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Vintage Sputnik Stainless

I acquired 100 of these Sputnik Stainless blades made in USSR in the 1970’s.
I read a write up somewhere which claimed they were every bit as good as Western blades from the same period so I had to try them!
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And the first shave with one was very very good - exceptionally smooth and extremely sharp.
Of course the next big question is longevity so let’s see...
... Has anybody else tried these vintage Sputnik?
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Space_Cadet

I don't have a funny description.
I think that generally Soviet blades were pretty bad. They even joked about it back in the day. But if you say these are pretty good, it must be a one off.
 
I think that generally Soviet blades were pretty bad. They even joked about it back in the day. But if you say these are pretty good, it must be a one off.
Yes I was surprised at the other good report I read about these blades and bought them on the strength of that recommendation.

The first shave is definitely gorgeous so let’s see what happens...
 
Very cool. Modern Sputniks don't get a lot of mention, but they're very good, too. To me, similar to GSBs.
 
So the first 3 shaves with the vintage Sputnik Stainless blades were all superb - very sharp very smooth and really nice.
The 4th shave however was horrible - almost unbearably tuggy and rough.
Perhaps it was to do with the steep angle I used with the R41 or perhaps it was a coating wearing off and later shaves would become smooth again.
I didn’t bother to find out and binned the Sputnik on shave #4 - I have many many awesome vintage blades queued up like Schick Plus Platinum, London Bridge and Gillette Platinum Plus so there’s no point getting hung up on the vintage Sputniks.

For three shaves they are easily as good as or better than a 7 O’Clock Yellow and then they’re done.
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I'm surprised they worked at all , that box has a lot of water damage which usually translates to edge oxidation on the blade...You're right though , they did have a good reputation, even in the Soviet era...
 
So I tried a second vintage Sputnik from the same box and it would barely cut at all!
The first blade was amazing for three shaves but this second one was complete rubbish straight out of the box...
 
I have a couple tucks of Sputnik Chrome blades. They came packaged in a blue and orange box marked "Made in USSR". I've not tried them yet, but I'll be sure to post my impressions.
 
Very cool Soviet relic. Any idea what are the squiggly symbols or drawings on the back of the wrapper, above where it says "do not wipe"?
 
I eventually got around to trying the Sputnik Chrome blade. They are pleasantly sharp and smooth. They feel about like an Astra Super Stainless to me. What I find most remarkable is that they have no Russian printed on the blade, just English. These blades were clearly made for export. I also like the internal wax paper wrapper. It's slightly tacky, so it keeps the blade from moving around without having the large wax dots that so many shavers abhor.
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