Im a newbie to wet shaving and have some experience honing. Many speak of great shaves using a straight razor. However, im not one of them. I can't seem to get a even half decent shave with one of my straight razors. Is it my razors suck or my hones are crap or both? Perhaps its my technique both on my stones and on my face? Maybe its all the above? I just don't know but its frustrating and im thinking maybe just go back to the shick quatro!
Frustrated
- Thread starter Benson2777
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Give us a bit more info...
what razor, post some clear pics of it
what hones? are they flat?
what's your process/progression in using them? how do you set a bevel and test?
what razor, post some clear pics of it
what hones? are they flat?
what's your process/progression in using them? how do you set a bevel and test?
Also: what is bad about your shave? Tugging hairs? Irritation? Something else?
No reason to give up. Heck, almost every man used to shave this way. It's just a hurdle, and you'll have all the help you need here, to leap it.
No reason to give up. Heck, almost every man used to shave this way. It's just a hurdle, and you'll have all the help you need here, to leap it.
Search youtube for some straight razor tutorials and pay attention to the skin-stretching techniques. That can help to get a nice close pass.
To get a perfectly smooth BBS (baby butt smooth) shave takes three passes. One with the grain (WTG), one across the grain (XTG) and one against the grain (ATG).
Most of the time I only do a single WTG pass with a straight and get a decent result. XTG isn't too much harder but don't even think about ATG while you're learning - especially if your edges are a bit blunt.
A Feather AC blade shavette could provide a reference point while you'll learning to hone. It'll show you what a shave with a sharp edge should feel like. These Aliexpress clones are also very good. I'd recommend Schick proline blades. They're a bit more consistent than the Feathers which IME start of wicked sharp and then calm down a little after a few shaves.
To get a perfectly smooth BBS (baby butt smooth) shave takes three passes. One with the grain (WTG), one across the grain (XTG) and one against the grain (ATG).
Most of the time I only do a single WTG pass with a straight and get a decent result. XTG isn't too much harder but don't even think about ATG while you're learning - especially if your edges are a bit blunt.
A Feather AC blade shavette could provide a reference point while you'll learning to hone. It'll show you what a shave with a sharp edge should feel like. These Aliexpress clones are also very good. I'd recommend Schick proline blades. They're a bit more consistent than the Feathers which IME start of wicked sharp and then calm down a little after a few shaves.
This picture is not intended as an insult but as motivation. I've got the matching t-shirt in my closet.
My honing is not as good as most folks in this forum. I'm learning and I know it. I know that I've improved over time, and that I'm not as good as I will be in the future. I'm still enjoying the effort. I still consider it a worthy pastime and I am happy that it has a practical application. I have discovered that I am fascinated by the geology associated with natural hones. My wife looked at me the other day and said, "you do realize that you are paying for rocks, right?".
Here are some pieces of advice that I've picked up here on the forum, in no particular order:
Hone until you think you are done, and then hone some more.
If you have nice razors, put them away until you know what you are doing. Do your learning with razors that won't break your heart if they are ruined.
Pay more attention to bevel setting and mid-level work. Your finishing efforts will be much more effective.
Use a light hand / feather touch when honing. It may take more laps, but you'll be happier with the results.
It's not necessary for your stones to be exceedingly flat, but the honing process is certainly more complicated when a given stone progression consists of a mixed group of concave, flat, and convex surfaces.
I tend to be heavy-handed when honing razors, so my learning is presently focused on having a light hand while ensuring that the spine remains uniformly flat on the stone.
I think you should cut yourself some slack and recognize that you are learning a new skill set. No worries. The progress will come along if you put in the work. First we walk, then we run.
Lastly, there are YEARS of conversations stored in this forum. The search functionality is not terribly helpful, but I've done a metric ton of reading here.
patience, if you just wanted a fast easy shave you would never have gone with a straight. Get a decent soligen razor 5/8 hollow grind with no hone wear from the great auction site for 20 bucks and start with that. Let us know what you are working with.
I like the quote! Time and patience are the two tools that helped more than anything in the straight razor honing journey for me. The reason you have a harder time with putting that light touch on it is because you hone so much on arks and they like little "twist". I know this because it's the same problem I've had to overcome. I just now think I've figured out the touch for my coticules which means I'm probably less than half way there. This place has 100s of years worth of knowledge compiled, so just from the research side of things, it takes lots of time. Instead of using the sites search function I search my terms on Google followed by "blade and badger" and it'll work far more efficiently. All those tax dollars sunk into Google really have them an unfair advantage that's hard to match. I think every single bit of advice you have is invaluable and on the spot.
Don't be discouraged, I was in that spot too when I started shaving with SR's. It could very well be that you are shaving with a razor with an edge that isn't shave ready? It could be your technique (Are you stretching?)? It could be your stropping technique? It could be your honing technique? This is all part of the learning curve but once you catch on, you're shaves will improve and become much more enjoyable.
What types of hones are you using?
Slash McCoy
I freehand dog rockets
<EDIT>Looks like I had this thread confused with another one. Anyway I will let the post stand. I think you can get some good from it.</EDIT>
If you are trying to teach yourself to hone a razor that you are trying to learn to shave with, there you go, the root of your problem. It seems perfectly natural to do both at once, or to learn to hone and then learn to shave. It almost never works. Seriously. You REALLY should get a verified shave ready razor and learn to shave first, and then get ANOTHER one, and when the first one gets dull, try your hand at honing.
Honing knifes and honing razors are not the same. Not even. I know it seems like it MUST be, but there are actually very few similarities and knowing how to hone a knife doesn't make it possible to just jump right in to making razors shave ready.
Before you whip out the credit card and pop that "buy" button in yoru browser, VERIFY the seller. So he says his razor is shave ready. Do you believe him? Why? Do you know him and trust him, or are you just taking his word for it, the guy who is trying to sell you a razor and doesn't know you or care even a little bit how good or awful your shave is? VERIFY the seller, always. See if he is a member of long standing on this forum, or another straight razor forum. See if he is known and respected and trusted. See if he shaves with a straight razor. Never trust someone who doesn't shave every day with a straight razor to hone your straight razor. EVERYBODY says or thinks he can hone and that his razors are sharp. Verify.
When you get your razor, put it to the test. Is My Razor Sharp? The Treetopping Test | Badger & Blade. If it won't treetop, it probably wont shave very good, either. Shaves arm hair? So what? You don't care if it shaves your arm or your leg or your back or your hiney or your underarms or your wedding tackle. You want to shave your face. If it treetops, it is capable of shaving your face and all that might be lacking is for you to know how to do it.
Here you go. Read this from end to end. If you won't read it end to end, I can't help you. You are too busy or know too much for me to do you any good. Likewise, all the threads linked in the thread. Again, read them end to end. If you won't, then you won't learn anything from me. My way only works if you follow directions precisely. Use somebody else's way. Those who follow The Method exactly and precisely, succeed, and they succeed brilliantly and at the first or second attempt. Serious. Plus it is the cheapest way to get this kind of edge and in fact is the only way that I know of to get this kind of edge. But do it like you feel it. Newbie Honing Compendium | Badger & Blade
The whole point of setting The Method out in excruciating detail is so you don't have to make any decisions. You simply follow instructions. You don't learn. You DO. Learning takes a long time. Doing takes a few hours the first time, a half hour the second time. You will learn as you do, but The Method has you DOing. If you know more than me, then teach me. If I know more than you, then listen, read, and do. You will thank me. Seriously.
But meanwhile, you need to get yourself a shave ready razor. A shavette sort of satisfies that requirement, sort of, but not exactly. For one thing, you will probably not believe that a straight razor can be as sharp as your shavette. In fact, it can, and that should be your objective. Once you master sharpness, then smoothness will take care of itself. Once you master film and balsa, synthetic stones are simple and naturals you got half whipped already.
But you want to go with a shavette anyway? I won't bother asking why. I don't want to write a book telling you why your reasons are not very good. Instead, I will recommend a shavette or two that won't send your kids to school barefoot.
This takes half of a DE blade. Don't bother with the ridiculous excuse for a blade that they give you for free when you buy this shavette. They are utterly without redeeming qualities. If you want sharp, get Feather. They can be expensive or they can be cheap. Buy online by the 100 and they are cheap. They are hands down the world's sharpest DE blade and they are the blade to match when you start honing. You probably won't beat this blade for sharpness, but if you can match it, you have arrived. All hail. If you want kind and gentle and please don't hurt me, go with Derby. They are a trusted name and not the sharpest blade in the drawer, but very smooth and also pretty cheap. A compromise? Try Gillette 7 O'Clock Green, or Israeli Personna. There are a few others you could try but generally avoid what is offered at walgreens or walmart or dollar general or other drugstores or discount stores. They will be overpriced and they will probably at least semi suck. The respected online shave vendors used by we in the community are good. You might want to try a blade sampler. Notice that the above shavette is styled closely after the Feather Artist Club shavette that uses the long Feather or Kai blade, but uses a half DE blade instead and costs about 1/10 the cost of the Feather AC. It's not bad, and this is my favorite type of shavette. There are many brands and prices are all over the board but knock on wood, most SEEM to be about the same so just skip over the absolute cheapest you can find and go for the next higher price tier and you will probably be fine.
Moving right along, we have this type:
1SALON HAIRDRESSING RAZOR HAIR CUT THINNING REPLACEABLE W/10 BLADES BARBER | eBay
1 Hair Shaving Razor Straight Knife. Choose The Deal and Compare Prices. "The sale of this item may be subject to regulation by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and state and local regulatory agencies.
www.ebay.com
There are many other types listed online and many of them use blades that are no longer available or available only in carpet cutter quality. There are also those that take the long Feather blade. Give them a miss, too, unless you just like to pay 5x the price for your blades.
Of course your ultimate goal is to shave with a straight razor. There are a FEW ebay sellers you can trust. Here is probably my favorite guy on ebay. If he says his razor is shave ready, it is good to go. Mostly he doesn't seem to be selling them as shave ready but he will hone your razor for a consideration before shipping it to you. He has some exceptional razors and a few real bargains. A NOS Dorko 42, $125? I would spring for that if I could keep Mrs. McCoy from knowing I was buying yet another razor I would probably never get around to shaving with before I die. I saw a nice 7/8 NOS Kikuboshi I think, for $120. That's insane. He has a few dogs but just post a pic on this or any other forum and get an opinion before you click Buy Now.
You might also try this guy, who sells shave ready razors. I have not bought from him and know him only by reputation but he is a member of this forum and also another one that I belong to, and I think I can safely recommend him. He has a few real nice ones in his ebay store.
Finally, keep an eye on the BST subforum here on B&B. Just remember, the good deals get snapped up really quick and the leavings are not representative of the best deals you can get at all. I have seen a few real bargains. And if a member says his for sale razor is shave ready, his reputation is on the line, not just a few bucks, so it probably does have a very good edge.
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Possibly all of the above. As it is your first post, welcome to B&B. As others have said, a bit more information is needed.
with even a short time of practice. dedicated practice you'll be surprised how it turns out
I’m going to go ‘atg’ here and say: Of course knowing how to sharpen knives and tools will help you when starting to hone a razor, at least if you’re thinking about it. You’ll already know about how bevels and edges work, and why some will cut some things better than others, and how to achieve that. Assuming that someone actually knows that honing a razor is done differently, and to different ends, then it’ll give them a more acute understanding of why.
If you assume that, then the main difference between freehand knife sharpening and razor honing is that the former is that the former is largely dependent on angle control and the latter on pressure (it's why you can make a relatively simple jig to sharpen a knife well, but making a machine to hone a razor would be wildly difficult and expensive).
For both you need muscle memory, albeit of a different type, and there's no real way around that apart from practice. The main problem in learning to hone a razor is that if you f up you have to go a long way back. But learning to sharpen a knife you can sort problems relatively quickly, because if you're holding an angle properly then you can play with pressure. It's an added variable that in theory makes freehand knife sharpening more difficult, but in practice probably also makes it easier to learn quickly and get to a perfectly reasonable level.
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One thing mentioned by @Pedigree above that I think is incredibly important to emphasize to anyone coming to razor honing from knife or tool sharpening, is to learn about stropping. It'd take me a little more time, and experience, to be able to explain this, but stropping a razor is very very different to stropping a knife. And I think is more disparate and alien than the act of honing on stones.
If you assume that, then the main difference between freehand knife sharpening and razor honing is that the former is that the former is largely dependent on angle control and the latter on pressure (it's why you can make a relatively simple jig to sharpen a knife well, but making a machine to hone a razor would be wildly difficult and expensive).
For both you need muscle memory, albeit of a different type, and there's no real way around that apart from practice. The main problem in learning to hone a razor is that if you f up you have to go a long way back. But learning to sharpen a knife you can sort problems relatively quickly, because if you're holding an angle properly then you can play with pressure. It's an added variable that in theory makes freehand knife sharpening more difficult, but in practice probably also makes it easier to learn quickly and get to a perfectly reasonable level.
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One thing mentioned by @Pedigree above that I think is incredibly important to emphasize to anyone coming to razor honing from knife or tool sharpening, is to learn about stropping. It'd take me a little more time, and experience, to be able to explain this, but stropping a razor is very very different to stropping a knife. And I think is more disparate and alien than the act of honing on stones.
I think the big problem with knife honers moving to razors (and the other way around, though this happens less commonly) is that they often do so without understanding the differences. Yes, a lot of skills overlap, but the ones that don't can be a major impediment if you are unaware or ignore them.
Also, while honing both a knife and a razor is fairly straight forward when everything is set up right, honing a razor can have many strange issues if there is even the slightest problem with the razors grind. These issues are unique to razors, and would never be encountered by someone who has only done knives. The solutions to these problems can be learned, but are often far from intuitive.
Yeah very true. And probably ties into being able to use a little more force on a knife to make corrections - warps or small inconsistencies in grinds are either quite easy to solve or largely unnoticeable.
Touch wood only one of the razors I have so far has an issue lie this. And it's up at the tip, which seems to makes it a bit easier to work around (I imagine) than if there'd been a problem in the middle...?
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Much thanks for all the information and also the ebay store recommendations. I really appreciate you all taking the time to help me out.
Ian C.
Ian C.
