Hannah's Dad
I Can See Better Than Bigfoot.
9 baby!
gillette slim adjustable
- Thread starter saj
- Start date
Then you should reclaim it!
The setting number is meaningless--meaningless--unless the user also gives a clue on how tough (or mild) his whiskers are.
I have pretty tough "old man whiskers" and 6 is right for me on the Gillette Slim, giving a desired balance between comfort and closeness. I'm also a "set it and leave it" guy, 97% of the time.
(I also use the setting of 6 on the Gillette Super Adjustable, and I use a 5 on the Fat Boy adjustable.)
I have pretty tough "old man whiskers" and 6 is right for me on the Gillette Slim, giving a desired balance between comfort and closeness. I'm also a "set it and leave it" guy, 97% of the time.
(I also use the setting of 6 on the Gillette Super Adjustable, and I use a 5 on the Fat Boy adjustable.)
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Toggle, Fatboy, Slim, or Super Adjustable, they are always on 9.
7. And it is never adjusted. I bought the adjustable to find out where it should be adjusted to, and thus adjusted, it stays.
I love the Slim! I use mine for a 3 pass shave as follows: 9, 7, 5 or sometimes 8, 6, 4, depending on growth. Anything under 3 is pretty useless on my beard.
Ron R
I survived a lathey foreman
I like to use my Gillette slim or Fatboy on( 7)1st pass and then to (8) for 2nd pass & pickups seems to work for me. When my technique was not matured I like to start out around 4 or 5 and went down from there, but then someone on B&B thread mentioned to start at your favorite starting point and go up on aggression settings, he figured you can get the flat lying whiskers better so end results are a closer shave.
Brother Salty,
Always? Always wide open at 9? It sounds like you're a charter member of the More Is More Club.
Think of all the money you could have saved if at the beginning you had just bought a Muhle R41 and a big bag of Feather blades!
3 or 4. My neck likes it mild
Brother Salty,
Always? Always wide open at 9? It sounds like you're a charter member of the More Is More Club.
Think of all the money you could have saved if at the beginning you had just bought a Muhle R41 and a big bag of Feather blades!
BBS is the goal and the only way I can get there with a Gillette adjustable is wide open. Curiously, my Gibbs gets me to bbs just fine on 4.5.
I've learned, the hard way, that our little hobby has nothing to do with saving money. Any cash I may have saved on razors would have gone toward creams, soaps, emollients, potions, unguents, and all stuff like that there, to borrow a phrase from Fibber McGee.
till last year it was on 7 but now it stays on 5
Ah, Fibber McGee. Then I take it you're an old-timer, probably over 40 years old.
I think 7 is good but I dial it to 6 and try to use technique to get a close shave. I use a GSB blade.
I get a great shave on 4 or 5 with a Nacet.
I've mostly set mine at either a 4 or a 5 (using Nacet and IP blades) and really like the shaves I'm getting on those settings.
I'll make a pitch to experiment a little with settings/blades on the Slim. A couple of weeks ago, I tried it on 2 (armed with a fresh Nacet) just to see what happened, fully expecting it would be too inefficient to be practical. Much to my surprise, it worked beautifully. It was a little less efficient in that I needed to do a third pass instead of my usual 2, but boy did it feel smooth -- just a very different experience. The Slim on a 2 allowed me to be a tad more cavalier/reckless with the shave, without much worry about irritation. "Forgiving" might be the better word for this. It required a slick lather though.
TLDR: there's opportunity to get some variety out of the Slim that is probably worth exploring.
I'll make a pitch to experiment a little with settings/blades on the Slim. A couple of weeks ago, I tried it on 2 (armed with a fresh Nacet) just to see what happened, fully expecting it would be too inefficient to be practical. Much to my surprise, it worked beautifully. It was a little less efficient in that I needed to do a third pass instead of my usual 2, but boy did it feel smooth -- just a very different experience. The Slim on a 2 allowed me to be a tad more cavalier/reckless with the shave, without much worry about irritation. "Forgiving" might be the better word for this. It required a slick lather though.
TLDR: there's opportunity to get some variety out of the Slim that is probably worth exploring.
In the category of "Things I learned on B&B", I recall being impressed by a particular thread that said (I'm paraphrasing now), "if you really want to learn to shave effectively, holding the razor at that sweetspot angle, where the blade slices perfectly through those whiskers. You need to practice shaving with mild razors instead of bulling your way through your whiskers with an aggressive razor".
Unfortunately, I don't recall who taught me this little gem, so at that point, my focus became more on comfort.
Regarding blades, IMO, the Slim is one of those razors that works well with almost any blade. These days Gillette Silver Blues and Gillette Platinums would be my choice.
The black beauty has been my only razor for the last few months. I am not sure if it is randomly bad technique but I find the setting really blade dependent. With feathers I go down to a three and do reasonably well ( but still need to be careful ) and yet currently I have been testing persona platinums and i can abuse it carelessly at 6 with no issues.
Usually 4.
If I'm looking for a more aggressive shave, I'll go to something with an open comb.
If I'm looking for a more aggressive shave, I'll go to something with an open comb.
I have a mix of black, and wiry gray/white beard hair, so it depends on how many day's worth of growth, the blade (how old, how sharp) and how I'm feeling as I find a shave with them on 8/9 harsher than a Fat Boy on 8/9. With that said, with one day's worth of growth this morning I went with a 6 and stayed there for two passes. With more than two day's worth I'll go to 7-8 and maybe move down for successive passes, or not--and anything under 3 is unsatisfying (no efficiency, no blade feel, no audible feedback, etc.). "For me," the longer handles and slimmer head (Slims/SAs have the same head geometry) don't fit me. The Super Adjustables look cool, but IMHO, they are over-hyped, cheaply made, and haven't aged as well (bind up, get dirty/lose the last 1/4 turn, and need constant attention). For the money/performance, the Slims being all brass are pretty reliable, but I prefer the higher/thicker head of the Fat Boy and earlier Super Speeds (I have a beat up '46 Aristocrat that gives a better shave than my Slims/SAs).
