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EJ Kelvin with DE89 Head - Review, Photos, Measurements, Photo Analysis

I tried the blue painters tape method today, wow, so much smoother. First pass I did without shims, and it felt like it didn’t really do anything, but adding two shims and this became a very smooth shave. I wouldn’t say it was efficient and as normal I had to do a some buffing on my problem areas. But the buffing was so much nicer on my skin, and very care free.

Also I found this set up to be by far the most chatter free set up I’ve rigged on this razor and ATG was quite easy, whereas before on my chin it was impossible with two shims.

Interestingly to me, I actually felt less need for pressure with this set up as well, even though it is quite mild.

Now since this is my only razor, can any of you pros tell me what would be an similar razor. I don’t mind tweaking the set up but at some point I’d rather find a razor with similar characteristics. I’m starting to think I’m one of those that genuinely prefer a milder style razor.

In part that’s also due to one of my trouble areas being right at the inner edge of the corner of my lips and it feels that anything too aggressive would be risky there.

Cool! I'm glad that the painter's tape under the cap edges worked for you, too. :001_smile Once I started using tape strips, I didn't stop. It just made the EJ Kelvin work better and allowed me to tailor blade exposure in combination with shims. I'm doing stuff like that now with the Bevel razor. It's normal for me now to modify razors, even though it's not ideal. I'd rather find a razor that works best for me without modification, which is similar to your quest to find a milder razor.
 
Whoa! Stop! I love the enthusiasm, but YOU DON'T HAVE TO PAINT YOUR RAZORS! I wouldn't do that. You're right about reflections and recesses making photo analysis more difficult. I'm glad that you're trying to do it. It's not easy, I know. You should know that I've really improved my techniques. I take a lot of different photos now that allow me to be very accurate now and not sweat about taking the perfect picture in trying to capture the cutting edge, which has its shortcomings anyway. Nevertheless, a good picture, if captured, is usually good enough even though it's not as accurate as what I'm doing now. To get that good photo analysis picture, take the time to get the camera propped up and aligned with the blade cutting edge. I've never photographed my setup or detailed how I do it, but it's not easy and it's the hardest part of the setup. Once you've got everything ready, this is when the secondary light source comes in. I use a small LED flashlight and manually adjust the white balance of my camera so that, when I take the picture, the color looks okay. I hold up the flashlight close to the razor head at the right position and angle, with fiddling around, so that the light shines off the cutting edge in the right way for the picture to help capture the cutting edge and make more contrast with the contours of the razor. I snap the picture with my other hand.

Hopefully, my advice helps with taking photo analysis pictures and helps you NOT paint your razors, because as far as I'm concerned, taking the pictures of a painted razor would still be difficult. Are you propping up a metric scale/ruler next to the razor?

When possible I eschew common sense whenever brute force and simplicity is an option.:001_tongu I decided to dip each side of my EJ DE89 Kelvin in wite-out with the razor blade mounted. The results were interesting. I'm essentially taking a "mold" of where the blade is clamped by the top cap & bottom cap. Where the razor is clamped, no wite-out can flow past, and when I take the blade off of the razor, a raised ridge is left behind. This raised ridge makes it easy to measure with a caliper, because you can put one jaw on the razors edge, and slowly close it with the thumb-screw until the second jaw hits the raised ridge and cannot advance. By dipping both sides of the razor in their entirety, it allows me to take measurements anywhere on the blade. As it turns out, this was fortunate, because I obviously didn't put the blade in straight! I wanted to take 12 measurements (left, center, right X North, South, X Top & Bottom) but one corner was too hard to get a measurement on so I only got 11. The blade itself measured 22.02mm with my digital caliper, which indicates an average sized blade and confirms the calibration of the digital calipers. Here is what I did:

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Here is a diagram of the blade measurements from the digital calipers :

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Results:

It's obvious from the photo that I not only put the blade in crooked but I also had .2mm more blade exposure on one side than I did with the other, which all the more funny because I shaved with this a week ago. It's one of the reasons I don't like blades that need manual adjustment, it's hard to eyeball correct alignment and it impacts the quality of the shave. I'm glad I dipped both sides of the razor in it's entirety; if I had taken a measurement at a single point with the blade mounted crooked it would have skewed my estimates significantly. Averaging the measurements corrects for the skew as well as for having more blade on one side of the razor than another.

Free-End Distance: 4.92mm
Clamping Distance: 1.308mm

Our estimates of clamping distance differ by .52mm (5.44mm vs 4.92mm) and our estimates of free-end distance differ by .61mm (1.92mm vs 1.308mm). I may try again later to see if the measurements are repeatable. First I've got to find an old tooth-brush to clean up the mess I made though...:001_huh:



 
When possible I eschew common sense whenever brute force and simplicity is an option.:001_tongu I decided to dip each side of my EJ DE89 Kelvin in wite-out with the razor blade mounted. The results were interesting. I'm essentially taking a "mold" of where the blade is clamped by the top cap & bottom cap. Where the razor is clamped, no wite-out can flow past, and when I take the blade off of the razor, a raised ridge is left behind. This raised ridge makes it easy to measure with a caliper, because you can put one jaw on the razors edge, and slowly close it with the thumb-screw until the second jaw hits the raised ridge and cannot advance. By dipping both sides of the razor in their entirety, it allows me to take measurements anywhere on the blade. As it turns out, this was fortunate, because I obviously didn't put the blade in straight! I wanted to take 12 measurements (left, center, right X North, South, X Top & Bottom) but one corner was too hard to get a measurement on so I only got 11. The blade itself measured 22.02mm with my digital caliper, which indicates an average sized blade and confirms the calibration of the digital calipers. Here is what I did:

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Here is a diagram of the blade measurements from the digital calipers :

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Results:

It's obvious from the photo that I not only put the blade in crooked but I also had .2mm more blade exposure on one side than I did with the other, which all the more funny because I shaved with this a week ago. It's one of the reasons I don't like blades that need manual adjustment, it's hard to eyeball correct alignment and it impacts the quality of the shave. I'm glad I dipped both sides of the razor in it's entirety; if I had taken a measurement at a single point with the blade mounted crooked it would have skewed my estimates significantly. Averaging the measurements corrects for the skew as well as for having more blade on one side of the razor than another.

Free-End Distance: 4.92mm
Clamping Distance: 1.308mm

Our estimates of clamping distance differ by .52mm (5.44mm vs 4.92mm) and our estimates of free-end distance differ by .61mm (1.92mm vs 1.308mm). I may try again later to see if the measurements are repeatable. First I've got to find an old tooth-brush to clean up the mess I made though...:001_huh:

Very cool! :thumbup: I'm glad that you measured both sides because there are inevitably differences on the two sides that need to be averaged out. Your measurements are shorter than mine by significant enough of a difference to point out, as you did. A reason for this difference may be in how you visually decided where the white-out line ended for your measurements, and that may be related to how the white-out dried. In my photo-analysis measurements, I had to visually decide where the free-end and clamp distances stopped, as shown in my illustration. My free-end distance is very good for a 21.96 mm blade. My clamp distance is good, too, but probably not as accurate because it was more difficult to decide where the clamp started.
 
I didn't estimate it visually, the hardened wite-out had a crisp raised line at the point of cap intersection that's about .5mm high and it actually stops the calipers from closing further when it hits it. There isn't much guesswork involved because the wite-out stops flowing where the blade is clamped against the cap and leaves behind that ridge when the piece is demolded. Like I said, I don't know what would account for the difference but I'll try it again at some point to see if the measurements are repeatable and try to figure out where error could creep into the measurement.
 
I didn't estimate it visually, the hardened wite-out had a crisp raised line at the point of cap intersection that's about .5mm high and it actually stops the calipers from closing further when it hits it. There isn't much guesswork involved because the wite-out stops flowing where the blade is clamped against the cap and leaves behind that ridge when the piece is demolded. Like I said, I don't know what would account for the difference but I'll try it again at some point to see if the measurements are repeatable and try to figure out where error could creep into the measurement.

I don't think that you'd want to measure where there is a crisp raised line. The white-out that would flow into the crevasses for measuring the free-end and clamp distances would get thinner and thinner until it couldn't flow into the spaces any farther. You'd want to measure the farthest points of the white-out from the blade cutting edges, right? Another possible reason for our different measurements could be that our DE89 heads are different. With your caliper, would you please measure the "cap width" as the overall horizontal distance from one longer side of the cap to the other? (Mine is 19.02 mm.) Also, would you please measure the "nominal baseplate width"? (Mine is 25.10 mm.) This overall distance does not include the end distances because the ends of my baseplate flare out a bit.
 
I don't think that you'd want to measure where there is a crisp raised line. The white-out that would flow into the crevasses for measuring the free-end and clamp distances would get thinner and thinner until it couldn't flow into the spaces any farther. You'd want to measure the farthest points of the white-out from the blade cutting edges, right? Another possible reason for our different measurements could be that our DE89 heads are different. With your caliper, would you please measure the "cap width" as the overall horizontal distance from one longer side of the cap to the other? (Mine is 19.02 mm.) Also, would you please measure the "nominal baseplate width"? (Mine is 25.10 mm.) This overall distance does not include the end distances because the ends of my baseplate flare out a bit.

Good points.

My cap appears to be slightly wider in the center ~19.1mm and tapers at the ends down to ~19.02mm.
My base plate is reading 25.12mm in the middle but interestingly, mine doesn't flare out, it tapers narrower at the ends to ~25.0mm.

I'm no machinist though, so I'd guess my measurements are at best +/- .05mm.
 
Good points.

My cap appears to be slightly wider in the center ~19.1mm and tapers at the ends down to ~19.02mm.
My base plate is reading 25.12mm in the middle but interestingly, mine doesn't flare out, it tapers narrower at the ends to ~25.0mm.

I'm no machinist though, so I'd guess my measurements are at best +/- .05mm.

I'm no machinist, either, but I'd say that Edwin Jagger machinists do a good job of making consistent razors! :laugh: Those dimensions are a lot alike. Therefore, it appears that our measurement differences largely come down to how you physically measured with white-out and a caliper versus how I digitally measured with a photo analysis.
 
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