B&B Modern Razor Aggressiveness Scale?

[Luc]

I'd love to have a formula to calculate aggressiveness, but I see some challenges with this:
1. It's difficult to measure blade exposure accurately
2. We'd likely have to test many razors from a given make over time to account for QC variances in blade gap and blade exposure
3. I suspect the ideal formula would still depend upon blades, technique, and skin/beard of the individual ... so a rough consensus might still be required.

As such ... and toward just trying to get a list on our wiki (that is better than no list at all) ... I've decided to simply poll people on their subjective opinions, relative between razors.


Also, if you're having problems fitting your whole list together with mine ... just scrap my list and post your own as a large collective vote ... using some high-point reference as a 10, and another low-point reference as a 1 ... and try to fit everything else in between depending on how they feel/work.

It's imperfect I know ... but I hope that our resulting list will still be useful and better than no list at all

You might get something that looks okay but if you rely on what Fred or Bob said, you will end up with a list that might not be totally right.

As an example, I do disagree with the current order for a few razors (the ones that I tried as I did not try them all). However, I'm one voice over many. I mean, I could share where I disagree, it's a razor in the middle of the list which should be, IMO at the top... Anyways, my point was, it's based on my opinion and not hard data.

I understand that such a list would be difficult to construct with a formula and it would take a long (very long) time. But the result is based on someone's experience versus another someone with a different experience (and preferences).

By using data that could be verified (measured) you always get the same result regardless of who is measuring it. The result will then be accurate.

As I said, that's my opinion on how such a list should be built. If you do go ahead with this list, I would like to see a caveat that mentions that the list is based on the membership opinion and no measurements so ranking will vary from a user to another.

 

[shawnsel]

You might get something that looks okay but if you rely on what Fred or Bob said, you will end up with a list that might not be totally right.

As an example, I do disagree with the current order for a few razors (the ones that I tried as I did not try them all). However, I'm one voice over many. I mean, I could share where I disagree, it's a razor in the middle of the list which should be, IMO at the top... Anyways, my point was, it's based on my opinion and not hard data.

I understand that such a list would be difficult to construct with a formula and it would take a long (very long) time. But the result is based on someone's experience versus another someone with a different experience (and preferences).

By using data that could be verified (measured) you always get the same result regardless of who is measuring it. The result will then be accurate.

As I said, that's my opinion on how such a list should be built. If you do go ahead with this list, I would like to see a caveat that mentions that the list is based on the membership opinion and no measurements so ranking will vary from a user to another.

I will definitely include a caveat to the list along the lines of "This list is roughly aggregated from the subjective opinions of forum members who replied to this thread." Sounds good? Thank you for the suggestion!

Since we don't have the budget and resources to do this in a science-worthy manner, my best suggestion is that we essentially do a quick public opinion poll ... which is I think a standard practice for those on a tight resources budget. My honest guess is that the end result will have some value to many current and future readers

 

[shawnsel]

I will add, even with loosely polling subjective opinions, the more honest, experience-guided "votes" that are added to adjust items on the list ... the more objectively accurate the list is likely to become.

 

[GBinOZ]

No adjustables such as the Futur on the list? I suppose they could be classified with their maximum setting?

 

[nuclearblast]

No adjustables such as the Futur on the list? I suppose they could be classified with their maximum setting?

Yup ... a wide open Futur would be pretty close to the top.

 

[DrAwkward]

The razors that I ranked in this post:
http://badgerandblade.com/vb/showth...or-Aggressiveness-Scale?p=6334269#post6334269

are based on my personal experience shaving with them. To the extent that I understand Porter's definition of aggressiveness (blade exposure, not effectiveness or harshness or whatever else), I have tried to follow it.
When shaving with a new razor, I mentally compare it to others in my arsenal and loosely put it somewhere on the scale. However, it takes quite a few shaves to get a good feel for a razor and sometimes I become distracted by other shiny things in the shave cave ...

 

[GBinOZ]

I am a little confused (as usual). Has a Wiki been established for this project of is it the list on the first post in this thread that is being updated?

 

[shawnsel]

I am a little confused (as usual). Has a Wiki been established for this project of is it the list on the first post in this thread that is being updated?

IF we get enough participants in the member opinion poll ... I would like to add it our page here:
http://wiki.badgerandblade.com/Double-Edged_Safety_Razors_Ranked_by_Aggressiveness

However, if we don't get enough experience-based votes though then the list would likely not be worthy of posting to the wiki. It would then have to just stay as an interesting thread in this forum....

I would think we'd need at least 3 experience-based votes per razor for that razor to be included in the list.

 

[GBinOZ]

Here is my list of razors that I own and use as part of my rotation.
10.0 Muhle R41 (2011)
10.0 Merkur Futur on 6.5
9.5 Muhle R41 (2013)
8.5 FaTip
5.0 Merkur 39C Slant
3.5 Merkur 38C Barber pole
3.5 Edwin Jagger 89
3.0 Giesen and Forsthoff Timor


This is the order in which I would rate them, and the scores from the original post seem about right to me.

 

[Copierguy]

Originally Posted by shawnsel Please specify if your votes come from personal experience OR from what you've heard/read. A vote from personal experience will be given greater weight.

I would go further than this and say that hearsay votes are basically worthless, and that people should really only submit opinions from their own firsthand experience.

As such, I probably won't be of great help to this discussion as only a small handful of my razors are current production, but I'll be very interested to see where this leads. Of the ones that I do have I would tend to agree with your placement, although I would probably put the Merkur 34C below the EJ/Mühle DE8x head -- more of a 3.0 than a 3.5. That may or may not be an accurate current comparison, though, since my Merk is a pseudo-vintage one from the '80s or '90s rather than a truly modern one.

Honestly, I'd be more interested in assembling a unified list of modern and vintage examples than just separate lists of either. But I can see how that would quickly become a chaotic mess, and starting with a smaller bite is probably wise.

The only thing I would take slight issue with, without dragging this thread too far off course is this:

Originally Posted by shawnsel
I'm going to define aggressiveness loosely, as a rough-consensus mix of efficiency and harshness. This is an easy area to get stuck on ... I'd like to just to give it our best shot for now. I realize that some shavers will get a less-harsh (on the skin) shave from a carefully handled Muhle R41 (2011) that they would from many passes with a Feather D2 ... and we can explain that on the wiki page, but my hope is that we can still come up with a consensus-based list.

This is overly muddy, and I don't really understand why there seems to be this overwhelming desire to equate aggressiveness with efficiency or harshness, which are both end products rather than primary characteristics. Aggressiveness should be taken to mean the amount of blade exposure a given razor provides, and the fact that we intuit that characteristic by feel rather than measure it directly doesn't change the fact that we're attempting to describe a physical characteristic of the razor, not what the razor does for us or how it makes us feel emotionally.

Yes, we won't all agree on exactly where a razor should be slotted, but we still should be trying to feel for how much blade the razor gives us to work with rather than attempting to characterize the quality of the experience as efficient or not, or harsh or not.

I will go one step further. What we are trying describe or measure is how unsafe different models of safety razors are. If you go by experience or impressions only, then the reports can just be a result of bad driving. If you really want a list of how unsafe various razors are why not use real numbers. Say if a razor is resting with the cap on a flat hard surface and one tilts the razor so the blade cutting edge just makes contact with the same surface how far is the safety bar or comb from the flat surface.

That exposure is measurable. Another measurement could be the weight. I tend to think this type of approach would be much more meaningful.

Maybe a formula part of which could be exposure times weight etc.

 

[GBinOZ]

While I appreciate the suggestions regarding formulae involving exposure, weight etc, I think that shawnsei was trying to contruct a simpler chart based on members' impressions of the actual functional aspect of each razor. A chart that someone could look at and say " I have razor X and want something more aggressive", and be able to locate his razor X on the chart and see which razors are more aggressive and by how much more than his razor, all based on other members impressions rather than on measurements. IMHO such a chart would be of value to members, and perhaps someone else may wish to pursue the more complicated mathematical solution which would also be of value, but perhaps to a different cross-section of members.

 

[Sceptic Pencil]

How many options can be included in a vote? If there are enough to cover from 1 to 10 in 0.50 increments, I would suggest running separate "aggressiveness" vote for each razor. It would then be easy to see the general consensus as to how aggressive a given razor is. All the separate votes could be grouped together in a sub forum. Apologies if this is a dumb idea.

 

[bosseb]

A chart that someone could look at and say " I have razor X and want something more aggressive", and be able to locate his razor X on the chart and see which razors are more aggressive and by how much more than his razor, all based on other members impressions rather than on measurements.

This sounds like a useful chart if based on actual first hand experience. Many members are pondering along the aggressiveness scale.

The same method could easily be adopted to vintage razors.

 

[nuclearblast]

I found the solution to this problem ...

Spoiler

Spoiler

Use it wisely, it contains the secrets of the Universe.

Spoiler

And also how to determine razor aggressiveness accurately.

 

[thamuil]

Question:
Razorock Jaws and Razorock OC/Cadet OC are listed seperately. Are they not one in the same? There is the Little Bastone, but same head as Jaws, right? Just curious. Please correct me if I am wrong.

 

[shawnsel]

I've added some experience-based votes to my list in my original post (see start of this thread).

Plus, in that original post, I'm still trying to improve my wording on why I'm doing this, how I see this as working, and what value I think it will have. Please reply if you have any suggestions on how this description and process can be improved ... while keeping the process short enough for me to actually complete a first wiki-worthy version by the end of July at least

This process will only produce a wiki-worthy list if we get a lot of people with multiple-razor experience posting their numbers. So, please encourage others to "vote" ... and many thanks to those who already have replied back with their list of numbers!


Cheers,
Shawnsel

 

[shawnsel]

How many options can be included in a vote? If there are enough to cover from 1 to 10 in 0.50 increments, I would suggest running separate "aggressiveness" vote for each razor. It would then be easy to see the general consensus as to how aggressive a given razor is. All the separate votes could be grouped together in a sub forum. Apologies if this is a dumb idea.

On razors which have have a lot of variance in experience-based opinion ... I was thinking of creating separate threads with a poll on that razor ... and where members would place their relative aggressiveness into the scale.

Thoughts? Thanks for your suggestions!

 

[DigJazz]

It would be interesting if a statistician could come up with some kind of formula, incorporating factors such as weight, gap, exposure, comb, etc, as Luc suggested. Then it would be interesting to cross reference the rankings from that method with the "practical" ranking method used here, where razors are ranked according to general consensus and how they "feel". I wonder if they would correlate perfectly or if there would be differences. Just a thought. Any math people out there? Again, thanks for compiling this list. It's been needed for a long time and I find it to be very valuable information.

 

[plywood99]

I like the idea of a user opinion based list. The statistician approach I think would not work so well.
As an example my Merkur Futur looks like a neck slicer even on 1. But it's very mild.

 

[bosseb]

I like the idea of a user opinion based list. The statistician approach I think would not work so well.
As an example my Merkur Futur looks like a neck slicer even on 1. But it's very mild.

Houston - we have a problem with the user opinion based list....