Second razor spotted, just like this one.
Rare Super Speed
- Thread starter pauls51
- Start date
In a place I can't direct attention to until it's over.
The presence of two lends credence to this thing being legit.
The second one is being sold by someone else. Not Glasgow. His is still up so it's not the same one.
The presence of two lends credence to this thing being legit.
The second one is being sold by someone else. Not Glasgow. His is still up so it's not the same one.
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I see it now... in the wildest auction I've ever seen in my life.
Yep. More real prototypes than others have fake. lol.
Such a tease! Too tired to really search. Gah!
True, some nice stuff in the lot.
What would really make me cry is if the boxes/cases were around, and they were tossed/binned.
Group buy!
Seriously, though, in the last pic posted by Radar showing the "O" on the bottom, look at the cutouts/"teeth" on the bottom right. In that light, a couple of them look a bit uneven, where others do not. Maybe it's just my eyes but I wouldn't imagine Gillette making that sloppy of a cut, if in fact Gillette did it. But then again, who knows.
EDIT: upon closer exam of the listing's big pics, the lower left side of the bottom view looks even worse. The "tooth" on the farthest left corner looks to me as if someone did a good job measuring off the cuts, marked them carefully, and for the most part did a good job drilling them out...but really screwed up on that corner cut.
Other cuts are sloppy, too...unless I imagine it, you can almost see on that lower left where a small drill bit made two distinct, rounded digs to make that bottom left "tooth," and did not go quite to the safety bar, leaving a flange of metal at the "bottom" of that tooth. This likely would be invisible from the normal view looking down from the top of the razor. From the bottom, though, it seems really obvious. Some tooth cutouts are not even. Others appear to be perfectly even. Anyone else seeing it?
I vote hoax, or really sloppy prototype. Leaning toward [correction] sloppy prototype.
Seriously, though, in the last pic posted by Radar showing the "O" on the bottom, look at the cutouts/"teeth" on the bottom right. In that light, a couple of them look a bit uneven, where others do not. Maybe it's just my eyes but I wouldn't imagine Gillette making that sloppy of a cut, if in fact Gillette did it. But then again, who knows.
EDIT: upon closer exam of the listing's big pics, the lower left side of the bottom view looks even worse. The "tooth" on the farthest left corner looks to me as if someone did a good job measuring off the cuts, marked them carefully, and for the most part did a good job drilling them out...but really screwed up on that corner cut.
Other cuts are sloppy, too...unless I imagine it, you can almost see on that lower left where a small drill bit made two distinct, rounded digs to make that bottom left "tooth," and did not go quite to the safety bar, leaving a flange of metal at the "bottom" of that tooth. This likely would be invisible from the normal view looking down from the top of the razor. From the bottom, though, it seems really obvious. Some tooth cutouts are not even. Others appear to be perfectly even. Anyone else seeing it?
I vote hoax, or really sloppy prototype. Leaning toward [correction] sloppy prototype.
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Or Piltdown man. Or both.
Ok, if the teeth were cut out by hand, then the question remains - cut out from what? There is still the matter of metal appearing where none existed before.
And then the second, identical super speed from a different seller also has that O on it, and while I do not see a date code - the handle suggests that it is from the same time period.
And then the second, identical super speed from a different seller also has that O on it, and while I do not see a date code - the handle suggests that it is from the same time period.
More often then not prototypes are sloppy. They are not meant to leave the lab and in most cases are fabricated in the company's machine shop. The fact that this design never went into production and nothing is known about it means it never reached the pilot run stage where some pieces would make way to salesmen or large customers. It's a very interesting piece. The two pieces we now know about are actually different where one has end caps and the other does not. In my mind that pretty much says these are hand made lab protos. Skilled machinists can do wonderful things.
Len
Len
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If someone wanted to go through the trouble of faking a prototype in order to get a couple hundred bucks for it (and he may yet), could it be a frankenrazor? IOW, is there another Gillette SS bed that does not have the cutouts you pointed out? It'd be a pain in the butt to pull off but several of us on this board COULD do it, if we were inclined to, as long as all the required parts mated up.
BTW, I am in no way impugning the seller...don't know him at all. But the razor looks a bit crude to be passable as a true factory prototype.
But as Oldguy says, maybe it's legit.
Not an SS. Only thing that comes to mind would be one of the old open comb tto's, but to the best of my knowledge, none of those had that crimp in them except for the british models, and that's a US head.
And in that case we would still have metal where none was before - in that solid bar guard going across the front of the combs.
I see what you mean. So what's the likely guess: Gillette had a machinist pull an SS razor bed before it had the hair/soap escapes cut into them, then milled the teeth out of it?
The problem is you guys are thinking these razors were made from existing products. I think the guards were made from scratch. Then existing parts like the handles and TTO mechanisms were fitted to it to make a working prototype. This is the way my company made prototypes when I started designing products in 1964. Those were the days when companies were run by engineers and the products were designed, prototypes made, pilot runs run and finally production run in the same building. We even did all our own plating for all our products in the basement of the building. I still think these two pieces are legit. Fortunately I had 41 years of design experience and unfortunately still think like an engineer.
Len
Len
Here is my theory:
If you look at the one auction picture, you can see the most used one is the "prototype". Also, the auction is from Massachusetts. That means there is a darn good chance this person may have either worked on the line or worked for Gillette. Given the use of the prototype razor, including the amount of soap build up, perhaps this was a prototype like the current iPhone 4g, that they let employees use and test, to determine if it would be a good idea/sell well. While it might not have been good enough for production, the people liked it so much, they kept using them.
OR
The slotted comb instead of open comb violated another companies design patent, which prevented Gillette from marketing it.
If you look at the one auction picture, you can see the most used one is the "prototype". Also, the auction is from Massachusetts. That means there is a darn good chance this person may have either worked on the line or worked for Gillette. Given the use of the prototype razor, including the amount of soap build up, perhaps this was a prototype like the current iPhone 4g, that they let employees use and test, to determine if it would be a good idea/sell well. While it might not have been good enough for production, the people liked it so much, they kept using them.
OR
The slotted comb instead of open comb violated another companies design patent, which prevented Gillette from marketing it.
I love a mystery as much as the next guy, so I'm just considering all possibilities.
The razor bed is stamped with markings that I've seen on at least one of my own razors (a blue tip I once had had the "O" on it). I still lean toward the prototype explanation. But the production markings stamped on the bottom of the bed doesn't quite make sense if it's a totally unique fabrication for a prototype. An existing, stamped but unmilled bed seems more likely, but we'll never know for sure.
All I know is, I'm not bidding on it.
The razor bed is stamped with markings that I've seen on at least one of my own razors (a blue tip I once had had the "O" on it). I still lean toward the prototype explanation. But the production markings stamped on the bottom of the bed doesn't quite make sense if it's a totally unique fabrication for a prototype. An existing, stamped but unmilled bed seems more likely, but we'll never know for sure.
All I know is, I'm not bidding on it.
Wow - that current auction contains the most impressive lot of razors ever seen, and considering they were all part of one person's estate and the current seller has little idea of their worth, the seller must be watching the auction in disbelief!
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