Another car boot hone.

[D_W]

I've read a number of historical references to "Turkey Stones" as being excellent hones but found very little information on them. Can anyone shed some light on them?

In the US, the term is sometimes used to describe a washita stone.

Anywhere near crete, it's for a type of friable novaculite oilstone that wears faster than an arkansas or oilstone. In an era where natural stones were the most prevalent, they were regarded as a fast cutting alternative to charns, slates, and arkansas stones because they shed particles and cut faster than similar fineness naturals that don't shed.

I would assume that synthetic stones eliminated them from the market, as they are still mined and sold as "cretan" hones, they just don't have much of a market.

They are one of the very few hones that I've never gotten a hold of, but not for any good reason other than that I just don't have that much use for a stone that cuts like a slurried arkansas stone.

 

[memzey]

So they cut faster but have a similar level of fineness to Arks? Sounds useful.

 

[D_W]

So they cut faster but have a similar level of fineness to Aks? Sounds useful.

From reading old texts, I'd say yes. There are different grades and hardnesses, so they may not all be that fine but razor board people claim to have finished edges with stones graded for knives and tools (which would be faster and coarser of the grades).

Holtzapffel's text suggested that they need to be trued/flattened fairly frequently, but that's not much of a problem with modern abrasives.

 

[memzey]

They sound a bit like a Washita on steroids. I'm pretty happy with my sharpening kit but if I come across one I'll give it a go.

 

[D_W]

I would if I were able to find them over here in full size for cheaper than $80 or so (that seems to be the cheapest I can find them, and often they are short fat stones that would be better used on razors - which need to be sharpened so infrequently that I have no interest in more razor stones).

 

[bugbear]

Ask bugbear about Turkey Stones. http://straightrazorplace.com/hones/370 ... key-4.html

I have no secrets from google!

BugBear

 

[adrspach]

I do have few Turkey hones and can say that they are just tad softer that Arkies and do not need need to be flattened too often as most other natural hones do.
There are two main varieties light and dark with sources from Crete to Turkey. The best man to speak to about them is at present Vasilis from SRP who is still able to get new ones for people.

 

[D_W]

If you're feeling lucky, you can buy them from an online store and choose them in sizes up to 5kg.

If I saw one on the street here in large size, I'd probably buy it.

 

[swagman]

Those of you interested in identifying the different makes of honing stones should be viewing this site; https://bosq.home.xs4all.nl/info%2020m/ ... part_3.pdf

Stewie;

 

[AndyT]

Those of you interested in identifying the different makes of honing stones should be viewing this site; https://bosq.home.xs4all.nl/info%2020m/ ... part_3.pdf

Stewie;

Thanks for that link - some very detailed and informative material that I'd not seen before.

 

[swagman]

Thanks Andy; I read some of the comments on Turkey Stones, and the only comment that came close to being accurate was made by adrspach

Stewie;

I do have few Turkey hones and can say that they are just tad softer that Arkies and do not need need to be flattened too often as most other natural hones do.
There are two main varieties light and dark with sources from Crete to Turkey. The best man to speak to about them is at present Vasilis from SRP who is still able to get new ones for people.

The special very hard CF stones are from the area of
Charnwood Forest in Leicestershire.

Some CFs can provide a very sharp edge. They can be used
for grinding or polishing of a cut with a light oil, but
preferably with water. Many of these ancient stones are
available 2nd hand in a specially made wooden box, which
is saturated with oil. Also, the stone very frequently has a
pretty thick layer of dirt. They are quite hard to plane -
even a little of smoothing can often cost several hours.

The best Charnley Forest Stone, as some have indicated, is
from the Whittle Hill Quarry, the other stones from nearby
exhibit sharper or hard spots.

Charnley Forest whetstone is one of the best alternatives for
the Turkish oil stone, and very sought after by carpenters
and others, to give a cut to different tools, pocket knives
and the best stones are suitable for straight razors.

 

[D_W]

Stewie, once again, you make assertions when you're really only in position to observe - you really don't have much whetstone experience.

From the same page that you referred to, there is an excerpt lower down describing arkansas stones as not wearing even under the heaviest use. What stone do you think that is a comparison to?

The excerpts are from different versions of holtzapffel, and there are plenty of other sources describing them, including catalogs retailing stones, which describe them as fragile and rarely free of defects, or in some cases requiring frequent flattening (which may be a couple of times per day in heavy use - heavy use when people ground things by hand wouldn't be sharpening four or five plane irons on them in an afternoon session, it would be something like finishing new hard irons or cutler or carver's work).

See hasluck's description of them in carving, as "wearing unevenly" and "most brittle". Relatively hard stones don't wear unevenly, though cretans are hard compared to modern synthetics (which are generally unsuitable for carving tools or leading edge knife sharpening).

 

[D_W]

It seems to be worth satisfying curiosity at this point for me, as it's one of the few stones I've never bought, and the shop selling the mined stones only asks 20 euro per kilogram for a big cretan, but good LORD, the shipping is 42 euro from greece!!!

I presume that the shipping for europeans is much more reasonable.

 

[essexalan]

It seems to be worth satisfying curiosity at this point for me, as it's one of the few stones I've never bought, and the shop selling the mined stones only asks 20 euro per kilogram for a big cretan, but good LORD, the shipping is 42 euro from greece!!!

I presume that the shipping for europeans is much more reasonable.

I found some here http://www.yataganelaletleri.com/catego ... &id_lang=1 at about 3 GBP/kilo that is 80 TL for a 7 kilo+ stone. Shipping says 10 US$ but the translation is a bit vague and yes the stones do come from Turkey but are they the aforementioned Turkish stones?

 

[D_W]

It seems to be worth satisfying curiosity at this point for me, as it's one of the few stones I've never bought, and the shop selling the mined stones only asks 20 euro per kilogram for a big cretan, but good LORD, the shipping is 42 euro from greece!!!

I presume that the shipping for europeans is much more reasonable.

I found some here http://www.yataganelaletleri.com/catego ... &id_lang=1 at about 3 GBP/kilo that is 80 TL for a 7 kilo+ stone. Shipping says 10 US$ but the translation is a bit vague and yes the stones do come from Turkey but are they the aforementioned Turkish stones?

I think those not the turkish oilstone type, but rather a travertine or some other type of sedimentary non-novaculite hone.

The various old sources list two types of old stones - dark and light colored, with the types being very similar but the light colored being a bit softer. The dark are listed as harder. All are listed as having voids and fractures - those are a bit too uniform looking.

The three names that I've seen for the turkish novaculites are turkey oilstone, novaculite and pierre du levant. I think the origin is only selling the light type, but they all darken once they are oiled.

I'd like to have the dark type, but I'm not aware of anything other than vintage stones of that type. I'll just bite the bullet and order a big one from the grecian knife shop selling the cretan. It's 42 euro to ship any size. Might as well get something interesting if it only costs another 20 euro to do so.

(the price in the US for these stones, and from european dealers, is about 3 times the source price for the small typical 0.75-1KG size - anywhere from $70 with shipping here to $80 euros overseas -quite a large mark up - all of those are also the light type).

 

[bugbear]

I found some here http://www.yataganelaletleri.com/catego ... &id_lang=1 at about 3 GBP/kilo that is 80 TL for a 7 kilo+ stone. Shipping says 10 US$ but the translation is a bit vague and yes the stones do come from Turkey but are they the aforementioned Turkish stones?

Back in the day, Turkey stone meant "that type of sharpening stone commonly exported from Turkey".

Just finding stone in Turkey doesn't mean you've found what used to be called "Turkey Stone".

It's the distinction between a name and a description. A "black board" is more than a board which happens to be black, as any chalk wielding teacher can tell you.

BugBear

 

[D_W]

Hopefully, turkey stone from that part of the world would mean novaculite, but only the listing on ebay assures that. I was going to try to get one from the greek knife company that sells them for 20 euro per KG, but the credit card verification service used in europe apparently has caused my credit card company to suspect something nefarious (EDIT: literally found out later in the day that trying to buy something directly from greece caused my card to be locked and I had to call to let the company know that was actually me).

So I ordered the white cretan type that's on ebay. Love to have one of the dark ones, too, but I'll have to hope one pops up on ebay and like minded people aren't thinking the same thing as I am at the same time. The ask for smaller hones in the past has been somewhere on the order of $100.

 

[D_W]

So much for giving the cretan a try. Here in western PA, the hone got within about 10 miles of my house, and then has taken an inexplicable trip to des moines, iowa. It's unlikely that it would've been address incorrectly, or it wouldn't have stopped here. Maybe someone at the local package stop was having a bad day and decided to play bin poker by putting incoming packages onto random outgoing trucks.

 

[MIGNAL]

If you are going by the tracking, that can happen sometimes. Your parcel can go right past your street and mysteriously end up 80 miles away, only for it to return boomerang style. Obviously for the US you have to multiply that 80 miles by a factor of 4 or 5.

 

[D_W]

Yes, by tracking in this case. The spot where the package ended up is our local priority mail stop for Pittsburgh. Somehow, instead of heading next to my post office (literally down the road 10 miles or so), it ended up in a basket and trucked to desmoines, which is probably about 700 miles away.

Scheduled delivery was today, which would've been the normal one day after arriving at the local distribution center. If the address on the package is right (likely it is), it'll be seen in des moines and sent right back, just 3 or 4 days late from what it was.

So while it looked really easy to try one of the white cretan types, the first place (in greece) caused my credit card company to put a fraud stop on the card, and the second place has the stones here in the states and they go to iowa! Maybe I shouldn't say it's so easy to get them!

I had a guy quite some time ago offer pick up stuff in crete for 20 euros a KG and mail it to me at cost. Maybe I should've taken him up on his offer!!