I picked up a Sta-Sharp straight distributed by Sears for $15 at a flea market, and for the first time I have been able to hone a razor from scratch to something resembling shaving sharp. It was in pretty damn nice shape physically, nice and shiny with only a couple small patches of corrosion nowhere near the edge. I had to hone out a pretty significant chip (about the size of the bevel, and a millimeter long). After an eternity of circular honing, I finally got it out and tried honing it on a norton 1k (probably 40-50 strokes), and the 4k/8k (30 or 40 on the 4k, 20 or so on the 8k). Did a few strokes on a Chinese 12k, but it seemed to get duller so I touched it up on the 8k and stropped with the CrOx on the back of a Filly strop. I tried the various test for sharpness but didn't know much about how to judge them, so I used improvement of the ease of cutting arm hair at various leves above the skin- when improvement stopped and the blade seemed pretty uniform, I moved up to the next grit.
Long story short, it shaves!!
Certainly not as comfortably as the various blades I have sent out to pros, but with my usual 3 pass pattern (WTG, 2 ATG) the results were similar in smoothness with only a slight dropoff on the difficult parts of my face, although there was some slight irritation. It shaved pretty well, but it was noticably harder to shave up on my neck (nearly ATG).
My big question is, does this basically sound like what I should be achieving with the 8k side of the Norton, or should I expect more? If this is maxed out, what next? Work with the Chinese 12k (all stones are lapped)? Buy some pasted strops? I can use this blade, but from a comfort standpoint I would much rather use my professionally honed blades. I'm not looking to go into business as a honer or anything, but I would like to eventually come close to their results so I can be self sufficient with my blades.
Overall I was pretty pleased, considering I have never come close to this level of sharpness before- granted, I have generally been practicing on junk shop and ebay razors, but it seemed like a good first step in the right direction. Now I am looking to repeat it on other razors and then hopefully take the 'next step,' whatever that is. Thanks in advance for any help.
Long story short, it shaves!!
Certainly not as comfortably as the various blades I have sent out to pros, but with my usual 3 pass pattern (WTG, 2 ATG) the results were similar in smoothness with only a slight dropoff on the difficult parts of my face, although there was some slight irritation. It shaved pretty well, but it was noticably harder to shave up on my neck (nearly ATG). My big question is, does this basically sound like what I should be achieving with the 8k side of the Norton, or should I expect more? If this is maxed out, what next? Work with the Chinese 12k (all stones are lapped)? Buy some pasted strops? I can use this blade, but from a comfort standpoint I would much rather use my professionally honed blades. I'm not looking to go into business as a honer or anything, but I would like to eventually come close to their results so I can be self sufficient with my blades.
Overall I was pretty pleased, considering I have never come close to this level of sharpness before- granted, I have generally been practicing on junk shop and ebay razors, but it seemed like a good first step in the right direction. Now I am looking to repeat it on other razors and then hopefully take the 'next step,' whatever that is. Thanks in advance for any help.
, even at the bevel setting stage. Better honers than I could undoubtably obtain a great edge, but I'll shelve these until... MUCH... later. Get the first one right first. It seems there is no substitute for quality.
