Anyone use cryogenically frozen blades?

[Doc Thornton]

I'm sure that this questions has come up before, sorry about that if that is the case.

There is a seller on one of the online auction sites selling DE blades to which he has given a cryogenic deep freeze treatment. He is claiming that these blades
will last 3X longer than an un-frozen blade of the same type. The prices he is asking do not seem too bad.

For those who do not know about cryogenic metal treatment, the general concept is that by taking the temperature of an object down to minus several
hundred degrees and holding it there for 3 days or so, then slowing bringing it back to room temperature, the object becomes extra hard and able to resist ware.
The process aligns the molecules in the metal or something also. It is said that the machine shops and other persons who need to extend the life of expensive
various tools send out their objects for this treatment.

I used to shoot a lot of registered rifle bench rest matches and for a while a lot of the shooters who were concerned about extending the life of their expensive
custom barrels were having them frozen. I guess that the principle should also work on razor blades.

If any of you have tried them, what say you?

 

[Krona Kruiser]

Wow! Interesting.....but blades are cheap to begin with. Maybe it will double the life of a Personna 74.

 

[Doc Thornton]

I do believe that the idea is a smart one, providing that it really works! I do not know a lot about DE blade prices or grades but FYI he is asking $10.50 for 50 Derby Extras and free shipping.
Whether or not this is a good deal, assuming that the blades really would last 3 tiems longer, I do not know. He is offering other brands of blades as well.

If the process does work well with DE blades one could find a local cryogenic treating business and have their favorite blades frozen there (do the math for cost effectiveness).

I had this process done in Wooster Ohio on a Dan Lilja barrel for a .22 LR match rifle. I think the name of the place was 300 Degrees Below Zero (?). I did it more for the reputed ability of
the deep freeze job to take any evil accuracy destroying vibrations out of the barrel. I don't know if it worked or not because I sold the rifle as it had other demons in it that I could not exorcise.

UPDATE

http://www.300below.com/ I found this by Googling it. If you want to hear an "official" explanation of cryogenic treatment better than I did, try linking to it. Razor blades or not, it is a pretty cool process.
Pun intended.

 

[fcdiscus]

I believe Ted Williams is using these!

 

[MondoJ]

I worked with a guy who swore by them on his fusion but I never tried them

 

[dcobranchi]

I've worked with liquid N[sub]2[/sub] (77 K) and liquid He (4 K). Even for a while differentially pumped liquid He (2 K). And this idea sounds like nonsense to me.

 

[Doc Thornton]

dcobranchi,

Which idea seems like nonsense, the razor blade cryo treatment or the cryogenics process? The blades maybe, the deep cold treatment of tool steel maybe not so much.
There is an industry built up around it (watch the 300 Below Zero video) and it seems to be used by lots of folks like NASA, US Military, industrial stuff too. I could be wrong,
I am frequently wrong according to my wife.

I have nothing to sell here. It is just an interesting concept on the possibility of getting more shaves out of one's blades. I leave it up to the cognoscenti, like yourself.

 

[mblakele]

This comes up every six months or so.

http://badgerandblade.com/vb/showthread.php/273298-Heard-of-Cryogenically-Tempered-Razor-Blades
http://badgerandblade.com/vb/showth...r-blades-anyone-have-any-experience-with-them
http://badgerandblade.com/vb/showthread.php/64890-Cryogenically-Frozen-Blades

To date no one has been very passionate about the benefits. If the process turned Derbys into Swedes, that might be interesting. But when blades are so cheap, who care how long they last?

 

[The M]

They even do this to Guitar Strings. Here is a link if you want to see what brand it is and more info about it.http://www.guitarcenter.com/GHS-Sub-Zero-Guitar-Boomers-Custom-Light-712728-i1520834.gc

 

[z3driver]

Before I switched to DE 6 years ago, I used the cryo Mach3 blades. No question that it doubled the life of the blades. It works.

 

[misterelie]

I remember about 15 years ago, a large retailer for brass musical instruments offered this service. The science geek in me always found it interesting, but I never thought it interesting enough to pay and try.

Been a long time since I've seen an ad for it, but I believe they said they slowly dropped the temp down to close to 0 degrees K to bring the molecules of the brass into a more settled state. Sounds like this is something similar.

 

[Doc Thornton]

mblakele - thanks for posting those links to previous chatter about deep frozen cryo'd blades. VERY interesting (to me).

I do agree that blades are fairly inexpensive but the folks on this forum must be somewhat concerned about blade life
because they always seem to comment about the number of shaves that they get from the blade which they are holding forth upon.

I think that the science involved in the cryogenic process has proven itself worthy in many applications.
For me I suppose it is worth the small amount of extra money to try them one time.

Derby Extras are $10.50 free shipping (50 blades) and Dorco ST 301 (50 blades) and Astra Platinum DE (25 blades) either one for $8.55 & ship free.
Anyone have a good feeling about one of these brands? I started DE wet shaving about 1966/67 and just returned to the fold. I have an average beard.

If these DO last 3X longer, that would be sweet.

 

[Valerius]

This makes no sense, I doubt there would be any difference.

 

[JHCC]

GreatRazors.com has Wilkinsons at $2.30 for a ten-pack; see: http://www.greatrazors.com/doubleedgerazors.aspx. They're currently out of stock, and I have no idea what they charge for shipping.

That's about twice what you'd pay for unfrozen (thawed?) blades. If the shipping is any more than a couple of bucks, you're paying more than four times the price of the blades for something they claim will last four times as long. Why bother?

 

[bryan1980]

Wow! Interesting.....but blades are cheap to begin with. Maybe it will double the life of a Personna 74.

A cryogenically-treated 74? That'd be last razor blade you'd ever have to buy!

 

[Judge Dredd]

If I cryo-froze my Tabac soap, it should last about 6 years...

 

[drlvegas]

I believe Ted Williams is using these!

beat me to it

 

[Nick_Cut]

I must admit I was skeptical when I first saw cryogenic razor blade advertisements. What would temperature have to do with strength and durability? Then I remembered that ancient sword makers used to heat up the sword and then submerge it in cold water. In fact, they still use techniques like this today. I did a little research and found an engineering thread about the subject that stated cryogenics can add 1 pt of hardening to certain materials and gave several links to scientific data.



One of the posts in the thread specifically mentioned razor blades:

“Howdy,, have a friend that has a cryo tempering service... started a couple years back... my experineces?,,,, did some disposable razor blades, drill bits, sawzall blades, a coring bit 16" in diameter( for concrete), some brake rotors and brake pads for my truck, and gears and bearings in a ford 9" rearend...Results????? cryo'd rotors have yet to warp- stop harder than ever... razorblades dont rip your skin - last longer..... the coring bit's life was almost tripled,,,, other drill bits last longer as well.. the gears- i cant say... still driving the truck.”

Of course, even if the process does work, how do you know that the person your buying the blades from really did cryogenically
freeze the blades? I would be interested in hearing from somebody that has tried two of the exact same blades, one normal and one cryogenically frozen, next to one another in a head to head comparison.

 

[rivieraranch]

Here we go again! This is the stupidest thing since cryogenically frozen electron vacuum tubes. I have been reading about those in my other hobby. I think that just about anything can be cryogenically frozen but there is no way to tell the difference.

 

[z3driver]

Here we go again! This is the stupidest thing since cryogenically frozen electron vacuum tubes. I have been reading about those in my other hobby. I think that just about anything can be cryogenically frozen but there is no way to tell the difference.

Wrong. Years ao I was buying the Mach3 cryo blades from the vendor listed in the thread. When compared to store bought blades they EASILY lasted twice as long. This is my direct comparison over an extended period. It works. Let's move on.