Also, you can get machinist’s granite blocks in various sizes pretty inexpensively. I paid about $25 ~15 years ago for a 9x13 block that’s true to one ten thousandth over the entire surface (and that’s the cheap hobbyist model).
I use plate glass because it’s cheaper and nearly as flat as a machinist block.
I had a chance to buy one of those 6 inch thick 4x3 foot solid stone machinist’s plates, true to .001 inch over the entire surface, for $80 once. Unfortunately I wasn’t in a vehicle that could carry it, and I’ve regretted that ever since. Small plates suitable for knife sharpening have become relatively inexpensive but big blocks like that one cost thousands of dollars normally.
How about old electrical machinery?
Fist-sized open frame relays can be restored by disassembly and polishing. This one is 36vdc SPDT, about a hundred amps continuous duty.
Edit:. Sorry about the orientation. Turn your head sideways!
Edit: There’s a big ol’ Narceus americanus in that jar. Pretty thing, very stylish color scheme.
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Maybe that’s a supplier specific issue. I have no problem buying cold rolled precision ground steel and brass bars. I verify flatness using a glass plate.
I don’t put so much pressure or move the bar fast enough to gets bends or temp gradients. A 12"x1.5"x3/8" bar is rigid enough for sanding and polishing.
I just put a hard crease in the paper and wrap it around the bar. That also gives me a 3/8 side for squaring up the choil and shoulder.
I would think granite would actually be more of a liability. Once you cut it down or have a piece small enough to use as a hand tool (again, I move the sanding block not the blade) you are in the realm of fragile. While I don’t put a ton of pressure on the tool, it feels like enough to fracture a thin-ish piece of granite.
I picked up my technique during 3 years I spent as an apprentice bladesmith. Sweeping, polishing, sanding, and cleaning was what I spent most of my time doing until I had enough skill to do my own pieces. When a blade goes through heat treating, no matter how well you polished the surface before treating you still have a good deal of oxidation on the blade. That means you need to work a piece of hardened and tempered steel which is a world away from the same material before it was heat treated. I’ve spent endless days in the zone sanding away at everything from 2" caping knives to 42" claymores. The bevels stayed crisp and the flats stayed flat. Mirror, satin, and acid etched finishes all started with the same surface prep of a sanding bar and a vice. I’m sure there are many ways to achieve a mirror finish. It’s simply that I’ve found using sandpaper and a bar of flat metal is an inexpensive, easy, and fast way to get there.
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Everything I can get locally is either ripply or costs more than stone (which is free from the countertop place) or glass (which is dirt cheap).
Since I only sharpen chisels to ultimate precision, and I use an angle guide, I’m using the opposite technique 
. I sharpen knives and swords on the tabletop belt sander, and I do mower blades and chainsaws with jigs and rotary stones. Axes I sharpen with whatever’s handy, you can get a slight hollow grind with a good river cobble.
Speaking of jigs and guides, I like the heavy rubberized clamp the gentleman in the video used with his waterstones. Elegant!
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uhhh, bud…this is an amazing/amazingly written post. I don’t know why you’re mucking about with data entry or faux historical holsters, I would pay honest money to read your memoirs (and I never pay for books, except late fees…)
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Sharpening is a whole other matter. I sharpen on used up 320 grit belts on a 2x42 belt sander using my thumbnail as the guide on western blades and bevel sharpen on eastern.
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Reverse polarity electropolishing. Now go have a beer - you can skip all the painstaking work, sharpen it, do a final polish, and have another beer.
Because those are the kinds of things that are perfect for author bios 
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I use spent belts on the final sharpen, too. But I’ll use fresh belts if I need to hog off a lot of metal to get to a straight edge. Just have to watch the heat, basically.
My big antique framing chisels have an absurd number of hours on them, cleaning, sharpening, polishing… they need to be able to glide through hickory, 200 year old heart pine and freshly cut white oak with equal ease. For them I use a precision guide and increasing grits of wet sandpaper on glass plates, finishing up the last bevel with 6000 grit. But I’ve just never found that I needed that level of sharp on a knife, and that level of sharp on an axe is counterproductive for my uses (I’m using axes for splitting and felling, not boatbuilding).
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Have old mirrors and glassware/china - will u work 4 food? 
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Probably completely baffled by the discovery that humans have access to hyperadvanced claw magic; but use it to kill vegetables rather than for something actually worthwhile.
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From what I understand most cut stone. But a sufficiently thick piece of the right stone cut as a counter top is apparently as reliably flat as any other option. Just always seemed kind of expensive to me. And you are, in that model, using it as a bench stone.
As for the brass? I doubt its any more likely to warp or be non-flat than the water stones I use. Which need to be flattened from time to time. And guess what something flat with sandpaper is the go to cheap way to make that happen.
But I’m guessing that’s the reason its not one of the default options. Along with price. Brass ain’t cheap.
I’ve heard hard mouse pads make great sharpening stations. Especially if you’re looking for a convex edge and don’t own a belt sander.
My trick for torn up screw heads is to chuck them in a hand drill, and then spin them into sandpaper over mousepad material. Sometimes I need to cut new slots, but they often come out looking new.
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I’ve done this; it is really slow (but maybe my pad’s too soft).
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Did you, by the way, sell to Japanese buyers?
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