Dropping the water stone and chipping a huge chunk off: priceless.

I'm pretty pissed at myself right now. Last month I finally had some money free for some discretionary spending, so I bought myself a set of quality hand planes (Woodriver) and some DMT diamond sharpening plates as a birthday present to myself. While the planes perform admirably, and my sharpening skills are passable with the use of a cheap jig, the edge that I produce leaves something to be desired, so I ordered a King 6000 grit Japanese water stone on Amazon.

It arrived today, and the edge it leaves after working up the grits I have is unreal. I'm in love with the results, and thinking that there are more stones I can use to fill the gap between the fine diamond plate and the 6000 grit stone that I can add to get an even better edge (I get the distinct feeling that I'm headed down a black hole here), when the unthinkable happens and the rubber feet on the bottom of the stone holder slip on the top of my workbench, and I'm helpless to watch as the stone flips to the concrete floor, cracking off a pretty good chunk in the process.

The bit that broke off is one big piece, so I'm thinking I might be able to let it sit out overnight to let it dry from being soaked, and epoxy it back together. A bit of epoxy in the right places would theoretically allow for a good many more sharpening and flattening cycles.

At least it happened as I was finishing up for the evening.

I would give it a try. What is to lose other than a few minutes to complete the repair.

I would be careful in avoiding getting epoxy on the working surface.

Good luck

That sucks.

Make sure you use a C-Clamp or similar to hold it together. I know nothing about sharpening knives but I imagine any lip or imperfection in the joint will render the stone useless.

I'll give it a try tonight. I figure it should be ready to be lapped by this time tomorrow.

Skins, the stone is super soft. My understanding is that Japanese stones are supposed to be lapped more often than other kinds of stones because normal use wears them so quickly, comparatively speaking. My real concern isn't a lip (easilyu correctable), it's that I end up with epoxy too close to top of the stone causing it to interfere with sharpening (not so easy to fix). I'm hoping that with some creative gluing I can kick that can down the road a few years, and by the time I have to deal with that I'll have appropriate knowledge to deal with it properly.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: vulrath,

Any chance you bought the stone with a credit card that offers purchase protection?

I would give the drying cycle a few days, if weather permits leave the stone in the sun to speed drying, or put the stone in a low temperature oven to completely dry it before trying the epoxy. When you get ready to try epoxy first trial fit it on a flat surface, then before you start the glueing process put down some wax paper or plastic wrap (might be a good idea to tape the wax paper to the flat surface) the give the epoxy plenty of time to cure. If you used oil as the lubricant on the stone I would use acetone or some other solvent to cut it.

That sux.

Remember when buying the in-between grits, the goal is the least amount of time for the same amount of refinement.

Assuming the goal is to get the most refinement possible with the 6000 king, you can get to it with just 6000 king stone but you'll wear it out sooner and it will take you longer until the bevel refinement is equal to the 6000 king.

If you put a middle grit between the 6000 and the prior grit, then you'll save wear on the 6000 by transferring the wear on the middle grit and you can cut down on the total time because it is quicker to get the refinement to the level of the middle grit.

But the more middle grits you add, total time increases. Although the stone wear gets allocated among more stones and the less frequent you have to replace them.

There's an optimal combination of the number of grits to get but sadly I didn't figure this out before I bought every grit step possible all the way to 16000.

I'm still just figuring out the least number of steps now.

And now, because of this thread, I just ordered two King combo stones

OP, good luck with bonding the chipped portion of the stone.

Michael

Well, it's done, and as I discovered, the epoxy I had on hand is 1 hour, not 24 hour, so I've already lapped it. In hindsight, I recognize that I probably jumped the gun and should have waited, but what's done is done. Would have been nice to have thought about the purchase protection beforehand (I believe my card does offer that), but I highly doubt they'll be able to help me after doing my repair job.

As far as I can tell, the repair went smooth as silk.

No before images, but I got some from after the epoxy dried and I'd already lapped it. The only area that's noticeable with the fingernail is down at the bottom, by the "K" on the stand (the rest of the outline is simply discolored from the epoxy). I can live with that.





I do need to fill the gap between the fine grit diamond stone and the 6000. I'm working on that, but don't have the funds for "every" grit, so I'm going to have to piecemeal it as I go. I must say, though, I'm liking the water stones a lot more than I thought I would.