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Am I missing something here?

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Benjamin Moran

Hello everyone,

I’m hoping someone can give me some advice. I seem to get irritation and razor burn almost all the time. I’ve used vintage Gillettes, Timeless, charcoal, Karve, Muhle, Merkur, and probably more I haven’t thought of, and two dozen blade varieties. Every time, my razor will glance over my stubble on pass 2 or 3. The best shave I can hope to get without irritation will leave me looking like I have 12-14 hours growth. And we all know what happens if you apply too much pressure. BBS almost never happens and DFS happens occasionally. Blade buffing doesn’t seam to help anything and usually ends in worse irritation. And there’s no way it’s the soap because I’ve used dozens of soaps and the lather always peaks and has the right amount of water. I’ve humored the idea that maybe I aught to hang it up and accept defeat but after 5 years I enjoy it too much even when my face ends up red as a tomato 🍅. Can anyone offer advice or constructive criticism?
 
I have a couple thoughts. My first is that we can sometimes get too hung up on the "don't use any pressure!!!" saying that we constantly have hammered into our brains as new shavers. The reality is that you do need some pressure. So hearing that your razor is glancing over your stubble makes me curious about that possibility. When you say "glance", do you feel anything? Tugging, skipping, etc? That could indicate not enough pressure if the blade is skipping or tugging.

My second thought is about your razors. That's quite the spread of reputable brands, but which base plates? My concern is that maybe you're using milder razors because of your irritation. What can happen when using mild razors is that it's harder to get a really close shave so we have to do more passes, blade buffing, or add more pressure to get a very close shave. All that extra time with the blade on the skin can actually lead to more irritation. So, without knowing which base plates you're using, I wonder if you'd benefit from the added efficiency of a blade-forward, more aggressive razor, if you're not using one already. But we need more information to really diagnose this.
 
Since you seem to have eliminated any gear as a source of the problem, I'd suggest you video-record the shave from beginning to end. Let us see exactly what you're doing. That's all I can think of at the moment.
 
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Benjamin Moran

It’s interesting that you say not enough pressure. I might grab my Slim Adjustable and crank it up a little and and see if more pressure is needed. Thanks for your help.


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Eben Stone

Staff member
You didn't mention what you use for pre-shave prep? By omission, I assume that's the problem. I used to get some irritation, but that has gone away completely ever since I started using a wet towel for about 1 minute and Proraso red and leaving it on for 2-3 minutes while I make lather.
 
It’s interesting that you say not enough pressure. I might grab my Slim Adjustable and crank it up a little and and see if more pressure is needed. Thanks for your help.

It's just a guess and could be a few other things. This is especially likely if you're using a mild razor with little exposure. We want to use just enough pressure for the blade to engage the skin fully and to plow through hair, but no more than that. Razors with little (or even negative) blade exposure will require more pressure than those with positive exposure because the blade is physically removed from your skin and you'll need to overcome that to get close. Again, we're not talking about a lot of pressure. Just enough. Positive-exposure razors require a bit less pressure (closer to that "no pressure" saying) because the blade is already prominent and easily engaged.
 
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Benjamin Moran

Well my favorite razor is a Tech and that’s about as mild as they get. I always thought timeless was way to aggressive but maybe I need to rethink my blade angle too.


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Benjamin Moran

Eden Stone, my mistake I use Proraso Blue Preshave.


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Well my favorite razor is a Tech and that’s about as mild as they get. I always thought timeless was way to aggressive but maybe I need to rethink my blade angle too.

I recommend picking a single variable to focus on at a time. If you want to play with angle, keep your pressure, prep, blade choice, etc. the same and focus on angle for the next several shaves. See if there is a change and repeat for the other variables, now keeping angle the same. You don't want to change razors and pressure and angles and blades and prep all at once because you'll never know what the solution was.
 
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Benjamin Moran

TexOkie, I left a few things out. I usually do WTG/XTG/ATG in that order. XTG and ATG doesn’t seem to go anywhere.


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I recommend picking a single variable to focus on at a time. If you want to play with angle, keep your pressure, prep, blade choice, etc. the same and focus on angle for the next several shaves. See if there is a change and repeat for the other variables, now keeping angle the same. You don't want to change razors and pressure and angles and blades and prep all at once because you'll never know what the solution was.
^^^^^What he said^^^^^ only change one thing at a time and give the change a chance to work. If it doesn’t work, move on to the next thing. I think @Blackland Razors is giving you good advice so I am going to shut up and let him work with you on this.
 
I found that spending a few extra minutes on soap/cream lathering with a good quality brush makes a huge difference. I as having some significant irritation on some shaves which left some really tender spots along my lower jawline.
I noticed in some shaving videos on YouTube that some of the shavers would spend twice as long as I was lathering with their brushes. I started doing that and it made a world of difference. Just a thought.
 
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Benjamin Moran

Eden Stone,

This isn’t everything I’ve tried but this is the most recent blades I’ve used.
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Another vote for blade angle. If you not seeing results when going XTG or ATG I think it is more evidence of the wrong blade angle.

I have a thick wiry beard but prefer milder razors. As an illustration, I get the best shaves from a Timeless SS SB .68 razor paired with a Personna Lab, Med Prep, or Wizmet Super Iridium blade.

Quite a while back I bought the Feather AS-D2 razor. I was just not getting good shaves with that razor. I tried adding shims to the razor but that just caused irritation. I then tried a Feather blade in that razor and changed the angle. Previously I was using an angle that put the handle closer to my face. I increased that angle. With the change in the angle and a sharper blade, the results were great. On the other hand, when I tried using more aggressive razors (such as the Muhle R.41) I would get massive irritation on my neck no matter what angle I used.

I also think you should stick to one set up for a while and make changes in your technique before going to another razor.
 
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