What's new

Straight Razors Downunder....

How many of you guys use a straight razor?
I have a couple but don’t tend to use them unless I have a heap of time and i just can’t make my left hand steady enough.

My Gold Dollar
proxy.php

I won this in a PIF and another I won in an online raffle that I passed on to my eldest son...

My Genuine Rattler the scales aren't genuine I got from eBay
proxy.php

What razor, strop do you use?

Do you hone your own or or can you recommend someone local who does it?

If you do hone your own what whetstones did you use?
 
Last edited:

Legion

Staff member
Yup, mostly straights. I have *cough* several, and I hone myself, using coticules for the most part.

We can still find good straights in the wild here, probably more easily than safety razors. Read all the restoration stickies, as it is mostly DIY. There are a couple of guys who will restore or hone for a fee, but not many.
 
I have one but I'm yet shave with it, a Dovo La Forme, which is essentially a Bismarck. I've managed to straighten the spine so it hones properly now, but I've not quite achieved the sharpness I'm looking for.

Shapton 2k, 5k and 12k, then diamond paste on balsa 0.5, 0.25 and 0.1 micron. I think a lighter touch on the stones is required, too used to chisels and plane irons.
 
I'm a relatively recent user of straights. I have two:

Ralf Aust 6/8 Round Point with schorkopf, full hollow
JMG Steelworks 6/8 French Point, half hollow

The Aust was my first, back in Feb/Mar this year and is a fairly typical European design on African Blackwood scales.
The JMG is my latest one, earlier in Aug, and is a nice modern blade with clean lines and high gloss polish and clear acrylic scales.

Haven't honed either of them. I used a ex-pat Brit (now in Auckland) to hone the Aust when I received it - wasn't quite shave ready. The JMG was ready to go when it arrived.

Strop is a Herold I bought at the same time as the Ralf Aust. Fabric one side, leather the other. Quite narrow, so I had to learn the X technique (or is that Y) quickly. Still looking into what I would need to take on the honing. Likely to start with a few vintage straights I acquired to try restoring/polishing so I don't destroy the edge of the new ones!
 
My Eldest son has a shave ready Gold Dollar that I passed to him and one of my strops.
He wants to learn how to hone it. What is a good set of whetstones for him to start with?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 

Legion

Staff member
_DSC1538small.jpg
My Eldest son has a shave ready Gold Dollar that I passed to him and one of my strops.
He wants to learn how to hone it. What is a good set of whetstones for him to start with?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Fwiw, I started with a king 800 for bevels, a norton 4k/8k, finished with a c-nat plus some CrOx. Worked well for me to learn with. Not fancy, but the progression taught you something about synths, naturals and pastes, all in one honing session.
 
Thumbnails of my two straights. Click on the image to see the full pic.





Excuse the orange glow on each of these - too close to furnishings (but it's kinda cool, so I left it).
 
Top Bottom