How To Break In A Brush & Get The Funk Out

[cichlid7777]

great post

 

[ike000000]

Just did this with my Duke 2 and Wee Scot that came in today

 

[tsimmns]

Curious to know if I could skip the dawn part and just let the brush soak in the lather. I'm actually wirried of doing this, but assume it will work with such great feedback. I would assume leaving the soap on there would dry the brush out.

 

[ike000000]

When i washed my new shavemac with the dawn the water was a little black, so i wouldn't skip. Just do as it says and you won't be disappointed

Curious to know if I could skip the dawn part and just let the brush soak in the lather. I'm actually wirried of doing this, but assume it will work with such great feedback. I would assume leaving the soap on there would dry the brush out.

 

[akamarcus]

Did this with my Omega 11648 and it is definitely clean. Now I've got to work on soak/dry cycles.

 

[rushchairman]

I don't mind the funk. It reminds me to be grateful to the little guy who gave his life so that I can coat my face in creamy gook.

 

[MrLara]

Oh yes indeed its the magic in the series of steps. It will remove most to all the funk and soften it up big time.

wish i would have seen this thread before trying to get rid of the smell on my brushes.

I only did the lather soak overnight. It didn't get rid of the smell completely, so i had to do the process a few times.

 

[Cody]

As my first post on this forum, I'd like to reply to this thread and say: "Thank you!" I bought a cheap brush to get me into it and see if I like it enough to commit a lot of money (I do!) made of Pure Badger and a plastic handle. The brush isn't as soft as I had imagined it would be, but this definitely opened it up and (from what I can tell) increased softness a bit.
Currently using:
Lord L6 handle
Feather Blades
Mama Bear's Sandalwood Vanilla Shaving Soap
van der Hagen Luxury Shave Set (brush and mug)

I'm going to look around the site for some suggestions on other places to get soaps. I'm ordering a bunch of slivers from Mama Bear's, but excited to have found this site, find suggestions, and learn more!

 

[plato]

I guess my experience is not very common according to this thread.

I tired the dawn trick w/ overnight soaking for my B&B essential boar and it still smells like carcass. I have made maybe 12 "test lathers" and the smell is just still there. I even let it soak overnight with some ToBS grapefruit lather and the ToBS tool awhile to fade to only bring the funk back (in a bad way). I guess my boar put up quite a fight before giving up his hair. Kinda reminds me of a future me.

 

[Galhatz]

The B&B essential is an *extremely* stubborn in the funk department, and though some people reported their brush didn't smell I was either unlucky or my nose is too sensitive. For comparison though, my omega 11137 was also stubborn in letting the funk go. My semogue mixed not however is now smell free.
The only difference is that is user ColConk soap for 2-hour lathers instead if other soaps (best use fir the conk IMO).

I guess my experience is not very common according to this thread.

I tired the dawn trick w/ overnight soaking for my B&B essential boar and it still smells like carcass. I have made maybe 12 "test lathers" and the smell is just still there. I even let it soak overnight with some ToBS grapefruit lather and the ToBS tool awhile to fade to only bring the funk back (in a bad way). I guess my boar put up quite a fight before giving up his hair. Kinda reminds me of a future me.

 

[kalbiking]

I hope Palmolive works okay. I'm about 15 minutes away from lathering it up for the overnight sit.

 

[Doryferon]

 

[merkur59]

Tabac cream did it for me. Even more than the soap. One lather (let it soak for about 1 hour) and my new semogue 830 smells of tabac.
[maybe the 830 has little funk to begin with?]

 

[HUF]

Tabac cream did it for me. Even more than the soap. One lather (let it soak for about 1 hour) and my new semogue 830 smells of tabac.
[maybe the 830 has little funk to begin with?]

Semougues are virtually smell-free right out of the box. My 49 Omega still smells after some 20 shaves, but I like it more than my Semouges.

 

[Pebcak]

I guess my experience is not very common according to this thread.

I tired the dawn trick w/ overnight soaking for my B&B essential boar and it still smells like carcass. I have made maybe 12 "test lathers" and the smell is just still there. I even let it soak overnight with some ToBS grapefruit lather and the ToBS tool awhile to fade to only bring the funk back (in a bad way). I guess my boar put up quite a fight before giving up his hair. Kinda reminds me of a future me.

Wow, I have two of the B&B boars and I didn't even bother doing this as there was next to no funk in them

 

[nowsharing]

Great writeup!

Another thing that really cuts the funk--even on boar brushes--is to add a few drops of essential oils to your lathering bowl religiously for the first week or so. I always add frankincense, but double the amount when breaking in new brushes.

 

[Marsman]

Thanks all for the information, i am off to get the stink out of my new brush that I just finished turning.

 

[Badger_Killer]

Thank you - I never would have guessed that you can safely apply Dawn to a brush at all, and right now I have my new B&B boar brush soaking in it.

I can only imagine this being a stupid n00b question, but I still don't know the answer - why, why, WHY do we the consumers have to deal with this??? How is it not the responsibility of the producers to wash whatever funky animal hair they use first, before they sell it in the form of brushes? I know it isn't too much for the wool industry to do this before converting it into sweaters and such...

 

[Graybeard57]

You can do all manner of tricks, but the fact remains, if you use it daily the funk goes away on its own in a week or two. Soap does that.

 

[mistercitizen]

My approach is to basically "over-funk" the brush by lathering extensively with Tabac soap .

Ben