I have had a couple vintage razors that needed lots of work to get their bevels set. I have created much more hone wear in that one sitting than in their previous 100 plus years of use. Is this normal? Were they honed with tape before? Am I doing something wrong?
Creating large amounts of hone wear on vintage razors
- Thread starter Ceefuhs
- Start date
Hone wear is part of honing, wether in one sitting or over 100 years it should be the same.
What you can do is to calculate the bevel angle and figure out if tape is needed or not.
Some like no hone wear and tape but in reality, the angle of the bevel will be too great and the shave will suffer. Ideal angle should be 15-17 degrees.
Im sure Slash will pop in and give you a better explanation but that's just my two cents
What you can do is to calculate the bevel angle and figure out if tape is needed or not.
Some like no hone wear and tape but in reality, the angle of the bevel will be too great and the shave will suffer. Ideal angle should be 15-17 degrees.
Im sure Slash will pop in and give you a better explanation but that's just my two cents
As the 2 prior members stated, it can take a lot of work to correct something "improperly" done. If a razor was honed on a dished out stone, then you could conceivably require a lot of work to correct that. I think dished out hones were surprisingly common back then. I imagine most barbers or sharpeners had only a few, if not 1 hone, and they really put some wear on them. Its not uncommon to see these well loved hones come up for sale.
But back to your original question, I don't see anything inherently wrong with what you are doing. The tape vs no tape debate is a bit of a personal preference issue.
But back to your original question, I don't see anything inherently wrong with what you are doing. The tape vs no tape debate is a bit of a personal preference issue.
What I usually do is tape the spine with 1 or 2 layers to set the bevel and once the bevel is set I dull it on glass and reset the bevel without tape. This allows the bulk of steel needed to be removed from the edge to be removed while still keeping the spine protected, then when the spine is uncovered and the bevel is being reset, less metal is removed from both the spine and edge. Hope this helps
- Thread starter
- #8
I would still calculate the bevel angle before adding tape.
- Thread starter
- #10
Doc226 what is the highest you want to go? 20 degrees?
Your welcome.
Slash McCoy
I freehand dog rockets
To put it in perspective, a Gold Dollar 66 right out of the box will hone up with about a 18-1/2 degree bevel angle and is typically a very mild, almost but not quite what you would call a sluggish, shaver, in spite of considerable weight in the blade. A Case's Ace in relatively good condition typically has just a hair under 16 degrees and is a fairly aggressive shaver, in spite of being very light. 20 degrees is about what I put on a small hollowground pocketknife that I want to be very sharp but that I am not likely to be using for heavy grunt work. The ideal bevel for most shavers and most razors will be something under 17 degrees.
If you protect the spine, then to keep the wear even you would need to protect the edge as well. I don't think that would work very well!
Tape if it is needed, not if it is not needed, and not if you don't know that it is needed. Hone wear is as natural a part of honing as edge wear. If you never wear any steel from the edge, you won't have an edge very long. If you never wear a proportional amount of steel from the spine, then the razor gets narrower but does not get thinner.
Your razor, of course, and your priorities. I'm just telling it like it is. Eventually if you hone with tape the bevel angle will detectably change. After many years it could even change enough to make a difference in how the razor shaves. When bevel setting you are removing a lot of steel from the edge. This is when you should also be removing a lot of steel from the spine. This is the worst time, not the best time, to tape.
Tape is a very useful tool in certain cases such as when a spine is too thin for the blade width, or for a frameback with a soft spine that wears quickly, or for finishing a wedge or a very hard and troublesome razor or other situatiosn like that. Also for honing a showpiece just because it ought to be honed at least once, and you want to keep a gold washed or delicately worked spine pristine to look at. When a razor will hardly ever be honed, it really doesn't matter much, as far as the geometry goes.
Yes, a blade's geometry can change very slowly from taped honing, and it can take years to have any effect. But a razor should have a useful life of over 150 years. Why mess it up in only 10 or 20 or even 30? Again, it's your razor and your priorities.
There is nothing ugly about natural wear marks on a tool. That is what spine wear is, a natural wear mark from normal use and maintenance. A straight razor is a tool for shaving your face, not a piece of jewelry. At least, most straight razors. Most vintage blades already have considerable spine wear anyway if they were used a lot, since electrical tape wasn't even invented until I think 1946 and probably nobody ever thought of doing something as bizarre as taping the spine of a hollowground razor until the CIA put LSD in the water supply. Certainly my Great Grandfather never used tape. Barber hone, lather, spit, and water. In an order that seemed quite random to me but probably had some scientific basis to him. If he were alive today I would ask him about tape. I am sure he would laugh at me thinking it was a joke. He would probably suggest that I wrap my truck tires in duct tape to keep them nice and wear-free. Something like that.
If you just can't stand to see a bevel on the spine, sand it round. Me, I have no problem with my razor looking like I have honed it any more than I have a problem with the sides of my saws getting rub marks or my hammer head getting little scratches or tiny dings. The jaws on my pipe wrenches look really rough, like maybe I have turned pipe or fittings with them. Oh no! I should have protected them! I have cold chisels with slightly mushroomed heads. Oh, the humanity! Why didn't I tape them? And all those scratches! My fids and marlinspikes all show a lot of wear from splicing wire and rope. I am ashamed to let anybody see them in that condition! People will think I let my tools get worn and ugly!
Hey, your razors. I'm just saying.
If you protect the spine, then to keep the wear even you would need to protect the edge as well. I don't think that would work very well!
Tape if it is needed, not if it is not needed, and not if you don't know that it is needed. Hone wear is as natural a part of honing as edge wear. If you never wear any steel from the edge, you won't have an edge very long. If you never wear a proportional amount of steel from the spine, then the razor gets narrower but does not get thinner.
Your razor, of course, and your priorities. I'm just telling it like it is. Eventually if you hone with tape the bevel angle will detectably change. After many years it could even change enough to make a difference in how the razor shaves. When bevel setting you are removing a lot of steel from the edge. This is when you should also be removing a lot of steel from the spine. This is the worst time, not the best time, to tape.
Tape is a very useful tool in certain cases such as when a spine is too thin for the blade width, or for a frameback with a soft spine that wears quickly, or for finishing a wedge or a very hard and troublesome razor or other situatiosn like that. Also for honing a showpiece just because it ought to be honed at least once, and you want to keep a gold washed or delicately worked spine pristine to look at. When a razor will hardly ever be honed, it really doesn't matter much, as far as the geometry goes.
Yes, a blade's geometry can change very slowly from taped honing, and it can take years to have any effect. But a razor should have a useful life of over 150 years. Why mess it up in only 10 or 20 or even 30? Again, it's your razor and your priorities.
There is nothing ugly about natural wear marks on a tool. That is what spine wear is, a natural wear mark from normal use and maintenance. A straight razor is a tool for shaving your face, not a piece of jewelry. At least, most straight razors. Most vintage blades already have considerable spine wear anyway if they were used a lot, since electrical tape wasn't even invented until I think 1946 and probably nobody ever thought of doing something as bizarre as taping the spine of a hollowground razor until the CIA put LSD in the water supply. Certainly my Great Grandfather never used tape. Barber hone, lather, spit, and water. In an order that seemed quite random to me but probably had some scientific basis to him. If he were alive today I would ask him about tape. I am sure he would laugh at me thinking it was a joke. He would probably suggest that I wrap my truck tires in duct tape to keep them nice and wear-free. Something like that.
If you just can't stand to see a bevel on the spine, sand it round. Me, I have no problem with my razor looking like I have honed it any more than I have a problem with the sides of my saws getting rub marks or my hammer head getting little scratches or tiny dings. The jaws on my pipe wrenches look really rough, like maybe I have turned pipe or fittings with them. Oh no! I should have protected them! I have cold chisels with slightly mushroomed heads. Oh, the humanity! Why didn't I tape them? And all those scratches! My fids and marlinspikes all show a lot of wear from splicing wire and rope. I am ashamed to let anybody see them in that condition! People will think I let my tools get worn and ugly!
Hey, your razors. I'm just saying.
See told you Slash would weigh in.
Yeah but he is beating around the bush regarding his opinion again. I wish he would just come out and say whether he is in favor of using tape or not....
Brian
Brian
That is exactly it! For me there's one situation where I tape: some razors do not take a good edge for whatever reason. ( Probably because my honing sucks). Then sometimes adding tape at the finishing state to create a secondary bevel improves things considerably. But that works only for some time. Eventually a bevel reset will be required without tape to reinstate the original blade geometry.
Slash McCoy
I freehand dog rockets
Yeah but he is beating around the bush regarding his opinion again. I wish he would just come out and say whether he is in favor of using tape or not....
Brian
Well, okay. I am in favor of it sometimes. Mostly not. I honed a full wedge last year and rubrubrubbed it without tape and then taped for the last dozen laps on .3u film over picopaper and it was quite a shaver. Incredibly sharp and loaded with gotchas for the unwary, (it got my chin) but one of the cleanest single pass shaves I have ever had. Could I have finished without tape? Maybe but I am a man of limited patience. Sometimes tape is good. Mostly it is just plain evil. Sorry if it still sounds like I am waffling.
I think what slash is saying is the angle of the bevel determines the aggressiveness of the shave. If you use tape the angle will be slightly shallower so not as aggressive as a razor with a higher angle. He put out numbers where 1-2 degrees made a difference. So a gd 66 with tape will shave less aggressively as one without. Look up formulas to determine as doc said. I dont like tape unless i have to. Sometimes i will put a piece on to make a micro bevel, but 99% of the time I dont.
^^^^ Yep. Saves a hell of a lot of wear on the razor.
Slash McCoy
I freehand dog rockets
<sigh>
The razor is made so that the spine wears at the same rate as the edge. That keeps the shaving angle correct. As razors are honed, they get shorter, but theoretically, the angle stays the same. If the spine doesnt wear but the edge does, then you will have a razor that wont shave correctly or at least not as it was designed to.
