Did I just shave with the world's sharpest straight? (0.125 Cubic Boron Nitride)

[SliceOfLife]

Interesting. Someone send some to Seraphim. I want to see a .125 CBN stropped edge next to a .1 (or 0.05) Lapping Film honed edge.

 

[gull]

All of a sudden I need to buy some of this stuff

 

[honed]

according to the caption on the picture here,
Keith is in the Orange shirt, Tom in the middle and Ken is on the end with the glasses

Thanks.
Obviously, Tom needs to grow a moustache to fit in

Cubic boron nitride is widely used as an abrasive (ref: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boron_nitride).

I've personally worked with it in cutting tools and grinding applications before.

Cooked up in a ceramic binder, in fine grit, it might make a superb barber hone...

It would probably be a very expensive hone, but my oh my, the 128.000 grit hone

I gave in. I bought a bottle of the stuff.

Damn your stupid post Honed!

You are welcome, if you go hungry because of spending your last € on CBN, please tell me & I'll PIF you some oatmeal

Nice, thanks Jens!

WOW! Thank you for the review, Honed!!!

I enjoyed every word, reliving my own experience off the very same razor! "The falling flimsy blond hair test" or FFBHT had me on the floor!

Ken is officially a vendor here, so you can contact him directly .

The whole BC and CBN thing is a little confusing. It took me a couple of weeks to get it all sorted out in my head.
Basically, Keith from Hand American (the guy on the left) has BC in 1 micron.

Ken from Precise Sharpening (the guy on the right) has .5 and .125 CBN.

FWIW, the BC is a paste and the CBN is a spray.

ChefKnivesToGo carries both of their products.

Thank you Tom!
For a more standardized test, I might make some of that flimsy-blond-hair available thru eBay... (please don't tell my wife )
Here is a genuine sample:

Might become the new standard for ultimate sharpness,
the CBN sure was a new standard for straight edges!

I understand why people get confused with these pastes.
And then Keith & Ken are good buddies & openly supports each others products, so that kind of makes it even harder to separate the two.
Before we know it, you might have come up with a third type of Boron concotion yourself & if you then grow a moustasche, the confusion will be disastrous


So.. how did you do it, from bevel to .125?

Interesting. Someone send some to Seraphim. I want to see a .125 CBN stropped edge next to a .1 (or 0.05) Lapping Film honed edge.

That's a great idea!

And with all the people ordering this stuff now (Hey, don't blame me ) someone should be able to send a razor to Craig anytime soon.

All of a sudden I need to buy some of this stuff

You know you want too..

 

[jendeindustries]

I used to have the handlebars, but then I got serious about my straight razor shaving a couple of years ago!

I'd be happy to hone a few people's razors on the .125 CBN for free (just pay $5.00 in shipping). PM me.

 

[randydance062449]

Good thread! I just ordered some of the 0.125 CBN and 1.0 micron BC.

Those paddle strops I made yesterday will now be put to use.

 

[Thebigspendur]

No, the "cubic" refers to the cubic lattice structure of the crystals.

All minerals at their basic level have a lattice work reflecting their makeup depending on the system they are in. It's their outward habit that makes it a generally accepted xtl based on all those subparts lining up and forming just right which is based on the conditions of formation. I suspect if you looked at this stuff under magnification they would be cubic in appearance.

 

[danjared]

All minerals at their basic level have a lattice work reflecting their makeup depending on the system they are in. It's their outward habit that makes it a generally accepted xtl based on all those subparts lining up and forming just right which is based on the conditions of formation. I suspect if you looked at this stuff under magnification they would be cubic in appearance.

Not exactly. Minerals may occur in an amorphous form, which by definition does not have a lattice structure, at least in the scientific sense (which is the only sense of the word I'm using). A crystal does not tend toward any "habit". It's a crystal or it's not, even if a crystal exhibits cleavage, and many crystals may exist in a single solid (hence the distinction between polycrystalline and monocrystalline). As for boron nitride, it commonly occurs in an amorphous form or one of two crystalline forms (hexagonal and a cubic form that is analogous to the lattice structure of diamonds).

By the way, cubic boron nitride is a commonly used "super" abrasive, just not for razors. Just ask 3M.

 

[huntmol]

Wow, this stuff sounds incredible, just might have to pick some of this up pretty soon...

 

[ctkelly]

Whats the consistency of this spray like....could it be applied to the linen portion of a hanging strop and worked in like CrOx paste or is it more watery like and best applied to some sort of a bench or paddle strop?

 

[jendeindustries]

The .125 CBN is in a water suspension, so it will need to dry. Settled, I'd say about 20% of the bottle is CBN, but Ken would have more precise numbers.

I put mine on balsa, but I imagine leather would be OK, too. Canvas might not work so well since it generally roughs things up a bit.

 

[Kees]

I received the bottle yesterday and applied some on both sides of a French paddle (one side wood, on the other a strip of leather). Initial impression: gets the razor's edge to a new level

One question to jendeindustries: on the bottle it reads: #0.125 (0-0.25) cBNP. Does that mean it contains larger boron nitride particles up to 0.25 micron diameter?

 

[jendeindustries]

I received the bottle yesterday and applied some on both sides of a French paddle (one side wood, on the other a strip of leather). Initial impression: gets the razor's edge to a new level

One question to jendeindustries: on the bottle it reads: #0.125 (0-0.25) cBNP. Does that mean it contains larger boron nitride particles up to 0.25 micron diameter?

It is a new kind of sharp, isn't it? How would you rate the shave experience?

I imagine the cBNP is the Cubic Boron Nitrate, and the P is maybe "precipitate"? I don't rightly know. That's a question for Ken. So is the 0 -.25.

Ken posted an interesting lab analysis on his blog of 3 diamond products which showed that all of them had lower and higher grit ranges than marked on the bottle. The peaks in the graphs show the concentration of particle sizes. Here is the link.

Based on the lab's analysis, I would guess that there is a range of sizes from less than .125 to .25 micron with the main peak being on .125 micron.

Hopefully Ken will chime in soon

 

[honed]

I received the bottle yesterday and applied some on both sides of a French paddle (one side wood, on the other a strip of leather). Initial impression: gets the razor's edge to a new level

One question to jendeindustries: on the bottle it reads: #0.125 (0-0.25) cBNP. Does that mean it contains larger boron nitride particles up to 0.25 micron diameter?

It certainly is a new level of sharp, isn't it
How did you like it?
What stones did you use before it?

I think Ken will chime in, he is member here, & he is the expert on this.

I probably have to pick some up too.
Only thing that bothered me was that shipping to Sweden was $30+, and the spray itself is $32...

It is a new kind of sharp, isn't it? How would you rate the shave experience?

I imagine the cBNP is the Cubic Boron Nitrate, and the P is maybe "precipitate"? I don't rightly know. That's a question for Ken. So is the 0 -.25.

Ken posted an interesting lab analysis on his blog of 3 diamond products which showed that all of them had lower and higher grit ranges than marked on the bottle. The peaks in the graphs show the concentration of particle sizes. Here is the link.

Based on the lab's analysis, I would guess that there is a range of sizes from less than .125 to .25 micron with the main peak being on .125 micron.

Hopefully Ken will chime in soon

That post of his is really interesting.
Obviously he knows a thing or two about sharpening

I had the second shave with my .125 Elliot wedge a few days ago.
It had just the same bite as first shave!

And I still feel that it is very similar in feel on the face to a good Thuringian/Escher edge. Only so much sharper. Like a Thuri on steroids.
In fact I'm thinking of doing a test-shave with a similar Sheffield blade I have that I just touched-up with my vintage Thuri.
Just gonna save up a few days of stubble to really put them to the test.

Shave one side of the face with Thuri edge& the other side with the CBN edge. And make sure to look for all differences during & after.
It will be old school natural vs. state of the art-modern technology

 

[Kees]

I have shaved once now with an edge "subjected" to 0.125 boron nitride.
Edge felt really smooth, not as harsh as I had expected. Face really smooth, took me about 10 min. The quicker the shave the sharper the edge IME.

I started with Hohenzollern (similar to Y/G Escher), Nakayama, 0.125 boron nitride. 20 laps on balsa paddle with 0.125 boron nitride followed by 20 laps on leather prepared with boron nitride. Edge finished on TM Latigo strop.

@Honed: shipping to the Netherlands just as expensive. Little bottle came in ridiculously large USPS box. IMHO shipping in padded envelope would have been much cheaper and just as efficient.

@jendeindustries: the link you gave is for diamond spray. Of course we can expect something similar for cBNP but I 'd be very much interested in an analysis of the 0.125 cBNP.

 

[ambrose]

Just bought a bottle ! cant wait to experiment !

 

[honed]

Just bought a bottle ! cant wait to experiment !

Great! One of the "big names" join in on the fun.
Can't wait to hear you impressions!

 

[Seraphim]

The .125 CBN is in a water suspension, so it will need to dry. Settled, I'd say about 20% of the bottle is CBN, but Ken would have more precise numbers.

I put mine on balsa, but I imagine leather would be OK, too. Canvas might not work so well since it generally roughs things up a bit.

FWIW, I get some of my finest edges off of a pasted cotton belt. I prefer it to pasted leather or hard felt. Canvas may indeed be too stiff and rough, but dome other forms of cloth hangers work quite well in my experience.

 

[superbleu]

Made these up last night. The material is some seatbelt type webbing. I made spanner with some chopped up pencils to keep the webbing from cupping, and the nylon rope is some cheap stuff I picked up a lowes.

I have some .5micron Diamond from SRP
.25micron Diamond from HandAmerica
.25micron CBN from Ken
.125micron CBN from Ken

 

[ouch]

Is it possible that the "grit" of the seatbelt material is coarser than than any of your pastes?

 

[Munxcub]

Is it possible that the "grit" of the seatbelt material is coarser than than any of your pastes?

But is the nylon hard enough to matter?