What's new

My first JNAT buying and trying

Indeed. For me too. Your saga has inspired me to exempt one of my razors from the Method pasted balsa strops, and experiment with shaving directly off of my finishing stone. I tried that some months ago, with indifferent results, but I'm better at honing now, so we'll see.
That’s great what stone have you got?
 
That’s great what stone have you got?

It's a Nakayama Maruka that I would guess to be around 30K grit. That guess comes from observing its scratches, then stropping with 0.5 micron paste on balsa, and observing those scratches. Very similar scale.
1626274188923.png
 
I’ve had the kitta stone and tomo nagura for 3wks now, I’ve probably honed on it about 10-12 times.
What have I learned about it?
I’ve barely scratched the surface but I’ve tried a few methods.
1 Raising a slurry then gradually diluting to clear/misty water.
I’ve tried this a few times and I find the edge tends to come out super sharp like a DE blade but stingy on my face.
2 Raising a slurry and honing until the slurry is almost gone adding no water for dilution. Ive only done this once but find it takes the stinginess away leaving the razor super smooth on my face. Amazingly smooth. it blew me away a bit. This was a surprise as the slurry was quite dirty by the time I’d finished but smooth and almost creamy feeling.
3 Raising slurry, honing, then refreshing the slurry when needed and very lightly diluting, just enough to keep the slurry wet and the stone workable.
Again this has tended to give an extremely sharp edge but toothy, slightly stingy.
4 No slurry, honing under trickling water. Ive only done this once but it made a very nice edge. Very sharp but smooth too, not as sharp as slurry and dilution and not as smooth as slurry with no dilution but somewhere in between, a nice middle ground.
Every edge has had its own feel but also every one has been crazy sharp. I’d say the best shave I had was when I used the slurry without dilution right to the bitter end. That edge was smoother than my coticule and sharp like pasted balsa. May have just been a fluke or I may have hit on something.Time will tell.
I only shaved once with that edge then honed it differently the next day, but I wish I’d kept it a bit longer as the smoothness was special.
There’s no science to my play, no rigorous measuring or assessment, I’ve made no conclusions, it’s just me feeling my way through the dark. I hone on it and shave and hone again and see what happens. I’m just guided by what my face likes and what the razor feels like, sounds like, looks like on the stone.
I’m glad I bought this thing it’s a lot of fun. It seems very versatile. Slight changes in technique keep it throwing up different edges.
I’m just scratching the surface but enjoying the process and the shaves.
 
Back when I was using DE blades, I found that they smoothed out after the first shave or two. Others on B&B also noted this. I'm thinking the same is true with straights. especially as they are stropped before and after each shave. I only shave once a week and have several razors in my rotation, so it will be a while before I can observe this "smoothing effect". But maybe others were can comment mom that.
 
Back when I was using DE blades, I found that they smoothed out after the first shave or two. Others on B&B also noted this. I'm thinking the same is true with straights. especially as they are stropped before and after each shave. I only shave once a week and have several razors in my rotation, so it will be a while before I can observe this "smoothing effect". But maybe others were can comment mom that.
I’ve found this too, that a rough first shave is quite smooth the second time around. Maybe I should shave twice with each honing to better assess it.
 
I really like my Jnat but it’s definitely my most inconsistent finisher. I taken to using it with only water. Even then a freshly lapped surface is different to a well worn surface. I usually get a good edge, sometimes a great edge but always a different edge.
 
Had a nice week away with the family, so haven’t used the jnat.
I took my 5/8ths Turner and my 5 x 1 inch coticule which fits nice in my bag.
The day after getting home I shaved with my Friodur which I’d previously honed on the jnat and the shave was fine but not as smooth as I wanted so later that day I took it on the jnat.
I made a nice thin yellow slurry and got started. At first the razor pushed the bright yellow slurry around at the edge without a lot of undercut, but gradually the slurry feel and sound changed and the razor began undercutting very nicely indeed.
I didn’t dilute or refresh the slurry just added a small drop or two here or there to keep the stone from drying out. Stone in hand now with the lightest possible touch I made shorter and shorter strokes until I felt I must be about there. The whole honing took maybe 10 mins or so.
I tried a hanging hair test but it wouldn’t cut.
Next I gave it 40 on linen and 60!on leather. This made a massive improvement to the HHT.
EF200194-B82E-4F9E-9294-0ADCE682711A.jpeg

I was optimistic that I’d done a good job and I shaved with it this morning.
It felt extremely sharp like a pasted diamond edge so I brought the spine close to my face and this made it feel very smooth. Each pass felt smoother still. I finished with Alum and some Lucky Tiger aftershave (very soothing) and felt my face.
this was more like it.
A brilliant shave even on the toughest part of my stubble.
 
Had a nice week away with the family, so haven’t used the jnat.
I took my 5/8ths Turner and my 5 x 1 inch coticule which fits nice in my bag.
The day after getting home I shaved with my Friodur which I’d previously honed on the jnat and the shave was fine but not as smooth as I wanted so later that day I took it on the jnat.
I made a nice thin yellow slurry and got started. At first the razor pushed the bright yellow slurry around at the edge without a lot of undercut, but gradually the slurry feel and sound changed and the razor began undercutting very nicely indeed.
I didn’t dilute or refresh the slurry just added a small drop or two here or there to keep the stone from drying out. Stone in hand now with the lightest possible touch I made shorter and shorter strokes until I felt I must be about there. The whole honing took maybe 10 mins or so.
I tried a hanging hair test but it wouldn’t cut.
Next I gave it 40 on linen and 60!on leather. This made a massive improvement to the HHT.
View attachment 1301762
I was optimistic that I’d done a good job and I shaved with it this morning.
It felt extremely sharp like a pasted diamond edge so I brought the spine close to my face and this made it feel very smooth. Each pass felt smoother still. I finished with Alum and some Lucky Tiger aftershave (very soothing) and felt my face.
this was more like it.
A brilliant shave even on the toughest part of my stubble.
You definitely need to strop before the HHT.
 
Adding to my last post, it has been claimed that the Suehiro 20k can produce good HHT results without stropping. But for me, stropping is definitely necessary after honing.

As part of my ongoing program to prevent myself from ordering a Suehiro 20K, I'd like to point out that people say that, however capable this stone is, it gives almost no feedback whatsoever.
 
I haven’t shaved from my slates in ages so before yesterday mornings shave I honed a gold dollar on my little piece of 12k slate under running water and it shaved really well. Vey sharp, very smooth. That slate had cost me £12 on eBay.
BD9192B4-2403-4327-8F24-481775962AC2.jpeg
I got thinking. You could spend hundreds on a stone and not get the edge too much better than this.
As I’ve been experimenting with a jnat and tomo nagura slurry, today I tried using the nagura slurry but using my big 8x3 15k Welsh slate as the base stone.
The slate is super hard and beautifully black when wet.
D69CC22D-0731-42F6-A3A9-70CE132FCE90.jpeg

It slurried less quickly than on the jnat but didn’t take long at all.
I just honed like I would on the jnat, the slurry broke down quickly enough and began undercutting nicely. I kept going until I felt like I was done. Maybe 15 mins then stropped 50 each linen and leather and shaved. The slate felt glassier than the jnat under the razor, less audio feedback.
The shave was very very smooth. As sharp as my jnat? Hard to say as shaving technique, lather etc all play a part in the quality of each days shave. First impressions I’d say not quite the keenness of my jnat but still lovely and smooth to shave with. I’ll keep using it this week, I also have a slate slurry stone which I’ve never used. Does slate slurry break up like nagura slurry? No doubt I’ll find out along the way. I wonder if I could use the nagura slurry and hone on glass or marble?
 
After using the slate honed razor for a couple of shaves I took the same razor back to the jnat with slurry.
What an improvement.
Going back to the slate made me appreciate all the more just how good my jnat is.
I was in a rush today so wasn’t a bit careful with the shave yet still, everything was cleared effortlessly and smoothly and the post shave feel is perfect.
7AA2A0F4-CBA5-4700-8AB9-C8F24FB4A41D.jpeg

The difference in colour between wet and dry. The stone is lovely when wet with rosy red spots here and there. Great shave today, and while I can get brilliant shaves from my £12 piece of slate I can get definitely get sharper and smoother with this jnat. The edges are just brilliant.
 
I’ve had a busy week so have been whizzing through my daily 4 pass shaves in about 15 mins which is about as quickly as I can do them, but today being Saturday I thought I’d take my time, break out the Trumper pre shave, the big Friodur, some Taylor’s Platunum cream and have a nice relaxed no rush shave.
All was going well, the stainless Friodur has a beautiful jnat edge and was performing very well when suddenly going atg on my top lip I felt a real bite. I knew it was a good cut straight away as I instinctively jerked the razor away from my face. It had sunk into my top lip where the lip meets the edge of the Cupid’s bow. I was spitting out blood for quite a few minutes as I carefully finished the shave. It was a small cut, maybe 2-3mm but deep. I was lucky not to cut a big chunk of lip clean off. After a few mins of bleeding quite heavily I rinsed and surprisingly the bleeding stopped quite quickly on applying the alum block. I’ll have to take it easy around that area for a few days. I’ve never been cut like that in all my years of straight razor shaving, including all my early shaves, all my tired shaves, hungover shaves, pre occupied shaves etc and yet the day I decide to really take my time, I get my worst cut. It won’t need stitching though I feel very lucky on that one and it’s a quiet reminder to me of just how insanely sharp these things are.
 
Top Bottom