What's new

Wanna get this right

I haven't tried it, but I know some guys use an alum block on their damp fingers to give them some "gription" when they stretch their skin. It might be worth a try and may work better than the washcloth.
 
I haven't tried it, but I know some guys use an alum block on their damp fingers to give them some "gription" when they stretch their skin. It might be worth a try and may work better than the washcloth.

That's a curious idea. I'll give it a try sometime. I find the washcloth works extremely well. It took me two tries to figure out the best way to hold it so I didn't have it dangling all over, but no problems after that. I'll try the alum and report back.
 
Waited until evening to shave today, so had 1 1/2 days and plenty of growth. Ordered a Finest Badger brush from Otto today. I'd like to have one I can use to face lather in hopes of traveling with it for interviews soon. Traveling with a bowl, TOBS bowl, etc. is a bit much. A stick would be better.

The Shave
Gillette Yellow on day 2. I can't tell if the Yellows or Astras are smoother for me as these still pull and tug a bit. Showered including scrubbing my face with a soapy washcloth, shampooing and leaving conditioner on it for a few minutes. On exiting the shower I rubbed in a bit of my TOBS with some water while I built lather, etc. I was kicked out of the bathroom for a few minutes, so I applied a warm (not very) washcloth while I waited to get back in. Very warm splash and lathered. WTG, WTG, XTG, XTG. I did some ATG and buffing on a few areas. I find that I have absolutely no tendency to use pressure while buffing, whereas I still start to once in a while during my normals passes. I always get a bleeder on my first XTG and this was no exception. Had two by the time XTG finished. Both closed up before the final pass and nothing re-opened at any point. Alum still burned a bit in a few areas and a lot in one area, but that's the least burn from that I've had yet. The bad spot was because I tried to rush at one point and went over an area without lathering it. (Doh!) Oh, and I used the washcloth to stretch the skin again and it helps immensely.

Outcome and Time
Didn't time at all. My daughter was shaving with me since she now has her own razor. (thanks, windrider!) This didn't help with distractions, but was totally worth it.
DFS, maybe even DFS+ in most areas. Still have to come up with a way to get the skin on my AA that can't stretch far enough out. I'm getting better with it though. Still having trouble with getting really close at the base of my neck where it also gets red. Getting better there too.

Takeaways
- As much as I advocate sticking to a blade for a long while while learning technique, these Gillette Yellows are still tugging on WTG areas where I know 100% my angle is correct. I think I'm going to load up a Feather next. Yellows still seem to tug about the same as the Astras, but I won't know until I try one of those again someday.
- Keep using the washcloth and try finger on alum to stretch skin.
- One of the least amounts of irritation I've had for getting an acceptable shave. I'm getting better at this.

Questions
None
 
Last edited:
No rush today and no need for a great shave. Need to shave tomorrow though, so took it pretty easy.

Shave
Day 3 on Gillette Yellow. Normal prep except that I did rub some TOBS on my face as I had to get a bunch of stuff around after leaving the shower. Rinsed that and lathered. 2x WTG, 1x WTG mixed with some XTG in certain areas. Left it at that. Not a very good shave, I guess for most it would be SAS. Can't feel stubble if I rub my hand WTG anywhere, but can see it pretty clearly due to how dark and thick it is. Good enough. Alum didn't burn at all anywhere.

But, I did notice my face started to burn like it usually does after the first pass just before I rinsed off the TOBS I had put on. I fear I may be having a slight reaction to it. That would be a real shame as I really like the stuff. The reaction isn't bad and I always just assumed I was doing something a little bit wrong on that first pass. I'll continue to do what I've been doing for now and will test this when I can get XTG without any alum burn as well.

Oh, no bleeders anywhere.

Outcome and Time
No rush and my daughter again shaved with me. Don't know time.
Again, was maybe a SAS with absolutely no irritation. I certainly won't settle for this most days, but need to shave tomorrow and it's good enough for now.

Takeaways
- New blade tomorrow. May try Feather
- Afraid that TOBS may not like me. The burning is slight, but is certainly there.
- I know I cannot get an acceptable shave for work days from just WTG passes.

Questions
Nada.
 
Simple shave today with a new Feather blade as I had great success yesterday with no irritation from the blade and the Yellows tug.

Shave
Normal shower with conditioner, TOBS applied with my Pure brush. I did have burning on the top of my cheeks from the lather before a blade touched my face. No tugging or pulling at all on WTG/WTG/XTG and about 2-3 touch-ups. Boy is that a nice feeling. I ended up with one small bleeder on my chin during the XTG and got sloppy at the side of my neck for an extra bleeder. Both sealed up with the alum, which only burned slightly at the mistake on my neck. Neither re-opened at all. Finished with WH and ASB.

Outcome and Time
Both shower and shave were a little faster than normal, totaling 50 minutes.
It's a solid high-SAS or low-DFS. Another XTG pass would be a very good DFS.

Takeaways
- Seems like I probably do have a slight allergy to the TOBS Sandalwood, but it's not bad enough to change anything yet. After I get a few great shaves with these Feathers, I'll try one of my soaps.
- Feathers are GREAT for me.
- Figure out how long Feathers last me
- Sometime in the future I should try the other recommended Gillettes, Meds, Labs, and Polsilvers if I want.

Questions
none
 
Day 2 with Feather and I got my first cut (not weeper or bleeder, all-out cut).

Shave

Normal shower w/ conditioner. I put a little lather on my face today while I made lather (not cream from the can, but early lather) because I wanted to take more time and try to build 'better' lather. Something like this. I used more TOBS, added water slowly, etc. I wasn't able to get that and so I tried adding a bit more water and ended up a little bubbly. After a long while I gave up (kept my face wet the whole time), added some cream and shaved with what I normally use. WTG, XTG, XTG using some ATG in a few areas where XTG doesn't work, but WTG gets close enough to jump to ATG. We're talking more touch-ups than real ATG pass. I did get my first cut as I screwed up a slight j-hook. I was more being lazy than anything and paid for it. 3/8" nice, true cut. Bled pretty well and would have dripped if I wasn't watching and wiping it. I hit it with a styptic right away after my warm rinse and it closed up very nicely. It didn't even re-open through the cold rinse, WH or ASB. Wife couldn't tell it was there when I pointed it out until she got really close. Not bad. I used alum on my fingers instead of the washcloth and it worked. It's not as good, but more convenient and certainly good enough. I'll stick to alum for this purpose.

Outcome and Time
I took my time today trying to build better lather. I probably took an extra 5+ minutes trying. Shower was 15:00, Shave 43:00. Total 58:00. A mostly-DFS with that one cut. Alum only burned in two small spots. I'm confident I can do WTG and XTG without any trouble and am probably good enough to do ATG with these blades as well.

Takeaways
- Totally sold on Feathers for now. I'll order another pack or two.
- I'll use this blade one more day and toss it no matter what.
- I'm a putz for cutting myself, but realize these blades are sharp enough that I can't be lazy.
- Still getting some burning from the TOBS, but not bad.
- Alum works well enough on fingers to stretch the skin. Not sure if that does anything to tighten the skin up though. I suppose it would. Keep testing this.
- I'm now convinced the other blades just plain aren't sharp enough for me as I've changed nothing and these are smooth without any pulling. - I'll try to remember to pick up some glycerin sometime. No rush, but curious.

Questions

None
 
Last edited:
I haven't tried it, but I know some guys use an alum block on their damp fingers to give them some "gription" when they stretch their skin. It might be worth a try and may work better than the washcloth.

As noted above, this does work. It's not as good for friction as a washcloth, but good enough and less hassle. I'm curious as to how much the alum tightens the skin though and will test as I go. If I start getting cut or having a hard time shaving the areas where I pull, I'll change things around. Thanks for the good suggestion and yes, it works.
 
Day 3 on Feather. Irritated my self slightly.

Shave
Normal prep incl. shower and conditioner. TOBS as I normally lather it. WTG,XTG,XTG,ATG. Things went well for the most part. I noticed a small bleeder after one of my XTG passes, but by the end of the pass I couldn't even find it again. I tried to be a little careful around the healing cut from yesterday, but did open it up just a bit. Used the styptic on it to great result and it didn't open up at all again. I caught myself trying to do a second pass without cream for touch-ups while doing my XTG and ATG passes. Probably noticed this 3-4 times (ugh). Of course, those areas had a slight burn from the alum and showed some irritation for about two hours after the shave. Oddly, my upper lip was red and irritated, I assume from razor burn. I only did a couple passes on it and didn't do anything different with the razor. My lather may have dried a touch though during one of my passes, so that may be the culprit. It's not bad at all, but I shouldn't have any irritation there.

After my 4 passes I did a few touch-ups and it felt and looked good. Warm rinse, alum with slight burn in a few areas, styptic on the cut from yesterday, let it air dry, cold rinse, let it mostly dry, WH, let dry, ASB. Tossed blade at the end.

Outcome and Time
Forgot to look at the time when I finished. Probably around 30 minutes for the shave.
DFS/DFS+ Cheeks are pretty close to BBS, neck is DFS. After the WH, I inspected a bit and noticed some stragglers if I make the bullfrog face. Never had that before, especially with ATG. Still getting some red dots along the edges of the growth on my neck, but they aren't irritated. I assume they'll go away with time and guess they might just be from the flat-laying hairs betting stood up by the blade.

Takeaways
- Not sure what think about the irritation. The blade may have been dulling a bit. Plus, was first day doing ATG with the feather. I need to try ATG again on a day 1/2 feather.
- I have to stop trying to touch-up areas as I go without lather. Duh!

Questions
None
 
Didn't shave yesterday, lots of growth today.

Shave
Left the conditioner on my beard a little longer and used a little hotter water in the shower. It felt a bit softer getting out.
New Feather blade, TOBS, WTG/XTG/hybrid pass and some buffing to finish. The WTG pass was better than normal. I think the new feather and extended prep helped that. The XTG pass started with less to remove and ended pretty well. Sadly, I still caught myself re-shaving small patches without re-lathering a few times - gotta break that habit completely. This caused a couple very small weepers, but they closed before the end of the pass. My hybrid pass was mostly ATG, but was oblique ATG in areas where ATG is still a bit troublesome. Finished up with a bit of blade buffing where needed.

I'm quickly learning what passes and parts of my face are better with what techniques and directions. I did some experimenting with blade buffing on the left part of my neck around the Adam's Apple and the bottom of my growth and it was very successful without irritation. I did not do that on the right side and can tell a difference in shave quality. I also was careful around the light scab from my nice cut a few days ago and didn't open it at all. I did shave over it for a DFS- on that little spot.

Warm rinse. Alum with medium burn in a couple areas where I had those weepers and a moderate glow in a few other areas. Cold rinse, WH, ASB.

Outcome and Time
Didn't time. Saturday, so I slowed down and learned a bit more about each pass and each part of my face.
DFS/DFS+ Very good shave with only mild irritation due to my bad habits. About 30 minutes later I have a light irritation on the right side of my neck and a little glowing feel on my upper lip and left neck. Those red spots (not irritation) didn't show up today until I rubbed in my ASB.

Takeaways
- I'll try using ASB everywhere except the bottom of my neck where the red spots appear and see if it's the rubbing or ASB causing it. Goes away in a couple hours and isn't irritated, so no huge deal.
- Feathers may only really work well two days, but I'll have to see how this one goes.
- Going to post about the blades I have and see if there are any I should outright skip as PIFs or blade bank trades. May not do it today.
- I've nearly perfected most of my trouble areas.

Questions
I'll ask about blades in another thread.
 
I plan to start writing only when something of note happens. Well, it happened. Terrible shaves. I got a new brush - finest Whipped Dog 22mm knot in a butterscotch Eveready handle. (there may be issues with it dropping to many hairs, but the guy I bought it from is working it out with me). Either way, I test lathered it a few times and it seemed to work really well. Then I tried shaving with it. I Just couldn't get a good lather with my TOBS. Everything I do seems to create a light, airy lather. If I add a little water, I get huge bubbles that follow the brush and turn to stingy, airy wisps when they pop. I tried adding product and it seemed to just dry out, but never exploded like I'm used to. Saturday I did a quick two-pass WTG/WTG-XTG and called it good as it wasn't smooth and my ace was drying out too much from standing water on it. It ended up better than I expected as maybe SAS, but was a bit irritated.

Today I gave it a go again with the new brush and had the exact same problem with lather - it wouldn't really explode in the bowl or on the brush. The lather started pretty well and I did a WTG, but the lather seemed to dry as I progressed. I added a tiny bit of water and it turned back to decent lather, but when I put it on my wet face, it started streaking. It also seemed to dry out pretty quickly in the bowl. I worked it more on my wet face and it seemed to make a better lather. But, it wasn't smooth on the blade and I gave up. Rinsed it down the drain.

I tried lathering with my Conk soap and it lathered better, but still not great. I did what I had to to get to SAS and called it good. Then I stood there and made lather trying to get it right. I can't so far. I probably made lather 10 times. I started with TOBS as I normally would but with the new brush and would get a great lather for a second, but then it quickly dried or something. A little more water and it wouldn't stick to the sides of the bowl, had a bunch of little bubbles and had the big bubbles. Doubled the amount of TOBS and couldn't make a go of that either, no matter what I tried. I then reached for the Conk soap and had a little better luck. Gave up and went back to my Conk Pure brush

With the Conk brush the TOBS was only slightly better with fewer small bubbles and not many huge ones. Pretty sure I was doing everything as I had only days ago. I then did a bunch of testing with the soap. I tried soaking the brush then 2 little shakes with 40 swirls. Then 3 shakes 40 swirls. 4-40. After each of the 40 swirls I moved to the bowl. None of them seemed right. I then did 60 swirls with 3 and 4 shakes. Marginally better. Next I did 80 with 3 swirls and it seemed a little better, but never exploded in the bowl. Finally, I tried actually making my lather on the puck. It mostly worked. The lather it made was very dense and wouldn't really peak an stand - it was almost sticky, but it was very slippery and felt like it had alright cushion. I moved that to the bowl and it was the best I had all night.

So, I have to figure this out. I hope my water isn't somehow harder this week though I feel like my sink and razor get more soap scummy lately. Seems unlikely though. I also noticed my face remained a little white without an extra two rinses after the TOBS. But, I was taking so much time making lather, I probably didn't notice I hadn't rinsed well. It does still irritate my face if I leave on lather too long.

I'm a bit frustrated and will watch the lathering videos and read up again in case I somehow forgot how to do this. Weird. Maybe I'll use some filtered water next time if I have trouble making lather.
 
Worth writing about. Didn't shave yesterday as I had the night before. Had extra growth due to bad last shave (bad lather). I thought more about the lather problems I was having and realized I must be using too much water. I also think I was trying to fix it too long. So, went back to my original brush and gave it one extra shake. I think it's breaking in and holding more water. Spot-on. Great lather in very little time from my TOBS.

Shave
I did my normal prep and included rubbing a little TOBS directly on my face in case I had a while to wait for lather. Lather was perfect right away and I went to town. Feather blade, WTG/XTG/XTG. Pretty good with no irritation, so I decided to go for ATG where I can and oblique ATG where I can't. Really good and still basically no irritation, so I did some blade buffing. I noticed one small bleeder, but I couldn't even find it again after my rinse. I caught myself trying to touch up an area after a pass without re-lathering. I expected to burn a bit there during the alum, but proceeded with buffing. Warm rinse. Alum, which burned just a bit, but nothing like usual. Cold rinse, WH, ASB.

Outcome and Time
Didn't time it at all.
BBS on pretty much every part of my face. Best shave yet. No real irritation, no nicks, no bleeders. Sweet! I don't even have the normal red areas at the bottom of my neck, which makes no sense to me, but I'll go with it. I even did ATG and buffing there without any problems.

Takeaways
- Need to shake out my brushes more, especially the new one.
- I need to stop making my lather when it's ready, not keep going to see if it will grow. Pretty sure this was part of my problem last two times.

Questions
None.
 
Awesome progress!

So I noticed from the pictures in your thread that your lower neck growth direction is practically identical to mine. I've always had issues tackling this area. How exactly are you reducing it? Shaving WTG does practically nothing for me because the hairs on my neck grow so close to the skin. What direction are you going XTG?
 
Awesome progress!

So I noticed from the pictures in your thread that your lower neck growth direction is practically identical to mine. I've always had issues tackling this area. How exactly are you reducing it? Shaving WTG does practically nothing for me because the hairs on my neck grow so close to the skin. What direction are you going XTG?

I'm getting better at it and today was my second real success, so keep that in mind. I do downward strokes to the area under my jaw where the hair points down. Where is starts to grow mostly sideways I usually do a WTG pass from center-to-outer. As you mentioned, this does little and I may give it up WTG and skip to what I do next: an off-angle (oblique) WTG. It's basically between WTG and XTG and usually makes progress. From there I do an XTG straight down or slightly on an ATG angle. I can't do a normal ATG here or it gets red - no burn or anything and never gets irritated, but gets red. Finally, I touch it up with blade buffing that's very nearly ATG. Today it worked extremely well. Even with 3-4 passes and buffing, I get no dryness or burning down there so long as I'm careful to use no pressure and have good lather.

I am experimenting between pulling the skin tight and letting it a little slack. Doing a mix seems to work, which leads me to believe there are an odd mix of hairs there. Again, I don't have it consistent, but I'm getting very good or great results and am tweaking just a tad each time to see what's best.

Hope that helped. the advice I received at that other thread really made my shaves better. Feel free to hit me up with any more questions.
 
Yesterday's shave left me with BBS until around noon and then DFS until early evening - what a great shave that was. This morning I woke up to amost-sas, but decided to shave anyway. I wanted to both see if WTG would do anything with just a little growth and wanted to see if I could get a decent lather with that new brush. Have some Polsilvers on the way.

Shave
Normal prep including TOBS directly on face while making my lather. I shook the brush out many times and actually had too little water on it. Added a few drops and lather came out well. So, my problems a few days ago were too much water. Did my first pass sort of oblique-WTG, but was too aggressive on the amount of XTG in some areas. Then did XTG in the opposite direction to OK results. Then ATG with some buffing in a few areas. Wasn't going for BBS, but probably tried too hard to get DFS+. I should have slowed and done two passes. I caught myself using pressure two times - not sure why. Either way, had one little bleeder that ended before the pass. I was much better about not touching areas without lather.

Outcome and Time
47 minutes to shower and shave.
Ended up SAS+ - not very good for all the effort. I should have slowed down a little more and only done 2 passes with some XTG touch-ups. Alum didn't burn as much as I expected and most of the light burning was where I used pressure. I'm back to red spots along the bottom of my neck, even though it doesn't burn at all. Probably just doing too many passes.

Takeaways
- If I'm going to shave the day after BBS, I need to do 3 passes max.
- I have to stop using pressure - still doing it by habit once in a while.
- I can get a good lather from that new brush, just have to shake it out better.
 
So as a little follow up to our discussion yesterday, I had some very good results (DFS) on my neck this morning. I did a WTG pass followed by an XTG pass (South to North) followed by a more oblique XTG pass (North to South between XTG and ATG). This is the smoothest my neck has ever felt after any shave without feeling like I just went across it with a cheese grater. I felt very little irritation and whatever little bit I did feel was gone after 10 minutes. Surprisingly, my neck is red, but that's nothing new after shaving it. It could be a number of different things, but I will refine this technique over the next couple of shaves.

Thanks a bunch for the pointers and ideas!
 
I've only shaved with a DE like 5 or 6 times so far, but your experiences sound a lot like mine, except I NEVER went ATG... I got a red neck the first 3 times anyway, but soothed it with some nivea sensitive after shave balm, good stuff. Keep it up, and thanks for the pointers!
 
So as a little follow up to our discussion yesterday, I had some very good results (DFS) on my neck this morning. I did a WTG pass followed by an XTG pass (South to North) followed by a more oblique XTG pass (North to South between XTG and ATG). This is the smoothest my neck has ever felt after any shave without feeling like I just went across it with a cheese grater. I felt very little irritation and whatever little bit I did feel was gone after 10 minutes. Surprisingly, my neck is red, but that's nothing new after shaving it. It could be a number of different things, but I will refine this technique over the next couple of shaves.

Thanks a bunch for the pointers and ideas!

Very glad to be of help. Mine was red today, though it wasn't yesterday. I think part of that is I have a slight allergy to my beloved TOBS sandalwood and part just getting used to shaving that area again. Keep at it. Let me know if you come up with anything else that works and I'll do the same.
 
I've only shaved with a DE like 5 or 6 times so far, but your experiences sound a lot like mine, except I NEVER went ATG... I got a red neck the first 3 times anyway, but soothed it with some nivea sensitive after shave balm, good stuff. Keep it up, and thanks for the pointers!
\

I use Nivea ASB as well. Purchased it right after my first shave. I wear a tie every day and had to do something to help with the irritation. That ASB did the trick.
 
Shower including conditioner on beard. TOBS sandalwood, butterscotch finest bush, new Feather, EJ DE89.

Shave
Not great lather - still getting the hang of this brush. Not a great shave likely due to lather. WTG (seemed decent for WTG), WTG again to see if it could help - didn't really do much of anything. XTG, XTG other way and still not very good. ATG and still had to do lots of buffing. Far more bleeders than I've had lately (~5-6). My angle was off a few times, but my pressure was spot-on. Even the buffing took forever.

Outcome and Time
DFS - pretty sad for 5 passes and buffing. Had to be the lather and angle. Didn't time. A little burn from the alum. Since I've been getting those bright red spots at the base of my beard, I decided to test whether the alum might be the culprit. I used alum on the left side of my face but not the right. Immediately it turned red as I rubbed the alum on, even though it didn't really burn. Half hour later, right side of my neck has almost none, left side has the normal dots.

Takeaways
- Going to try without alum on both sides of my neck to see if that's part of my redness.
- I'm starting to get confident and sloppy with my angle.
- Last Feather loaded tonight, will try some Gillette Blues and Greens, Astras again, and any others I haven't tried.
- Have to get better at consistent lather with this brush. I should have started over instead of using it.
 
I noticed my trouble spots turn red the minute I use my alum block as well. I had a few responses in a thread I made a couple days ago that suggested the same thing was occurring for other people. Some of them were saying they used just witch hazel by itself and had results with less irritation. I think tomorrow I will try using just witch hazel and see how my skin reacts. I will let you know how that turns out for me.
 
Last edited:
Top Bottom