I saw an article about safety razor maintenance in the wiki, but it dealt more with restoration than how to maintain a safety razor day by day.
After you rinse the head, do you simply let it air dry? Do you take it apart and rinse and dry the parts separately?
You will get a thousand different answers here, I simply rinse off the excess soap, and put it in the stand to dry. No problems, no rust. Some people dip in rubbing alcohol, some take it apart. I tend to not want to handle the blade anymore than I have to. About once a week, or every few blade changes, I try to clean it with some scrubbing bubbles, makes it look like new again!
every time i change the blade, i fill my sink with hot water, then just do some light scrubbing with a toothbrush under water. Loosens all the gunk and cleans it up pretty well without any chemicals or extreme buffing.
Is it necessary to store a safety razor in a stand? Am I going to damage the blade by simply laying it down?
Brian
Would you recommend reducing the tension of the blade, or do you leave it set at your prefered setting?
That oil is for clippers and it is okay to use. Light machine oil is more easily available and probably cheaper. I usually lubricate the threads weekly, just a small drop. Having said that I do dismantle the razor and dry the blade daily due to hard water issues so that puts greater wear on the threads as opposed to a rinse and let the blade dry insitu. The oil reduces wear and protects the threads at the same time.I would like to know though if lubricating my Muhle R89 twist with this oil is a good idea, particularly the twist piece in the bottom once in a month or so.
You will get a thousand different answers here, I simply rinse off the excess soap, and put it in the stand to dry. No problems, no rust. Some people dip in rubbing alcohol, some take it apart. I tend to not want to handle the blade anymore than I have to. About once a week, or every few blade changes, I try to clean it with some scrubbing bubbles, makes it look like new again!