Just honed with tape

[Thomas Martin]

I have used electric tape for the first time. Since I'm fairly new this honing business I mostly did it to protect the spine. The result was amazing. I never had such a good HHT result and I can't wait to do a shave test this evening. I also liked how the tape slows down the strokes on my Spyderco UF. I feel to have much more control that way. Has anyone made the same experience?

 

[Seraphim]

Unleash the hounds!!!

 

[oc_in_fw]

I don't understand the whole tape thing. When these razors were designed, electrical tape wasnt around. The spine was designed to set the bevel. Yes, I can understand how it may work a time or two, but eventually geometry is going to catch up, like it always does.

 

[Thomas Martin]

Unleash the hounds!!!

Oh no, please don't. I never intended to make this thread a religious war but merely a testimony of my personal subjective experience and invite others to share theirs. But I was probably a little naive.

edit: and as I said I used tape to protect the spine. I hone so much these days in order to improve my technique that I fear a premature end to my fine razors. I don't know yet if it actually will improve my edge and I may return to no tape honing once I'm sufficiently skilled.

 

[Doc226]

Congrats on the results. I don't think the tape had anything to do with getting the edge, the one time use with the minute change in angle does very little to change the actual bevel angle. Continued honing with tape will lead to a change in the bevel angle-good or bad thing depending on the razor.

Once taped you must always tape for touch ups unless you go back and reset the bevel. Also make sure you use the same tape everytime. If you use a thick tape like super 88 and next time use a thinner one the very edge of the edge will not be sitting on the stone and not really getting touched up.

I started like you taking all my razors. I have converted them all except my BB custom to untaped.

Report how the shave went.

 

[Legion]

Oh no, please don't. I never intended to make this thread a religious war but merely a testimony of my personal subjective experience and invite others to share theirs. But I was probably a little naive.

edit: and as I said I used tape to protect the spine. I hone so much these days in order to improve my technique that I fear a premature end to my fine razors. I don't know yet if it actually will improve my edge and I may return to no tape honing once I'm sufficiently skilled.

Good on you for a good result. I understand you not wanting to put excessive wear on your razor spine when you are new, but the problem is, then you will then be putting just excessive wear on the razor edge, and compounding the problem.

Practice on non valuable razors, no tape. Wear them down to a stub if you have to. Then get good razors and do it for keeps.

 

[Krodor]

Oh no, please don't. I never intended to make this thread a religious war but merely a testimony of my personal subjective experience and invite others to share theirs. But I was probably a little naive.

edit: and as I said I used tape to protect the spine. I hone so much these days in order to improve my technique that I fear a premature end to my fine razors. I don't know yet if it actually will improve my edge and I may return to no tape honing once I'm sufficiently skilled.

Havent had a good tape discussion in awhile. Good for the soul to do that every now and then, no worries.

Tape (a la unicot) is my next effort to try to wrestle my La Grise into playing nicely.

 

[robellison01]

Havent had a good tape discussion in awhile. Good for the soul to do that every now and then, no worries.

Tape (a la unicot) is my next effort to try to wrestle my La Grise into playing nicely.

Thats the angle I took yesterday on a run of the mill hollow ground razor that wasn't cooperating. Couldn't quite seem to find the sweet spot between dull and microchipping until I added the microbevel. Worked out good for me.

Edit: not using my coticule in the above, microchipping was on Shapton 12K

 

[Thomas Martin]

What's the unicot method?

 

[robellison01]

What's the unicot method?

In a nut shell, honing on a coticule with slurry, then adding tape to create a microbevel.

 

[Thomas Martin]

Congrats on the results. I don't think the tape had anything to do with getting the edge, the one time use with the minute change in angle does very little to change the actual bevel angle. Continued honing with tape will lead to a change in the bevel angle-good or bad thing depending on the razor.

Once taped you must always tape for touch ups unless you go back and reset the bevel. Also make sure you use the same tape everytime. If you use a thick tape like super 88 and next time use a thinner one the very edge of the edge will not be sitting on the stone and not really getting touched up.

I started like you taking all my razors. I have converted them all except my BB custom to untaped.

Report how the shave went.

Thanks. I don't think either that the result has something to do with the changing of the angle but rather with handling of the razor during the strokes. Since the tape slowed down the movement quite a bit I was much easier for me to do controlled strokes. I kinda liked the little cushioning the tape provided too. Tape or not seems to be a object of much controversy even among Honemeisters. I understand that some manufacturers hone with tape prior to delivery, like Hardsteel for instance. I reckon that this is rather a matter of personal preferences and not of scientific evidence.

 

[Thomas Martin]

In a nut shell, honing on a coticule with slurry, then adding tape to create a microbevel.

Thanks. I've read somewhere that some Honemeisters even use various layers of tape during the honing procedure. What does a microbevel do?

 

[global_dev]

Thanks. I don't think either that the result has something to do with the changing of the angle but rather with handling of the razor during the strokes. Since the tape slowed down the movement quite a bit I was much easier for me to do controlled strokes. I kinda liked the little cushioning the tape provided too. Tape or not seems to be a object of much controversy even among Honemeisters. I understand that some manufacturers hone with tape prior to delivery, like Hardsteel for instance. I reckon that this is rather a matter of personal preferences and not of scientific evidence.

the tape and spine width and size of blade all combine for edge/bevel geometry. that's pretty scientific to me. the personal preference comes in determining what angle best suits you or whether or not you can deal with hone wear and it's ramifications.

 

[global_dev]

Thanks. I've read somewhere that some Honemeisters even use various layers of tape during the honing procedure. What does a microbevel do?

microbevel increases the angle of the edge and can provide for a different feel/shave. it essential shortens the edge and maybe "strengthens" the resultant edge area

 

[global_dev]

i would think based on my experience, on some razors, like a wedge, tape can truly provide benefit to the long honing session that is staring you down.

 

[Thomas Martin]

Just googled unicot and found this: http://www.coticule.be/unicot.html . I understand that this method allows you to have different grades of abrasivity on one stone by using slurry of different thickness. So far OK but They don't offer explanations to what the microbevel is for.

 

[global_dev]

here is some info from coti.be

by Bart

It may be a simple layer of tape, but there is more to it than meets they eye. Sharpening is basically the act of abrading a flat facet with an abrasive stone. There are likely a few other principles at play, but those are defined by our choice of abrasives (in our case a piece of Coticule rock), and I won't get into that now. Abrasion it is. At two levels.
1. steel removal of the entire bevel facet. The rate is defined by the abrasive properties of the hone and by pressure.
2. detrimental steel removal from the edge where both facets meet, caused by collision of that edge with the same abrasive particles as are causing the surface abrasion. The edge hovers over a microscopic cobblestone path: the very edge bumps into the high spots.

The keenness limit of a hone (any hone) is a function of these 2 parameters. The edge is gaining keenness by the first, but the finer it becomes, the more prone it is to loose keenness by the second. In the end both principles keep each other in balance. The edge looses as much as it gains. The stone has maxed out.
On a Coticule, and certainly with Dilucot, the sweet edge, is found close to that limit. That is, in my opinion, why it can be a struggle. One must reach the maximum of the stone, before it will truly shine as a perfect shaving edge.

Unicot cheats the siituation in couple of ways, but one that is mostly overlooked is this:
By creating a very narrow bevel, the surface abrasion (parameter 1 form the above explanation) rises significantly. While at the same time, the detriment by edge collision (parameter 2) remains basically the same (except maybe for the first few strokes after applying the tape). This means that our abrasion/detriment ratio improves. Or in other words: the keenness limit rises. The effect may not be large, but it is there, and more noticeable when the razor orriginally had a wide bevel in it's untaped state. Dilucot can approach the keenness from a Unicot edge, but it will never surpass it.

That makes Unicot an excellent approach for the inexperienced sharpeneer, because it has a some more keenness to spare. But it makes it also a highly advanced sharpening technique, that can be used by and "edge aficionado" (an appropriate title for a gentleman as Gary) to dwell into the merits of the custom tailored razor edge. There is a lot to discover in the land of bevel angle alteration with secondary and even tertiary bevels. (Feather blades have a tertiary bevel, by the way).

does this help?

 

[ouch]

This thread is approved by Slash McCoy.

 

[jdto]

I tape. If my razors' edges wear enough that it adversely affects the edge performance by the time my son passes them onto my grandson, then they can figure it out and hone them without tape. I'll be sure to leave them a note about that issue if I'm not around anymore. I understand all the arguments for bevel geometry and the effects of wearing the edge vs. not wearing the spine, but if the razor shaves comfortably and continues to do so, there is no such thing as the wrong way. And the argument that tape didn't exist when these were designed is an interesting one. Neither did internet forums, telephones, autmobiles and many other things that we have these days.

 

[Seraphim]

I tape. If my razors' edges wear enough that it adversely affects the edge performance by the time my son passes them onto my grandson, then they can figure it out and hone them without tape. I'll be sure to leave them a note about that issue if I'm not around anymore. I understand all the arguments for bevel geometry and the effects of wearing the edge vs. not wearing the spine, but if the razor shaves comfortably and continues to do so, there is no such thing as the wrong way. And the argument that tape didn't exist when these were designed is an interesting one. Neither did internet forums, telephones, autmobiles and many other things that we have these days.

Leave them two rolls of electrical tape in your will.