After you’ve sharpened your cutting tools you move on to honing — polishing the bevel. To do this you need an ultra-fine stone, anything from 6,000-grit and upwards. A 6,000-grit stone produces an excellent finish that you can be proud of. If you’re looking for a mirror finish than you can move on the a higher grit.

The 6,000-side of the stone produces a precise, well-refined edge, suitable for most of my cutting tools. Most often this is the last grit that I use. However, for those cutting tasks that require ultra sharp edges, such as cutting dovetails, I move on to the 10,000-grit side. I also hone my kitchen Chef, slicing and filleting knives up to 10,000-grit.

Pride waterstones in the 220 to 6,000-grit range are made of Aluminum Oxide abrasive. The higher grits stones are made of ceramic alumina abrasive. You can use them on any of the premium tool steels — A2, D2, O1 and even PM-V11.  The 6,000-grit side cuts very fast, which means it wears fairly quickly, but takes fewer strokes to achieve an acceptable finish. The 10,000-grit side is noticeably harder than the 6,000-grit side and cuts more slowly, which means that it will require flattening much less frequently. You only need apply moderate hand pressure on either side of the stone.

With a width of just under 2″ I find this stone provides ample surface area for honing all my chisels and most of my plane blades comfortably. I sharpen my bench chisels and plane blades on a Tormek, which produces a hollow grind.  This means there are only two points of contact on the tool bevel when honing, so the 1″ thickness of the stone means I’ll get years of dependable use.

I’ve been using this stone for over 5 months, and am very impressed with it’s performance. It’s fast cutting, delivers an excellent edge on all the tool steels I used with it, and is well-priced. Treated with the respect it deserves, this stone will last most woodworking enthusiasts a lifetime.

You can also get Pride Abrasive stones in all the common grits from 220 to 10,000.