Thread: More about Veritas Green Honing compund

I bought the green crayon a while back and was never able to make it work properly.
I had read it should be about 3000 on the WnD scale (which is different from the stone grit ratings) and I figured this would be the perfect thing to follow on with after my 2500 WnD paper.

What I found was that after polishing the blade up to 2500 on the paper, the green crayon would bring the finish on the edge back to somewere near that of my 1500 grit paper Not Happy Jan.

I decided to give the crayon another go the other day and have realized the error of my ways.

The reason I gave the crayon another go was that I'd heard that some MDF is not as good as other MDF. I figured that the MDF I got from Bunnings may have been dodgy so I picked up a small off cut from the local cabinet makers supplier and gave that a go.

I apply my green crayon to MDF, BTW.

At the same time I gave my Veritas honing guide a bit of a clean up and removed the little bit of filings, grit, etc that builds up above the wheel.

The result? Beautiful!!!

I have the scar to prove it. :eek:

As a result of changing two things a once I can't be sure which one made the difference, but I suspect that cleaning the guide may have been the big one.
I think that the waxy based green crayon may have caught all the "dirt" off my honing guide, giving unpredictable results.

As a bonus I realized how much the WnD was rounding over my edges and that the crayon can fix that.


I was feeling so good, that after my finger healed a bit I decided to try my newly sharpened plane on a sample of Cooktown Ironwood I had been itching to have a go at.

Cooktown Ironwood 1. plane 0.

Sucker for punishment.


Just thought I'd share.

Ben.