15th Shave Milestone

[RouxBlade]

If it's true that you reach a Milestone every 15 shaves or so, I've reached my first one today.

In the process I've acquired a 3' @Tony Miller Premium Black strop to go with my beginner 2.5' that I'll use to travel with. And I somehow managed to stop with just 2 SR's, both 5/8. A Dovo Colonial Conk and a Noonan & Sons Colonial that I picked up for much less on Ebay, which I think I somehow like more. I really like the Spanish point.

Things I've learned/am learning/still don't know:

- Whoever suggested focusing on shaving with the heel was onto something. It helps figure out angles.

- The more time I spend in prep, the better the shave.

- I still usually end up with skin irritation but it's getting better so I must be moving in the right direction.

- I like to learn by immersion but at the same time I understand my limits and the necessity of breaking things down. I'm shaving my entire face, not just the cheeks. But I'm not trying for anything more than WTG on my upper lip and chin yet.

- Stroping. How do I figure out if I'm doing it wrong? Is there some feedback if I roll the edge? So far I haven't cut the leather and the razors still seem sharp.

- Man. I wish I had started this years ago.

- It's interesting that one aspect that would have deterred me from SR years ago was the all the new skills to be learnied. That's now one of the most compelling aspects to this.

- Man, this is a great community. Thanks everyone.

 

[RouxBlade]

 

[rbscebu]

Congratulations. It only gets better and even more enjoyable.

For stropping, see the stropping section in the instructions:

Traditional Straight Razor Shaving Instructions for Beginners

The attached are instructions for beginners in the gentlemanly art of traditional straight razor shaving. Updated instructions will be posted in this thread as they are developed. To keep this thread reasonably clean and easy to read, please post any comments/suggestions in this thread and ask...

www.badgerandblade.com

Once you have your technique pretty much sorted out, you can start on your coups de maître. Advice can be found here:

Fool's Pass With A Straight Razor - All You Need To Know

The information in this post is based on my experience with performing about 800 daily SR fool's passes. The fool's pass is shaving S - N on the upper lip. It is not a pass for everyone. Most people have whiskers growing about N - S on their upper lip so the fool's pass is considered here to be...

www.badgerandblade.com

 

[Kyle89]

It only gets better.

In terms of stropping feedback when you roll the edge, from my experience when I rolled my edge it left quite the gouge in the leather. It was an instant "yup, just rolled the edge". It's like breaking a bone. You'll know. Interested in reading some other takes on this matter from more experienced Sr shavers.

Congrats on 15! It's fun.

 

[Seelector]

Congrats on 15 shaves! You’re still in that zone where every shave is noticeably better than the last one - it’s a sweet place to be.

They’ll continue to get better and better for a long time too. I’m between 50-60 shave and still improving all the time. My shaves now are about the same as I got with my DE.

Your skin irritation will get less and less and you improve your technique. Keep your angle low and your pressure light against your skin. Like really light. If it feels too light that’s probably about right. The better your edge, the easier it is to keep light pressure.

Make sure you map your beard so you know the grain direction everywhere. You might be surprised at what you find. My left cheek WTG is North to south, but on my right cheeks it’s east-west except my sideburns which are also N-S.

If you haven’t started honing yet, that’s more fun. Nothing like shaving on an edge you created yourself.

 

[Biltong & Boerewors]

Well done!

You are right about the importance of skin prep. I firmly believe that you have to warm up the beard and face, and hydrate it as best you can. I also believe that in order to hydrate the whiskers, you have to "degrease" them thoroughly, to allow the hot water to do it's work. Some recommend washing your face with a glycerine soap, scrubs, ect. The short-cut that works for me is to wash my hair and face with shampoo - thinking behind it is that if shampoo is good for softening hair, it must be good for softening whiskers. Best time for a shave is after taking a shower or a bath, or in my case, while having a bath. I never drop a razor!

After that I face-lather. That means I apply a bit of shaving cream to the brush and then work into a lather on my face. For me that achieves the scrub, working the lather into the whiskers and providing the cushioning and lubrication to protect your skin from the blade.

Instead of an aftershave I use a few drops (max 3 drops) of my own mixture of about 20% high-quality vitamin E oil (Jasons) mixed with 80% sweet almond oil. The vitamin E oil is a bit too sticky on its own. This leaves my skin supple and hydrated, never oily.

My face has never been happier!

 

[Tomo]

Congratulations. You should be nearly out of woods now.

In terms of stropping, sound and feel are your best indicators. It should be nice an smooth. Scraping sounds are not good.

 

[StellaNova]

One way to tell if you rolled your edge after the fact is by inspecting it with a loupe.
Have a bright light behind/above you shining onto the blade, tilt the blade at varying angles and look at the reflections.
If you see a thin bright line of light reflecting from the very edge of the bevel while the rest of the bevel is dark, then you may have rolled your edge.
If that is the case, the reflections will be different between each of the sides of the blade.
Or you have a secondary bevel.

It might be useful to get to know your edge and keep checking it to see if anything changes. I think it is useful when starting out to inspect expertly honed edges and become familiar with what they look like before they get used and also to track how they may degrade with use and abuse. Just my 2c.

As Tomo said, if you hear scraping while stropping, it's a bad sign.

 

[PintoPlain]

Congratulations on 15 shaves. As @Seelector said you are probably noticing improvement with every shave. Don't get concerned when this stops. I found I plateaued for a while before noticing improvements again. I figured I was consolidating what I learned up until then. Even now after over 1000 shaves, I still get a few shaves where I find there is improvement, then another plateau. Unfortunately at this stage the plateaus (plateaux) seem to last much longer than they did.

As for only having two razors, good luck. These rabbit holes are deep.

 

[RouxBlade]

One way to tell if you rolled your edge after the fact is by inspecting it with a loupe.
Have a bright light behind/above you shining onto the blade, tilt the blade at varying angles and look at the reflections.
If you see a thin bright line of light reflecting from the very edge of the bevel while the rest of the bevel is dark, then you may have rolled your edge.
If that is the case, the reflections will be different between each of the sides of the blade.
Or you have a secondary bevel.

It might be useful to get to know your edge and keep checking it to see if anything changes. I think it is useful when starting out to inspect expertly honed edges and become familiar with what they look like before they get used and also to track how they may degrade with use and abuse. Just my 2c.

As Tomo said, if you hear scraping while stropping, it's a bad sign.

Ah. That makes sense now. I haven't done that yet, though I started going a bit faster than needed today and nearly rolled it.

And that's when it clicked. I nearly rolled the edge instead of the spine. I get it now.

I also figured out that I probably don't need as much pressure as I started out with. It's similar to shaving in that respect.

Right now in the shaves I'm concentrating on light pressure and moving the blade as I place it on the skin. That's making for better shaves.

 

[RouxBlade]

Yeah. I think I can hold off [at three razors. This post was supposed to quote @PintoPlain but didn't.] for now. But I have an aunt and uncle who are at "The world's biggest yard sale" and say they're keeping an eye out for straights. And I'm going to let them. :-D

Whenever I go down the honing rabbit hole I'll definitely start on a 3rd blade to be safe. Oh. Sharpened my first knives today. I figure that's a good way to learn a comparable and hopefully transferable skill. Took a completely dull pocket knife and a moderately dull kitchen knife and got them in good shape.

 

[rbscebu]

Sharpening knives can teach you some bad habits when you transfer to SRs. You would be better off starting with SRs and then, once mastered, give knife sharpening a go.

 

[Ravenonrock]

Good to hear things are coming along for you, positive and optimistic. Nice looking razors, they should serve you well. Although I’ve been SR shaving for a while I continue to refine my stropping, touch, pressure and duration. Still learning and tweaking things somewhat. Good luck!

 

[StellaNova]

Ah. That makes sense now. I haven't done that yet, though I started going a bit faster than needed today and nearly rolled it.

And that's when it clicked. I nearly rolled the edge instead of the spine. I get it now.

I also figured out that I probably don't need as much pressure as I started out with. It's similar to shaving in that respect.

Right now in the shaves I'm concentrating on light pressure and moving the blade as I place it on the skin. That's making for better shaves.

I would just like to point out that when I refer to "rolling" and edge, I mean causing the apex of the edge to fold over to one side of the blade.

This can be caused by putting too much pressure/emphasis on the edge while stropping, possibly also combined with a strop that is too slack.
When this happens you will hear the scraping sound referred to by @Tomo, if I am not mistaken.

You can also do the same damage by flipping the razor over the edge instead of the spine at the end of the stroping stroke.
This is also likely to result in a cut strop.

Another stropping accident to look out for is inadvertantly lowering the handle of the strop at the end of the stroke while flipping the razor at the handle end of the strop.
In this case the strop is not there for the flat of the blade to rest on at the end of the flip. The razor can then continue turning such that the edge is presented to the face of the strop and then cuts into it.
You are then left wondering how you cut your strop when you flipped the razor over the spine.
If you like, try it on a belt with a blunt Razor Shaped Object (RSO) to see how it can happen, then practice avoiding it.

I would avoid speeding up stropping strokes for a while still and be sure to build good muscle memory by making steady deliberate motions. It's very easy to get over confident and all it takes is a moment of distraction to damage an edge and strop.

Somebody recently ( @Slash McCoy I tihnk ?) did a nice video of inspecting an edge with just a bright light. I havn't been able find it, but it shows how to check an edge very well.

There is also this post with nice pictures by @H Brad Boonshaft:

When to hone - or to send it in to hone ?

When it stops shaving well. Get some magnification, any magnification. Look straight down on the edge with strong light behind you. If you see any shiny reflections, that is where the edges are not meeting, chip or rolled edge. If proper stropping on leather will not bring the edge back, (no...

www.badgerandblade.com

 

[CpnStumpy]

Glad to hear attending the heel has been helpful, I usually give that advice to folks who've gotten past the initial shakes because I think it's within a learner's grasp and helps you learn the razor isn't like a knife with one long usable edge, it's got anatomy and techniques all across it.

But I give that advice partially guessing it may help because I really struggle to remember learning as it was too long ago and I worry at times my advice is inappropriate for learners. Glad to hear you're finding that helpful!