Thanks so much. I wanted to give the oil suggestion a try for a few days and then reply back. I cleaned the diamond stones as usual "warm soapy water, an old disposable electric toothbrush", dried the stones with a towel and applied my favorite oil (ballistol). The Ballistol immediately pulled up a bunch of gunk from the diamond stones that the soap, water and toothbrush did not get. In fact,
It was like I had not cleaned the stones at all giving the amount of gunk that came out of the stones.

I washed the gunk out, dried the stones again and applied another light coat of oil. I have had no rust issues since using your suggestion of the oil and it has not affected the performance of the stones. I like to use Ballistol because it is not toxic to humans and many of the knives I sharpen are kitchen knives.

Thanks so much for the help, I truly appreciate it and perhaps this will help others with the same issue.

Dan...

Dan, I did the same (using Ballistol) about a week ago and am happy with the results so far. I was initially concerned that there might be a tendency for the diamond stones to get gunked up, but this did not happen. I will probably continue to use it in this manner until I notice any potential problems. I plan to use it only on the diamond stones.

Ralph

Ralph, thanks for the info. It looks like oil is a good cleaner and keeps the rust away. I just keep finding more and more uses for the ballistol and being non-toxic is a bonus.

Dan, I cannot say this is true for just any other oil/lubricant, but the key perhaps with Ballistol (IMO) is that it emulisfies with water and it seems to resist to allowing accumulation of grit/shavings (low gunk factor) from sharpening. Someone on this forum could probably give us a Chemistry lesson on this, but I am not qualified since I had 2 years of freshman chemistry. LOL

Ralph