Vintage Aoto Medium-High Grit Japanese Natural Sharpening Stone 2lb. 13oz. (1275g)
197mmX38mmX63mm
It is very heavy stone for the size, so it should be very condensed stone.
It is not easy to find Natural Japanese stone in Hawaii, but I found it here in Hawaii.
Hawaii has a long immigrant history from Japan (I guess it has been over 160 years), so Carpenter, barber, cook, fish cutter, butcher, etc. needed good sharpening stones, especially carpenter and barber needed high-quality fine grit stones in old days (until King synthetic red color sharpening stone came up on the market in 1960s, Aoto is the main medium to medium high grit sharpening stone).
Hardness-------------8.7
It raises very good amount of slurry, and it has smooth sharpening surface, but it is very hard stone.
It looks it does not need tomo nagura or the device to raise the slurry (worn Diamond lapping stone).
(Scale; 1 to 10, 1-3 is very soft, muddy, rough grit whetstone 3-6 is soft medium grit whetstone, 6-8 is hard medium grit whetstone; 8-10 is fine grit whetstone)
Particle Size----------7.6
It makes my Swedish pure carbon steel / soft iron blade knife;
Jigane became dark frosted silver color finish, and Hagane became bright silver color.
(Scale; 1 to 10, 1-3 give deep scratch marks to the steel, 3-5 is delete the 1-3 scratches, 5-8 makes 3the steel cloudy, 8-10 makes the steel semi-mirror finish or mirror finish)
Natural whetstone has wider capacity than artificial whetstone, and actually, we do not know until sharpen blade on the hone for a while. Because artificial whetstone molecules do not break down to smaller sizes, but Natural whetstone molecules are possible to break down to smaller sizes, and those molecules are mixed with sharpened steel molecules, and make Jigane as suitable Jigane color, and Hagane as suitable Hagane color. It is natural mystics.