Keeping waterstones flat

firasmaruf

How do members of the ChefSteps team prefer to flatten their stones? Lapping stone? Coarser stone?

sixten.be

Personally I really like using my diamond lapping plate (180grit 75 micron) 76x200mm. It's big enough to cover a large portion of my stones and works the stones flat almost immediately. I find that it works much more efficiently then using dedicated ceramic stone flatteners, which may leave marks as many of them have a much courser grit (as low as 20 grit) and no need to even consider soaking it as you may need if you use cermaic stone flatteners or rub it against a courser stone.

In the end whether you use a dedicated lapping stone/plate or rub it with another of your stones you will in all cases get something flat and the main reason for choosing one over the other is what you feel suits you best. I prefer a thick and heavy metal plate with a diamond grit to have something very flat, that will not get bent out of shape and only needs to be dried off after use. It's more practical but the cost of my plate was the same as buying 2 or 3 new water stones.