Darn razor , just won't hold or get an edge......

[cityjim]

You guys ever come across a razor that no matter how much you hone it or how you do this/that or how much pressure , basically blah blah blah that the sucker is just not sharp ?

Some blades you work your fingers off basically for nothing . Some other blades take minutes to restore a good one .

My findings are some blades are standouts , some are so-so and some are junk . It's all in the steel .

My best shavers are made of Swedish steel . One that is near the top of my list is a stainless Friodur which is surprising . Everyone says carbon steel only . Ok but this razor just works .

I guess you find some that shave and others wind up in the BST area here on B&B . Wonder if I might say buyer beware ???


cityjim

 

[LarryAndro]

The hardest steel I've found was from the Sochi area in Russia. It took a little more work to get and keep sharp than most blades. It took a sharper edge than I liked in fact.

Excluding pure junk razors, speaking only of quality razors, there is one type razor that just never took the sharp edge I anticipated. But, shaved very well nonetheless. I've only honed 3 or 4 Spike near wedge razors. No matter what I did, I could never get it as sharp as I liked. This might have been because of the metal. But, it might have been due to it being near wedge. (But, I have gotten near wedges acceptably sharp before.)

When honing my first Spike, after honing it an inordinate amount of time trying to achieve proper sharpness, I finally out of desperation shaved with it. It shaved well! Even though it sounds crazy, the metal felt soft. I had to watch my technique a little more, using stretching and slice and such. But, it proved to be a nice shaver.

These blades sometimes can buffalo (haven't used that term forever!) us!

 

[professorchaos]

I had a few razors such as you can describe. Try a Spyderco UF or Shapton 12K Pro with .5 or .25 diamond spray as a slurry. It'll settled their hash very, very quickly.

 

[taffy]

Only once, one of my first honing experiances, never could get it sharp, sent a different razor out to be honed and also included this razor, and even the chap who I sent it to failed!

 

[mdunn]

yeah, I had one that the edge kept crumbling.. a few layers of tape to change the angle helped out a lot.

 

[Haiku]

Could it be that the razor was either never tempered properly or that it lost its temper?

If a razor is overheated say by someone using power tools to polish it, it could lose its temper and require retempering.

There are guys on this forum and on the straight razor forum who have forges at home and who can temper a blade.

 

[Will P.C.]

Could it be that the razor was either never tempered properly or that it lost its temper?

If a razor is overheated say by someone using power tools to polish it, it could lose its temper and require retempering.

There are guys on this forum and on the straight razor forum who have forges at home and who can temper a blade.

I always try and stay away from blades on ebay and the classifieds that look 'restored' unless I know who the restorer is and that they are professional. Guys using dremels and such can heat up a blade fast and mess with the temper if they do not know what they are doing.

It seems more and more people on ebay are selling these half *** restore jobs to try and pull in more money. I just stay away from them

 

[Haiku]

I always try and stay away from blades on ebay and the classifieds that look 'restored' unless I know who the restorer is and that they are professional. Guys using dremels and such can heat up a blade fast and mess with the temper if they do not know what they are doing.

It seems more and more people on ebay are selling these half *** restore jobs to try and pull in more money. I just stay away from them

I don't blame you. I wouldn't limit it to ebay though. There are a number of guys on various shaving/razor internet boards who I'm sure destroy the temper on the blades that they purport to "restore".

 

[chess1]

There is could be many reason razor will not take shaveable edge.
1 temper
2. In fact hard steel.
takes too much time to get where you like to be.
3. is horrible blades fromm etc.
4. someone clean up the blade and heated up so much changed the temper.
hope this helps.

 

[kfralin]

dont forget warped or uneven spine and improperly set bevel...darn there are so many variables