Incidence of bad blades

[Al Bundy]

I'm just over a year in to discovering the delights of DE shaving. In all that time I have just experienced my second bad blade from a tuck of otherwise fine ones and was just wondering what the general incidence rate of bad blades is in other peoples experience?

Also, how quickly are you able to realise it's a bad blade? I am not yet sufficiently confident (arrogant...?) to believe that one bad shave is unlikely to be my fault.

In this instance, for example, the first day I had just loaded up a new blade and, having just received it in the post, decided to use Truefitt & Hill 1805 shave cream. After a horrible shave I concluded that maybe with this being a previously untried cream that I had not got the lather optimised.

The following day I used one of my more regulars, namely Crabtree & Evelyn West Indian Limes soap. Another horrible shave and I'm thinking "hmm, that's odd. Lather was fine, maybe I wasn't concentrating on the shave fully...."

Day three. Body Shop Maca Root, a very well known quantity to me. Absolute focus results in a third horrible shave and the jury has returned - it's not me!

A quick change of blade for day 4 and everything is great again - 3 easy passes to BBS with zero irritation

 

[anemic]

I thought I had suffered a run of bad blades but it turned out to be operator error. My first DE razor was not vintage; it was a vdh modern take on a 1950s Gillette TTO. Blades lasted so long for me that I didn't often open it, but when I did, the twist mechanism was very difficult to operate. So I figured I would spare hassles when I left the twist mech partially tightened. Big mistake. I didn't realize how that would affect the shave quality. It randomly cut me. I thought it was bad blades. Very frustrating few weeks.

Now I relieve the twist mech after every shave (and tighten it before every shave). All of my vintage razors function very nicely using this method. I no longer use the modern vdh razor. In retrospect, I haven't had any bad blades and I wonder if they even vary from one to another. It's possible, but the mfg process is dialed. I think the software may be the chief variable with bad blades.

 

[Your Majesty]

The merkur I got felt like sandpaper to me.

 

[epipeman]

I suppose that it depends on the particular blade. I've found that Derby Premium can range between heavenly and the worst blade on earth all within the same tuck. It's a bit annoying. In future I will ask for the heavenly ones only, please (but even I think that that won't work...despite natural optimism).

 

[Badgerstate36]

Its not uncommon to get a dud from time to time. With the churning out thousands and thousands of blades at high speed, a bad one is bound to get out from time to time.
That was always one of my gripes with DE blades, they arent always the best quality in the world.

 

[Chaucer]

The only real duds I’ve had lately are Gillette Blacks. Maybe 1 out of 15 or 20. The rest have been VG to E.

 

[Your Majesty]

You all can't be as unlucky as me.

Last July I bought 25 Astra sp and I threw out 1/3 because of duds. Luckily Astra is cheap.

 

[BigJ]

I have been lucky! I have had roughly one bad blade per 100 with my top-tier blades.

 

[AZBronco]

Blades are cheap. If one is giving me a problem, I toss it and get out the next one. No need to drag it across my face for multiple days because I spent $0.10 on it.

Having said that, I probably only toss 1 or 2 blades a year because of a bad edge.

 

[musicman1951]

Gillette Black 5 pack - three bad edges, but I think that's unusual.
Med Prep - 2 or 3 bad edges in a box of 100.
Labs - 4 or 5 in a box of 100.
PolSilver SI - 2 in a box of 100.

I can tell it's a bad blade half way through the first stroke - but I don't ever seem to stop mid-stroke. It's a lot like my golf swing.