The DE Razor Blade Dimensions Table is up and running!

[ShavingByTheNumbers]

Great, it will benefit all members, especially newbies and I really see no harm or downsides to the concept being implemented.

Great news! I got word back that it's okay to use either a relative scale or an approximate absolute price! I'm leaning towards binning the prices near $5, $10, $15, etc., rather than using a relative scale from 0 to 10, but what do you think? Either method would involve occasional updates.

 

[Joe blow]

I an sorry I am not familiar with the term "binning", context in sentence is, " towards binning the prices near $5, $10, $ 15". Your mind is a lot sharper than mine, so I can only offer my somewhat limited input, for example Kai Blades are only carried by one brick and mortar store here in Toronto and the price is $1.00 per blade, no discount for quantity. However someone else may be selling the same blade's online from a remote corner of the Mongolian desert and he is only charging .25 cents per blade, Gillette Platinums here in T.O are say $2.25 per pack but at any of the Art of Shaving stores that I have visited in America the price is $1.00 per blade, with four packages of 5 taped together, so you cannot purchase just 5 blades, 20 for $20 is the minimum purchase they will sell. Point I am after making is right here, right now in Toronto, the Kai blade is the most expensive blade on the planet to us ( assuming we are ignoring the Clowns at The Art of Shaving) I love the concept, but how on earth will it ever be possible to establish an even playing field for the pricings ???? ....help ....

 

[troy]

Great news! I got word back that it's okay to use either a relative scale or an approximate absolute price! I'm leaning towards binning the prices near $5, $10, $15, etc., rather than using a relative scale from 0 to 10, but what do you think? Either method would involve occasional updates.

Glad you're getting the go ahead. Keep up the good work, I look forward to seeing more.

 

[ShavingByTheNumbers]

I an sorry I am not familiar with the term "binning", context in sentence is, " towards binning the prices near $5, $10, $ 15". Your mind is a lot sharper than mine, so I can only offer my somewhat limited input, for example Kai Blades are only carried by one brick and mortar store here in Toronto and the price is $1.00 per blade, no discount for quantity. However someone else may be selling the same blade's online from a remote corner of the Mongolian desert and he is only charging .25 cents per blade, Gillette Platinums here in T.O are say $2.25 per pack but at any of the Art of Shaving stores that I have visited in America the price is $1.00 per blade, with four packages of 5 taped together, so you cannot purchase just 5 blades, 20 for $20 is the minimum purchase they will sell. Point I am after making is right here, right now in Toronto, the Kai blade is the most expensive blade on the planet to us ( assuming we are ignoring the Clowns at The Art of Shaving) I love the concept, but how on earth will it ever be possible to establish an even playing field for the pricings ???? ....help ....

I'm sorry for the confusion. I didn't explain well enough. The table has what I call "P100" right now as "Price for purchase of 100 blades (USD), taken as the minimum price found without any consideration of shipping". 100 blades is a standard bulk purchase amount, which is fair for comparisons. I don't think that you'd find this in a brick-and-mortar store, but online, which is where we usually buy blades. (I could buy some blades in my local supermarket for $1 or more a piece, but it's ridiculous.) Whether the price is the minimum or an average value of what's out there, the price would be "binned" in the $5, $10, $15, $20, $25, etc., "bin" that best represents the value for a 100-blade purchase. P100 would be an approximate value. Shipping would not be included. Is that fair? I'm open to suggestions.

 

[ShavingByTheNumbers]

Glad you're getting the go ahead. Keep up the good work, I look forward to seeing more.

Thanks, troy!

 

[Joe blow]

yes, it sounds great. The price for a hundred lot of blades is a great idea. My question would be, would the 100 Price come from a retail outlet such as West Coast Shaving, or from an individual Ebay seller ? There is so much price variation it boggles the mind. I guess I'm just hung up on what the eventual pricing "Standard" will be ... can't wait ... sounds exciting

 

[ShavingByTheNumbers]

yes, it sounds great. The price for a hundred lot of blades is a great idea. My question would be, would the 100 Price come from a retail outlet such as West Coast Shaving, or from an individual Ebay seller ? There is so much price variation it boggles the mind. I guess I'm just hung up on what the eventual pricing "Standard" will be ... can't wait ... sounds exciting

That's a real issue. I know. I'm not sure what's best. Should the approximate prices ($5, $10, $15, etc.) come from B&B vendors only? Should they be minimum prices, average prices, or median prices? Should eBay sellers be considered? We're developing the "standard" right here, so if anyone would like to chime in, now's as good of a time as any. Whatever process is used to get P100 (price for 100 blades), it needs to be consistent, fair, and easy to apply.

 

[Tokyospike]

Thanks a lot, Grant. Very good stuff. Since, we've already said prices will be occassionally updated, and nothing is going to be precise, I would recommend the average price across B&B vendors. A date of the price calculation would probably be useful as well.

 

[Hoka Hey]

How about Amazon? Just looked at Feather blades. Amazon 23.00. eBay about the same, but blades come from Thailand. Only problems I've heard of with Feather was from Thailand. Checked 2 of the larger vendors, one was 40.00, the other 24.99.

Yes, you can save small amounts on specific blades at specific places, but Amazon generally has good prices and availability.

What do you all think?

 

[Tokyospike]

There's nothing really wrong with the Amazon idea. If I ever get around to buying 100 blades, there's at least a 50% chance that's where I'll do it. I just like the idea of keeping the price discussions around 'our' vendors . . . the prices are mostly useful as relative prices, anyway . . . I don't know, let's see what others think . . .

 

[ShavingByTheNumbers]

Thanks, @Tokyospike and @Hoka Hey for your thoughts.

The date for those prices would DEFINITELY be noted and updated when the prices are updated. You're right about that, Tokyospike.

Approximate prices should reflect what we'd actually pay (without shipping), which means that they should come from sellers that we use, right? I feel like Amazon should be included because so many of us use them. It is the largest marketplace. However, Walmart shouldn't be counted out. They are giving Amazon a run for their online money, if you haven't heard in the news or seen for yourself how Walmart's online market has improved greatly since years ago. That's why Amazon recently dropped back down to their $25 minimum for free shipping. eBay is used by many, too.

If I were looking to buy blades, I'd pay the lowest price that I could find from a legitimate seller. Finding the lowest price from Amazon and Walmart and B&B vendors would be easy. Including eBay probably wouldn't be fair because of hidden shipping costs and the potential for illegitimate blades, like Hoka Hey was talking about.

So, what about using B&B vendors and Amazon and Walmart without eBay? Are there blades that you can only get from eBay? For Hoka Hey's case with Feathers, we'd get an approximate binned price of $25 for 100 blades. I checked Walmart and found the best price of 200 blades for $45 from a third-party seller there. Even in this case, the binned price would be $25, but it easily could have been $20 if the price were a little lower. Should that price at Walmart even been considered? I went to Amazon and found 100 Feathers for about $25 and 200 Feathers for about $42 from apparently Feather itself. That 200 Feathers price would mean a binned 100 count for about $20, but that would be outside of the standard 100-blade purchase, so we'd be back to $25 for P100.

Should P100 be allowed as any bulk purchase from the sellers we include, approximated for the equivalent 100-blade price? Maybe P100 should be replaced by a binned price per blade P ($0.05, $0.10, $0.15, etc.) based on the best bulk purchase from the sellers that we include? I like the latter idea if 200-blade purchases should count, but who buys 200 blades at a time? Isn't 100 blades the real "standard"?

What do you guys think? (By the way, it would be great if a moderator could let us know if it would be allowed to define the approximate price as coming from the best of B&B vendors, "Amazon", "Walmart", and possibly "eBay".)

 

[Hoka Hey]

Stick with 100. Yes, you can get some quantity discounts, but not on every blade across the board, so I don't know if it's fair. I've seen 200 Kai's from one of our vendors for 60.00, which is about the best price you'll find them for, but 35.00 for a hundred is competitive, a fairer comparison I think.

 

[ShavingByTheNumbers]

Stick with 100. Yes, you can get some quantity discounts, but not on every blade across the board, so I don't know if it's fair. I've seen 200 Kai's from one of our vendors for 60.00, which is about the best price you'll find them for, but 35.00 for a hundred is competitive, a fairer comparison I think.

Thanks. I agree. We'll stick with 100.

 

[Tokyospike]

Grant, I find your exhaustive explorations exhausting - but I want you to know that's a good thing. .

I think you're right about sticking to 100. Personally, while I bought both of my safety razors on eBay, I have the sense that prices there are so volatile and various you should probably exclude them.

 

[KQY61]

Hi,

As far as measuring thickness goes, you are not using the correct tool. You need what is referred to as a Paper Micrometer, such as a Starrett 223. They have large diameter anvils to prevent compression of thin material.

The problem with standard anvils is that it is all too easy to get a reading .001 off - either by compressing the material and obtaining too thin a reading, or by being extra careful to not compress and obtaining too thick a reading.

And, yes, the referenced mike is not digital. I don't know of a Paper Mike that is digital. But the old analog scales still work just fine - if one knows how to read them.

Stan

 

[ShavingByTheNumbers]

Grant, I find your exhaustive explorations exhausting - but I want you to know that's a good thing. .

I think you're right about sticking to 100. Personally, while I bought both of my safety razors on eBay, I have the sense that prices there are so volatile and various you should probably exclude them.

Yeah, it seems like we should leave out eBay. It's too volatile, like you said. So, do we agree that P100 should be defined as the minimum price found among B&B vendors, Amazon, and Walmart for a 100-blade purchase?

I followed up with the moderator Don (@dangerousdon) about the issue of writing that the price comes from "B&B vendors", etc., and we have the okay to do that, so that's what I'm going to do. If there's a problem later on, then we could easily fix it. I'll let you guys know when I've fixed the page and added the approximate prices.

 

[ShavingByTheNumbers]

Hi,

As far as measuring thickness goes, you are not using the correct tool. You need what is referred to as a Paper Micrometer, such as a Starrett 223. They have large diameter anvils to prevent compression of thin material.

The problem with standard anvils is that it is all too easy to get a reading .001 off - either by compressing the material and obtaining too thin a reading, or by being extra careful to not compress and obtaining too thick a reading.

And, yes, the referenced mike is not digital. I don't know of a Paper Mike that is digital. But the old analog scales still work just fine - if one knows how to read them.

Stan

Hi, Stan. Thanks for your feedback, but you are mistaken. There is nothing wrong with using a standard digital or analog micrometer to measure razor blade thickness. A paper micrometer is not necessary.

As I wrote in the thread about my measurement process, which I linked to in the overview above the DE Razor Blade Dimensions Table, I'm allowing the micrometer's ratchet to handle the "feel", or force, of when to stop turning the spindle. This makes for consistent measurements, which, as stated, are made with a micrometer resolution of 0.001 mm and a reported accuracy of 0.003 mm, considered "sufficient" by me for accurate and precise measurements. I also wrote some details about the ratcheting:

"The measuring force with the friction-drive thimble is either 4 N to 7 N (0.90 lb to 1.6 lb) or 5 N to 10 N (1.1 lb to 2.2 lb) according to the calibration certificate or the manual, respectively. The ratcheting thimble allows for more repeatable, precise measurements, particularly when the micrometer is employed by someone who has not developed the light, consistent touch of an experienced user."

I prefer the consistency and simplicity of a ratcheting thimble with a digital micrometer, but an experienced user could also make consistent measurements with an analog micrometer. Either way, a standard micrometer is just fine for measuring blade thickness, as discussed in the next paragraph.

What I didn't write about in my detailed measurement process thread was how I considered deformation due to the applied pressure from the micrometer. That would have been too much detail for something so insignificant. A "paper" micrometer, or a micrometer that has larger measuring surfaces for less applied pressure, isn't necessary for measuring steel, which is considerably stiffer than paper. As stated in my measurement thread, the carbide measuring surfaces of my micrometer have diameters of about 6.47 mm (0.255 in.). Assuming the worst case of the reported measuring force as 10 N, we get a worst-case applied pressure σ = (10 N)/[(π/4)(0.00647 m)^2] = 304 kPa. The modulus of elasticity of steel is about E = 200 GPa. Correctly assuming linear elasticity here, we use Hooke's law, σ = Eε, and calculate the strain ε = σ/E = (304 kPa)/(200 GPa) = 1.521 × 10^-6. Blade thickness h generally ranges from 0.09 mm to 0.1 mm. Taking the approximate worst case of 0.1 mm for the most elastic deformation, we get a worst-case elastic displacement or change in thickness u = εh = (1.521 × 10^-6)(0.1 mm) = 1.521 × 10^-7 mm, which is orders of magnitude below the measuring resolution of 10^-3 mm.

This proves that the applied pressure from the ratcheting thimble of my digital micrometer does not throw off razor blade thickness readings. The whole point of using a ratcheting thimble is to greatly reduce measurement subjectivity from the user who would otherwise be solely responsible for feeling when or where the spindle should stop. Also important for correct micrometer measurements of a razor blade are clean measuring surfaces and a clean blade, which were discussed in my measurement process thread.

As supporting evidence that my measurements are correct or sufficiently accurate, Feather and Kai state that their blade thicknesses are "0.1" mm and "0.10" mm, respectively. For the four Feather blades that I've measured, the result is an average thickness of 0.101 mm, and for the sixteen Kai blades that I've measured, the result is an average thickness of 0.100 mm. I could be mistaken, but I believe that standard razor blade strip steel is either just about 0.1 mm thick or less than that. The Swedish manufacturer Sandvik, for example, makes razor blade strip steel in two thicknesses: 0.099 mm and 0.076 mm.

 

[Slapo]

@ShavingByTheNumbers : is it possible for you to measure the width of the blade edge grind as well?

 

[ShavingByTheNumbers]

@ShavingByTheNumbers : is it possible for you to measure the width of the blade edge grind as well?

Not with a micrometer. Measuring blade honing widths and angles is much more complicated.

 

[Slapo]

Not with a micrometer. Measuring blade honing widths and angles is much more complicated.

I had thought that'd be the case, just hoped you'd have a tool for that. Would be interesting. Oh well...