I use a product called, " Liquid Wrench " to clean my stones. Soap and water will remove oil, but there are tiny bits of steel clogging the surface of the stone and they have to come out if your stone is to cut again. Liquid Wrench has some oxidizers in it that actually help dissolve the steel bits, loosening them enough to float up in the Kerosene base and be wiped off with a rag or paper towel. I put the oil on the stone, let it sit for 20 minutes to a half hour to work, and then wipe it off. If I still see streaks of " shine " or steel on the stone when held up to low angled light, I repeat the process until all the shine is gone. Now the stone's grit can cut the steel from the edge of the nextknife or chisel I want to sharpen.
I do not recommend using oil on your honing stones. Oil fills the pores of the stone, and lets the edge of your blade slide over the abrasive, rather than letting the abrasive cut steel. Worse, the oil suspends bits of abrasive worn off, along with some bits of steel and those wash over the top side of your blade edge while you are trying to sharpen the bottom side. Then when you turn the blade over to sharpen the other side, the slurry begins dulling the edge you just sharpened.
I use Liquid Wrench because its mostly kerosene, on my medium and coarse stones to help carry the bits of steel away, and to have the oxidizers already down in the surface of the stone when bits of steel are cut off by the abrasive surface of the stone. I want the large grit suspended so that i can frequently clean off the slurry, and replace it with new liquid wrench, during the sharpening process.
Now, I use a 3-step process to sharpen knives. I use my medium or coarst stones to create the initial bevel to the edge. This is a shallow bevel or angle, typically under 20 degrees. The point is to remove metal away from the edge so that the edge can work without interference from a wide blade.
Once I have a bevel established on both sides of the blade, I go to my fine, Black Arkansas stone. I do NOT use Liquid Wrench( Kroil etc.) on this stone when cutting my fine, final edge. That is done on a dry stone. I raise the back of the knife up to increase the angle of the edge for this final honing. That give me what is referred to as a supported edge, but a very fine, thin cutting edge to the knife. The Liquid Wrench is used to clean the steel out of my fine stone when I finish with the sharpening.
Because no matter how fine a stone you use, a burr will be worked up on your edge from the sharpening process, the third step is to use a strop to remove that tiny burr from the edge. A Burr is often called a " false Edge", because those who don't know better, will feel the burr, and think the knife edge is both sharp, and ready to use.
Its not.
stop the blade to remove the burr the entire length of the blade. I use an old belt that I loop over a doorknob. I hold the other end, lean back so my arm is holding both the strop taut, and my weight from falling, and then stroke the knife back and forth on each side of the blade to remove the burr, and make sure the edge is absolutely straight.
Clean any remaining oils or crud from the blade, prepare it for storage, and you are done. Now go back and clean your stones. Don't put good honing stones away covered in oils, or crud, or with steel clogging the surface. You might as well fill the saw teeth of a saw with weld before putting it away in storage, for as much use as a loaded stone will be the next time you need to sharpen a knife blade.
