English Stones

cotedupy

cotedupy

Guru
The last of the triptych* then. In comparison to Wales and Sotland, England is perhaps somewhat underrepresented in terms of first-class historical sharpening stones. Or at least ones that we know much about, because at various times there were likely many hundreds of quarries in England that produced whetstones alongside building material, but knowledge of them has simply faded away with time.

The big name in English honestones is of course the Charnley or Charley Forest stone, from Charnwood Forest in Leicestershire. And I assume that many people here might have one, as they've become recognised again in the last 15 or so years for their ability as razor finishers. So would love to see any pics and impressions people have of theirs, or any other English stone...


* There are a handful of whetstones from the island of Ireland mentioned in historical sources, all from the ROI as far as I can see. Stones from Drogheda and Howth - two coastal towns north of Dublin, as well as a fine, green razor stone from the mountains of Co. Kerry around a lake known as 'The Devil's Punchbowl'. Though I'm not sure if any known examples exist of any of them.
 
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cotedupy

cotedupy

Guru
IMG-6310.jpg


T to B:

Charnley Forest A small, hard and fine, razor grade Charnley. Initially I thought this was an Idwal, but I've changed my mind after lapping and using it a bit more, and seeing a couple of other stones like this identified as CFs. It shows the variation in patterns and colours that they can exhibit.

Charnley Forest I only got this stone last week and actually posted in the Welsh stones thread as a slightly atypical Idwal, though again I actually now think this is a Charnley. Stones from the Whittle Hill quarry can often look like this - without any of the red stripes that makes some CFs quite easy to spot. Although both are types of novaculite Charnleys tend to be slightly softer than Idwals, and they have slightly lower SGs; these three Charnleys are between 2.70 and 2.72, whereas Idwals seem to be 2.74 - 2.76. The other slight giveaway is their appearance under a microscope; Charnleys are a much purer form of novaculite than Idwals - in fact they look a lot like translucent arkansas. Fine and fast (for a CF).

Charnley Forest Lovely big stone which I was very lucky to find on the cheap in a market in Devon. This is quite a typical razor type Charnley - fine and quite slow. Because of this I like to use them with slurry stones; Tam, Thuri, or Coti slurry works very nicely to speed them up a bit at the beginning.

Moughton Whetstone This rather beautiful stone from the Yorkshire Dales was very kindly given to me, and is obviously something of a rarity, though it will be known to anybody who's familiar with Henk Bos's writings. Some old sources have the stone as popular in the Sheffield cutlery and razor industry, though I'm not sure how popular tbh, as old examples effectively never come up. It's a very slow stone leaning massively toward edge refinement over sharpening or abrading. Which has an interesting effect that although the 'grit' of the stone is perhaps only in the region of 6 - 8k, it can be used after finishing stones to polish an edge without degrading it. I noted this the first time I used it, and only later noticed that HB had said the exact same:

'The Moughton whetstones are at their best when they are used to smoother a sharp cut. They are excellent after using a synthetic fine stone. She acts slowly, but even with a slurry they will not degrade into the 12k to 30k range.'
 
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cotedupy

cotedupy

Guru
A few more pics:

Small CF. this does have some red in it, but the patterning is quite unusual nonetheless:

IMG-6314.jpg



Medium (7 x 1.5). No red at all in this, it's quite a uniform green colour with some faint black lines/patterns. You can understand why I originally thought both this and the above might have been Idwals:

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Large (10.5 x 1.75). A far more classic and recognisable Charnely colour scheme:

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Moughton stone when I received. Before cutting two slurry stones from it, shaping, and making the base:

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MichaelS

MichaelS

Forum GOD!
Great write-up thanks! I have one hard, dark green Charnley (or at least sold to me as a Charnley) which I'll use this week and post. I used to have a grey one with red splodges, like a couple of the above, but it was softish and I couldn't finish a razor on it. Are the red splodges a sign of a softer stone?
 
cotedupy

cotedupy

Guru
Vacumatic said:
I have 2 by 8 inch stone without a base, does anyone know of a source for the wooden holder?

Thanks
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Do you mean like the cool, old-school carved box/holder things...?

If so - I have a load of them, and they’re mostly 8x2s. More than happy to clean one up for you if you’d like? If you’re in the UK - my family are over visiting atm and could just take back with them and pop in the post from there...

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cotedupy

cotedupy

Guru
MichaelS said:
Great write-up thanks! I have one hard, dark green Charnley (or at least sold to me as a Charnley) which I'll use this week and post. I used to have a grey one with red splodges, like a couple of the above, but it was softish and I couldn't finish a razor on it. Are the red splodges a sign of a softer stone?
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I’m not enough of a Charnley expert to say for sure, but I don’t believe people can really make a distinction on colour or pattern, afaik.

Of the ones above; the last two, that I don’t have any more, were coarser/softer types, the first three will all finish a razor. And apart from the second stone all of the others have had some red bits in them.

I understand that stones from the Whittle Hill quarry are less likely to have any red, and they were often regarded as the best quality. Though back in the day quality was probably more equated to being coarse and fast I imagine (?)

Anyhow... look forward to seeing yours!
 
Vacumatic

Vacumatic

Testy
cotedupy said:
Do you mean like the cool, old-school carved box/holder things...?

If so - I have a load of them, and they’re mostly 8x2s. More than happy to clean one up for you if you’d like? If you’re in the UK - my family are over visiting atm and could just take back with them and pop in the post from there...

View attachment 112440

View attachment 112441
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That would be perfect, I will send a PM, and thank you
 
cairnish

cairnish

Forum GOD!
MichaelS said:
Looks a beast, what are the dimensions please? I'm guessing you use as a finisher?
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1 3/4 x 10 — a generous runway for sure. I am a rank and generally clueless amateur. My first try as a finisher was 200 laps on ballistol dilution and the result was very nice and entirely satisfactory. Next I tried 100 laps on a fairly harsh Koraat and the result was also excellent.
 
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