Cracked Wostemholm Peerless

[PolsBirthday]

Hello all, I got this razor off of ebay for a mere ten dollars, and am quite pleased with it (although I have yet to hone and shave with it, but I hear good things of the make).

There is however a very small crack near the heel of the blade, maybe a quarter inch. I do not believe it will affect the shave much, as it is very out of the way, however the metal from the crack heading towards the heel is just ever so warped/ misaligned, and I fear I would get too much resistance/ dig a long groove in my waterstone should I try to hone it..... any recommendations on straightening it out? or will 1/2 a mm even matter? I'd hate to hone just 9/10ths of the blade and leave it hanging, just wouldn't feel right...

Any opinions/past experiences would be great.


*Added second picture, sorry about the poor quality, my camera doesn't have manual zoom... the crack moves slightly towards the heel, so its not perfectly perpendicular, also, if you look at it from the bottom of the blade, aside from it gravitating to one side a bit you can see it cracks on a 45 degree angle, like..... _//_

 

[professorchaos]

Don't know that I'd shave with that...the shoulder tends to stabilize against torsional rotation. With just a little bad luck, you could end up with one of those corners gouging into you.

 

[Fnord5]

Can you post a picture with the blade laying flat, and the camera directly above it?

I cant exactly see where the crack is pointed, but I have fixed 2 or 3 razors by grinding the heel so that the crack is removed.

 

[PolsBirthday]

hmmm, that's a nice job, could I use a rotary dremel for that? maybe with a metal grinding bit?

 

[PolsBirthday]

The aluminum oxide bit on my dremel worked like a charm, however the flapwheel was too big in diameter unfortunately Still, i for some reason or other got a "stylus" attachment with my dremel which means you work with a nice little marker sized dremel. These are a few pictures, on after the oxide grinding bit, and another after the 600 grit sandpaper, the color is still a little off, but the shank still has some tarnish on it, and i'm hoping it will even out upon polishing a little more (probably get some 1500 grit anyhow), after that all it needs is a solid honing and we're in business

thanks for all the help fnord5!

P.S. don't mind the stained looking line, just a little residue from a vinegar mishap trying to get the rust off the goldwash (WD-40 worked wonders btw) the line isn't on the goldwash, and the maas I ordered should be in any day now (i'll be taping over the goldwash when i polish)

 

[zippo]

Nice job ,I would be putting an ever so slight radius on that point if it was me ,I can see that drawing blood in the not to distant future .
Well done
kind regards Peter

 

[Dubbya]

First off, very nice job with the Dremel. Secondly, I would second the idea of rounding the heel just a little so that you don't take a small chunk out of your cheek.