# Which flattening stone for a Bester 1200?



## belfaborac (Jun 14, 2016)

Hi all!

So I've swapped my annoyingly small Suehiro stone for a Bester 1200, which is excellent. I should have gotten a flattening stone at the same time, but having a memory best likened to a collender of course I never thought of it. Now that *have* thought of it though, I'm unsure which flattening stone to get as this'll be my first one.

Should I get a coarse stone like the Suehiro 1B005, or a medium stone like the Suehiro 2B006? Or should I get something else altogether? Or can I maybe just use my old Suehiro whetstone, a 1000/3000 combo thingie?

Thanks in advance!


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## foody518 (Aug 6, 2015)

What is your budget? If you can afford diamond plate flatteners I would recommend that.

I would not use your previous 1k/3k combo for flattening the Bester.


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## belfaborac (Jun 14, 2016)

Thanks for replying!

I hadn't considered a diamond plate, but of course I suppose that would be both the best and most durable option.  As far as budget goes I'm really not sure, but considering the Bester is the only stone I use and not very expensive I'd feel a bit silly shelling out a fortune on a flattening device.

What damage am I looking at if I go for diamond?

And if I don't go that way, for reasons of price or otherwise, what coarseness would be best in an ordinary flattening stone?


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## foody518 (Aug 6, 2015)

http://www.toolsfromjapan.com/store...roduct_info&cPath=335_462_463&products_id=852 this is one of the more cost friendly options though I don't know what shipping and customs you might have to pay for that coming from a vendor in Japan

The 140-300 grit range is a good option otherwise


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## belfaborac (Jun 14, 2016)

In fact I got my Bester from TFJ, but never looked at diamond while I was browsing there. Japanese shipping is almost always very reasonable indeed compared to most of the rest of the world and often cost less than shipping from the EU. Compared to shipping from the US, which is often the main alternative, but generally extortionate, it's an easy choice.

I had assumed diamond would be more expensive, but seeing the prices I think I'll go for this 300/1000 plate and get a base to go with it as I did with the Bester. That'll give me a #1000 side to use for sharpening and a #300 side exclusively for flattening, as I can't see me needing to use the latter on my knives unless I have an accident resulting in bad chipping.

Thanks a lot for the tip; much appreciated!


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## millionsknives (Apr 25, 2014)

Looks like a good choice

I have two tips using the diamond plate

1) wear gloves or you'll cut up your hands

2) Use very light pressure.  Not much more than the weight of the plate itself is needed.  If you push down you're just going to pull out diamonds.  If you use it to sharpen it's going to leave deep scratches.  Don't use much pressure there either.  Personally I'd rather use a coarse stone for repair like 200 grit.  Scratches are more manageable than with diamond anything


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## foody518 (Aug 6, 2015)

It's probably better on your knives if you stick to using the Bester (I assume you have the Bester 1200 grit?) as opposed to the 1000 side of the diamond plate. As Milllions says above, because of how those plates are set up, pretty deep gouging and scratches can come out of using them on the knives as opposed to just as a flattener.


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## belfaborac (Jun 14, 2016)

Thanks for looking out for me guys.   TFJ's relevant product pages do indeed state that only a very light touch should be used, so I'll make sure to follow both yours and his advice.  I would have started out carefully anyway, but probably not as gingerly as I will now.  Gloves I hadn't thought of at all, so my fingers thank you for that one especially.

I certainly don't think I'll be using the diamond plate to do my main sharpening (just making assumptions here, as I've never used one) given how "brutal" they sound.  However, I'm thinking the #1000 side may be handy for a few careful passes on a particularly dull knife before I take it to the Bester.  I'm not really thinking of my own knives, which never get properly dull, but now and again I sharpen knives for friends who usually make do with electric or hand-held sharpeners of the usual, crappy kind and I'll have no compunction using the diamond on those as it might save me a good bit of time and work.


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## foody518 (Aug 6, 2015)

If you have the budget to do so, picking up a King Deluxe 300, Suehiro Cerax 320, Sigma Power 400, or Beston 500 I think would be a better option to use on the friends knives preceding the Bester. My thinking is stone scratch pattern vs diamond plate scratch pattern, though I'm primarily speculating on this (I don't have a similar grit synthetic stone and diamond plate)


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## belfaborac (Jun 14, 2016)

It's not really a matter of how much I can spend, but how much I want to spend.  The Bester was cheap, but still does everything I want it to do very well and I don't particularly want to spend several times as much just on a flattener which may now and again be used on my friends' knives.  If it was a question of knives for professional use, if I had a large family or if I regularly hosted huge dinner parties I'd be perfectly happy to move far into the hundreds on both stones and knives, but things being what they are that would be shooting sparrows with a howitzer.


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## millionsknives (Apr 25, 2014)

Honestly flattening doesn't matter as much as people say.  If your stone is dished a little you get a convexed bevel.  That's not the worst thing.

You can search out high and low spots by eye and spend more time sharpening with those spots to even it out more or less

If you are sharpening straight razors or single bevel it would matter much more.  Double bevels I say who cares


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## belfaborac (Jun 14, 2016)

Always nice to get a dissenting view just as I've landed on a purchasing decision...   Anyway, while I'm entirely prepared to believe you're right (just as I'm prepared to believe everyone else, seeing as I have insufficient experience myself), I'm still going to get the diamond plate.  It'll hopefully pay for itself in time saved on sharpening my friends' badly blunted Victorinoxes, Fiskars, Zwillings and Wüsthofs.  And if it doesn't, well..., then at least it'll have been educational.


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## foody518 (Aug 6, 2015)

@MillionsKnives, given, I usually tend to feel this is a problem after multiple sharpening sessions/multiple knives, but the face of the stone near the side edges does end up higher than closer to the center, almost feeling like having a high lip to the stone, before I flatten it out. Do you also get that over time, and does it impede having a clean/consistent edge trailing strop stroke (not feeling like the stone is wavy due to concavity when doing a edge trailing sweep)?


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## mike9 (Jul 13, 2012)

On a tip from Murray Carter I use every available part of the stone so I don't have to flatten often.  It takes a minute to get into that groove as it feels counter to what you see in videos, but it works.


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## rick alan (Nov 15, 2012)

I use the "full treatment" technique also.  First I check the stone to see where the high spots are.  I have a few knives I'm "slowly turning into lasers" and I'll use these if it looks like the high places can use some extra beating down. This technique of course requires your knife edge to go past the edge of the stone.  One side going over one edge, the other side going over the other edge.  Then rotate the stone 180 and do another set of passes.


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## millionsknives (Apr 25, 2014)

The stone that 


foody518 said:


> @MillionsKnives, given, I usually tend to feel this is a problem after multiple sharpening sessions/multiple knives, but the face of the stone near the side edges does end up higher than closer to the center, almost feeling like having a high lip to the stone, before I flatten it out. Do you also get that over time, and does it impede having a clean/consistent edge trailing strop stroke (not feeling like the stone is wavy due to concavity when doing a edge trailing sweep)?


I sharpen in sections so I don't feel I'm missing parts anyway


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## foody518 (Aug 6, 2015)

Sharpening in sections - Does that include strop strokes as well?


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## rick alan (Nov 15, 2012)

You are finishing with your stropping strokes, so here I do not worry about how even I am wearing the stone, I'm just concerned about putting on the perfect edge.  This is also where I do my microbeveling, which I do symetrically, the only departure I make from Jon's instruction.

The center will go concave unless in the rest of your sharpening, both laterally and longitudally, you are intentionally biasing toward the edges, end to end and side to side.

You get more out of this with the softer stones, and in the end you of course do not need to maintain flatness 100% with sharpening technique. You should just do it to the extent you enjoy playing the game.


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## millionsknives (Apr 25, 2014)

I wonder if the shun sharpening service really gives you back the same knife or if they just do a swap.  Like propane exchange you end up with a different one ready to go


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## rick alan (Nov 15, 2012)

It definitely was my knife, had the same exact hazy patches from my thinning work.  It was less than .010" at the edge when I sent it to them, came back .025" thick and with a 50deg inclusive angle!  When they refused to honor the warranty I told them to just send it back, but they decided they'd do me the "favor."  When I confronted the slimeball who runs their warranty/service department he asked me if I'd like to send it back for another "assessment."


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## millionsknives (Apr 25, 2014)

With the volume they deal with, they probably just grind away on a wheel.  Belts would wear out too fast.


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## rick alan (Nov 15, 2012)

I think we both just commented in the wrong post Millions.


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