Valet VC2 with GEM blade

[romsitsa]

Hello!

Found this VC2 for ~2 USD, as it later turned out, the crimps of the head were broken down and replaced with a very generous amount of solder. After cleaning out the mess and soldering back the plate I folded back the blade locating pins and added a brass plate as a back stop. After fiddling around with the door hinge it now accepts despined GEM blades (more precisely the blade I have at hand) so I really hope all (or at least a few) new production blades have the same measurements as this one.
It will be cleaned but won’t be replated.



Adam

 

[Dog Whiskerer]

Two dollars! A good deal is a steal. Let us know how it shaves.

 

[ajkel64]

Great price, let us know how you get on with it.

 

[Ron R]

I can relate to your VC2 repairs because I have a VC1 open comb that needed some repairing and replaced a blade stop, adjusted the tension system and reduced the gap from Approx .011 thousands of a inch to .007-.008 thousands and that smoothed out the razor. The open comb teeth on this Canadian Version C1 are very malleable brass and tweaking can be done fairly easy IMO. Today was a interesting day with a new modified Gem SS PTFE blade, the gap tighter and it was one of my best shaves for closeness with a little more irritation from the Alum block than expected. I was not that impressed with Valet auto-strop at first but when you get everything going right it is a smooth razor and can perform very well. It can be a intimidating visual razor at first but it can do the job on my learning curve with them. That is why they sold hundreds of thousands and had MFG plants in different countries producing them. The owner of Valet Auto-strop(Henry J. Gaisman lived to the age of 104 yrs ) ended up taking control of Gillette because of Patent Blade infringements, this fellow was a Genesis in business and a great inventor with approximately 1000 inventions from my limited research.

Have some great shaves!

 

[romsitsa]

Thank you all. I’ll have to source some blades, as I had only one and that suffered a lot during the conversion. Till I get some GEMs, made a new handle from a dental drill. It’s hollow, pluggedat the bottom, so the razors weight went down to 53 g.
I’ll be back with a shave report, it looks like a nice medium effective razor.



Adam

 

[romsitsa]

Hello again!
A fellow enthusisast donated me a Personna PTFE blade, so I tried out Dalek. I named it Dalek as it looks a bit similar (imho), but as it turned out today, it also wants to kill humans, at least me, so the name is spot on.
It’s extremely effective but also really unpleasant.
I’m used to highly effective DEs, but Dalek is something else. The blade sits on top of the comb, so there is almost no “safety” feature.
The blade is held by the blade stops firmly and the gap looks ok, so I have to think Dalek is ok.

I really want to get along with Dalek, so please, what is the trick?


Adam

 

[Ron R]

Hello again!
A fellow enthusisast donated me a Personna PTFE blade, so I tried out Dalek. I named it Dalek as it looks a bit similar (imho), but as it turned out today, it also wants to kill humans, at least me, so the name is spot on.
It’s extremely effective but also really unpleasant.
I’m used to highly effective DEs, but Dalek is something else. The blade sits on top of the comb, so there is almost no “safety” feature.
The blade is held by the blade stops firmly and the gap looks ok, so I have to think Dalek is ok.

I really want to get along with Dalek, so please, what is the trick?
View attachment 1022814

Adam

I think you have to much gap between teeth and blade from your picture, I adjusted my from .011 thousands of a inch to about .007 thousands and that made a difference for smoothing out the shave. I think today's blades are sharper then maybe in the 1930's and my C1 was a very uncomfortable shave also at first. What I did was bend the malleable teeth upward a little to tighten the gap and then took a picture with my phone and magnified the picture with my fingers to see what teeth were not uniform and just tweaked those ones to tighten the gap up. My last shave was excellent but still a little aggressive, a 2 pass shave is all I need with a touch up pass.
Also the GEM Personna SS PTFE blades are extremely sharp for the first couple of shaves!(Feather sharp IMO)
Have some great shaves!

 

[romsitsa]

Thank you Ron! Just finished the other thread about “too sharp” fresh GEM blades. It’s the same, for me, with vintage Wilkinson Sword blades, the first few shaves have to be done with a milder razor.
Bending up the teeth will not only decrease gap, but increase the distance between the blade edge and the rounded end of the comb, makes sense.
Will be back after the second session.

Adam

 

[romsitsa]

Hello, second shave done. Stropped the blade in my palm and held the head dead flat against my face (where possible). Still not butter smooth, but no cuts, minor irritation and an extremely close shave in two passes.
It’s nice, but not a safety razor at all.

Adam

 

[romsitsa]

Third shave done. Bent the comb upward (thank you Ron), almost to zero gap. It’s lobotomized now, as it lost all of its previous characteristics and became a very direct, but smooth shaving tool.



Adam

 

[Ron R]

Third shave done. Bent the comb upward (thank you Ron), almost to zero gap. It’s lobotomized now, as it lost all of its previous characteristics and became a very direct, but smooth shaving tool.

View attachment 1024034

Adam

I'm glade it worked out for you, it helped my shave with the Auto-strop C1 also. Sometimes a beast has to tamed!