Arkansas stones are way too slow on many of the high alloy steels like S35V, but they do work OK on A2.
 
As far as cutting speed goes you should be able to alter it to your liking by lapping it with different grits of lapidary diamond.
 
This Ascent line from Norton is very appealing to me for the following reasons:

- Norton explicitly instructs to use these dry (I can't stand sharpening with oil or water, the mess drives me nuts)
- no need to lap, ever (again, another maintenance task that I would prefer not to do)
- potentially a great value given the reasonable price and the hardness (in my interpretation) equal a lifetime of use (this is a big deal since water stones and diamond plates wear relatively fast)

The one thing holding me back is a lack of a 1000 grit stone.
 
nickycat said:
This Ascent line from Norton is very appealing to me for the following reasons:

- Norton explicitly instructs to use these dry (I can't stand sharpening with oil or water, the mess drives me nuts)
- no need to lap, ever (again, another maintenance task that I would prefer not to do)
- potentially a great value given the reasonable price and the hardness (in my interpretation) equal a lifetime of use (this is a big deal since water stones and diamond plates wear relatively fast)

The one thing holding me back is a lack of a 1000 grit stone.
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You WILL need to refresh the surface periodically as the surface abrasive wears.
 
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