Re: Diamond &Ceramic Plates – Microscope progression
Excellent question, Mark!
You can see fromt he 1K Diamond picture that everything looks pretty good – minus my 2 little bumps in the edge of the edge. :whistle: The scratches are consistent, and the depth of each seems to reflect in a consistent manner. The hidden scratches from coarser grits are masked by the “noise” from the reflections of light from the existing bevel. This is because the refinement isn’t enough to get a clear reading of the surface, and because the diamonds scratches are still pretty deep, causing the peaks and valleys to reflect light in different directions.
1K WEPS diamond:
On the 1200 Ceramic, the depth of the scratches are more shallow, and the quality of the scratches makes a more even surface that allows for the deeper scratches to be exposed – it’s a lot like looking to the bottom of a pool through a disturbed surface vs. looking down through a calm surface.
1200 WEPS ceramic:
This issue of deeper scratches being exposed happens at every level simply because each grit makes finer scratches. That’s one reason I like a progression that uses more stones with smaller jumps between grits – it takes less time to smooth over the surface from the previous scratches.
However, fewer stones with larger jumps between grits really just needs more time to establish the finer grit’s scratches. Keep in mind that different mediums will require different amounts of time to abrade the surface sufficiently. That’s why I said that the exposed scratches could be attributed to my scrubbing not being enough.
I suggested going back to the 800 or 1K paddles because if an edge has a lot of deeper scratches, it would be more advantageous to step back a grit. But if the scratches are from a closer grit, then more time on the existing grit can often remedy the problem. I chose more strokes in this case.
There will be a point of diminishing returns, though. Don’t expect your 30K Shapton pro stone to remove the 400 grit scratches any time this week. 😛