I recently bought three Gold Dollar 1996 razors and they sure seem to be plated. Looks like nickel to me but it may be chrome. The entire razor seems to be plated after all work, including the 'honing' has been finished. I expected some overall poor geometry but was quite surprised by the plating.
As to the warping, all three of them are pretty bad but at least one I believe is outside the realm of any type of conventional honing. That razor has quite a radius in the grind of the hollow such that it touches the hone at the heel and toe on one side and the heel to about the middle of the razor on the other side. Doing rolling strokes to reach all the way to the toe on the second side requires about a seven degree angle to get to the toe. Even then, the bevel does not make anything like a plane surface but rather a twisted angle that is tough to maintain going through the dilution of the slurry. At some point it must require either power tools such as a [hopefully slow] belt sander or just disposing of that razor.
The other two are not as curved at the bevel but are quite tapered from heel to toe; it seems the spines are both tapered and thinner toward the toe.
The spines on all three are pretty rough, almost as though the razors were cast. Add the plating and the razors really resist any appreciable amount of stock removal, even after covering the razor edge and really bearing down on the spine.
Do some of you Gold Dollar folks use something like a belt sander or Dremel to remove the first few ounces of steel when starting out? ( but only kind of....)
As to the warping, all three of them are pretty bad but at least one I believe is outside the realm of any type of conventional honing. That razor has quite a radius in the grind of the hollow such that it touches the hone at the heel and toe on one side and the heel to about the middle of the razor on the other side. Doing rolling strokes to reach all the way to the toe on the second side requires about a seven degree angle to get to the toe. Even then, the bevel does not make anything like a plane surface but rather a twisted angle that is tough to maintain going through the dilution of the slurry. At some point it must require either power tools such as a [hopefully slow] belt sander or just disposing of that razor.
The other two are not as curved at the bevel but are quite tapered from heel to toe; it seems the spines are both tapered and thinner toward the toe.
The spines on all three are pretty rough, almost as though the razors were cast. Add the plating and the razors really resist any appreciable amount of stock removal, even after covering the razor edge and really bearing down on the spine.
Do some of you Gold Dollar folks use something like a belt sander or Dremel to remove the first few ounces of steel when starting out? ( but only kind of....)