I'm fairly new to straight-razor shaving and honing (~2 months). And I was getting really frustrated by my inability to bring my razor's edge back after it started pulling. I made at least three separate attempts to run it through my Naniwa progression (1k, 3k, 5k, 8k, 12k). But each cycle was just a little worse than the last. I had a couple of jeweler's loupes which were well-rated on Amazon. But they were almost totally useless. So I was honing "blind."
Then I watched a knife-sharpening video on YouTube last week; and the guy was using a USB microscope. So I thought that was a great idea and picked one up from Amazon for ~$35. And I can't tell you what a game-changer it is!! As soon as I plugged it in, I saw exactly what my problem was... I wasn't taking anywhere near enough strokes on my stones to ever actually finish the job...
Here's what I saw as soon as I looked under the microscope (this was actually after a fresh hone):
And here's what I did after I could finally see my work for the first time:
It actually shaves better now than when I first got it! And I'm totally psyched about that
Here's the microscope I used.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B00XNYXQHE?psc=1&ref=ppx_pop_mob_b_asin_title
Then I watched a knife-sharpening video on YouTube last week; and the guy was using a USB microscope. So I thought that was a great idea and picked one up from Amazon for ~$35. And I can't tell you what a game-changer it is!! As soon as I plugged it in, I saw exactly what my problem was... I wasn't taking anywhere near enough strokes on my stones to ever actually finish the job...
Here's what I saw as soon as I looked under the microscope (this was actually after a fresh hone):
And here's what I did after I could finally see my work for the first time:
It actually shaves better now than when I first got it! And I'm totally psyched about that
Here's the microscope I used.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B00XNYXQHE?psc=1&ref=ppx_pop_mob_b_asin_title
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