1st shave not so great but what I experienced.

[Traprock]

One of the first things I realized was I need to make my soap thinner and slicker than what I use for a DE. I'm not sure if it's because I'm wiping the blade dry on a towel whereas my DE hits my face wet, thus adding a bit of water to the spot I'm shaving. I felt like the blade wasn't gliding smoothly and was sticking to my skin. I definitely had the spine off the skin level so I'm not sure why, unless it was the issue of my soap/water ratio.
Second thing is my blade isn't as flat along the length of the edge as I thought. I didn't realize this until after my shave and I held the blade flat on the edge of counter top. Now that I see it, I can better judge how much of the blade is in contact with skin.

Main problems I encountered are properly stretching the skin even after drying fingers and most difficult was finding the correct way to hold the blade while doing the neck, especially the first WTG pass. It seemed like I couldn't find a way to hold it where I had the blade level with the skin without having the heel or toe ready to go into my jawline or bottom of neck. Also troubling was the angle of the scales so as not to be in the way or even hitting body somewhere. I'm sure these are things that will come with practice and I'm not too worried. I remember my first DE shave which was full of irritation and left plenty of stubble and a few nicks on top. Now I shave super smooth with no irritation and never the tiniest nick.

I wasn't expecting my first shave to be good. Main concern was to see what issues I needed to work out and obviously to not cut myself where I'd be inclined to put it down and not try again.

 

[dmatcuk]

Hi and welcome to the world of straight shaving! It sounds like the shave wasn't too bad for a first go. I think you are headed in the right direction. Couple of things:

Most people do like a little slicker of a lather for straights. So a little more water may help for sure. Another thing that helps is lathering different sections of your face. That way the lather isn't drying on your face while you shave other areas. It helps while you are learning. I still do it for my across the grain pass.

The other bit of advice would be to use an alum block if you have to help with your grip for stretching. I wet my fingers and rub them on the block. They stick a lot better to my face and really help with the stretching.

The holds and angles will come to you in time. You could always watch a couple youtube videos to give you ideas. Take your time and enjoy the shaves.

 

[RedsFan75]

I'm not that far ahead of you and found that the thicker DE style lather will indeed cause the blade to feel sticky as you described. The is a link to the interactive guide, and it has photos of various grips. Welcome to the club.

 

[Traprock]

Hi and welcome to the world of straight shaving! It sounds like the shave wasn't too bad for a first go. I think you are headed in the right direction. Couple of things:

Most people do like a little slicker of a lather for straights. So a little more water may help for sure. Another thing that helps is lathering different sections of your face. That way the lather isn't drying on your face while you shave other areas. It helps while you are learning. I still do it for my across the grain pass.

The other bit of advice would be to use an alum block if you have to help with your grip for stretching. I wet my fingers and rub them on the block. They stick a lot better to my face and really help with the stretching.

The holds and angles will come to you in time. You could always watch a couple youtube videos to give you ideas. Take your time and enjoy the shaves.

Thanks for the suggestions, I'm going to try it this morning and see. I'm shaving around a very short tight beard. At first I thought it would be easier to practice this way but now I'm thinking while it is less to shave and I don't have to worry about the chin, the beard is requiring some skill to shave around. I will probably shave it off this week and try again next weekend with a bare face.
I've never had or used an alum block before. Might be worth looking into.

 

[Traprock]

I'm not that far ahead of you and found that the thicker DE style lather will indeed cause the blade to feel sticky as you described. The is a link to the interactive guide, and it has photos of various grips. Welcome to the club.

Thanks. I'm going to try it much thinner today and see. I used to shave with the soap as thin as it could be without falling off the brush, but then found a little thicker was better for my DE. I'll go back to that thinner method. And as Dmatcuk suggested, I'm going to do one section at a time so things aren't drying out while I fumble around.

 

[Traprock]

Update on 2nd shave. Went pretty much the same. The blade was choppy and not really cutting. I know I'm new at this SR thing but I'm figuring something may be wrong with my edge. I received the razor with a note saying don't strop before using first time, so I didn't. I did so little shaving with it in the first attempt, I didn't bother to strop for attempt number 2. After having similarly poor results, I was trying to determine the sharpness of the edge by running it over my arm hairs, which it would not cut or grab at any distance unless virtually touching. That didn't seem right. So now after 2 shaves worth I stropped the blade and immediatly noticed something. After about 10 passes on the strop, I started to get some auditory feedback, despite a super gental and flat motion on the leather. I figured this must mean something so I continued to strop some more and wiped the blade. I tried the same test of running it across the hairs on my arm and this time it chopped through whatever it contacted even way above the skin.
It was too late to test on my face, especially after doing 2 passes with the straight, each followed by the DE to clean up.
I did decide to use it on the hair on the sides of my neck. I normally do this once or twice per week so there was a few days growth there. I lathered up and tried again and what a difference. I did a WTG and XTG with zero trouble and no irritation. Now I now this hair is finer than my beard but the skin tends to be very sensitive there, plus I had a few days growth it was cutting through at once.
This is giving me some high hopes again. I was going to wait until next weekend to try the straight again since my neck was so irritated but I still may try again tomorrow.

 

[seattleshaver]

Just don't shave your neck with the straight if you can do it with your DE and not irritate it (and thereby give it some more time to heal and still be able to use your straight for everything else).

Stropping shouldn't make a great deal of difference after just one limited shave. Regarding the feedback while stropping. I assume you have a hollow ground blade and you get that "singing" sound when you strop. That is normal.

You are probably still getting used to the best angle for you to shave with. When it is close (but not on) to your face it should be easy to cut. When you increase the angle it gets harder to cut. Of course shaving your cheek is easier than shaving your chin.

You shouldn't worry too much about a HHT. There are too many variables especially when you are new. If it shaves that's good and if it doesn't that's not so good.

 

[StubbleTrouble]

Your improved results could be the result of stropping, improving technique, or both. Make sure you read up on stropping as it is equally important to the shaving technique itself. While good stropping maintains the edge quality, bad stropping can round the edge, in which case the only remedy is re-honing.

 

[Traprock]

After reading other posts from other beginners, I'm going to go ahead and assume the problem was me and not the edge. I used the DE today to give my neck area a break . Will get back to the straight tomorrow. I watched a few more you tube videos in the mean time.