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Which Blades Have the Best and Worst Reputations For Consistency?

If you use enough of any type blade, there's almost always a "rogue" in the bunch that nicks or shaves too rough. In your experience, or from what you've heard, which brand blade has the best consistency for the SAME good shave, time afrer time, and which has the MOST "clinkers"?
 
Not from personal experience but I have heard more than one member comment about getting great shaves from Voskhod blades then ordering a hundred pack and getting mostly crappy shaves. I tried a tuck of Voskhods and thought that they were meh. So I will put this out there as a maybe inconsistent.
 
I'm using primarily Polsilver SI, Nacet Stainless and BIC Chrome Platinum and i've noticed that there's a slight inconsistency with the different batches from the BIC blades. I had blades from 3 batches from different time periods and some of the blades felt a bit smoother while others felt a bit sharper. Both of them work for me, so i'm not really complaining. The Polsilver and Nacet incredibly consistant and I don't remember using a bad blade from any of them and i've got so accustomed with them to the point that I know exactly when the blades will become dull.
 

Tirvine

ancient grey sweatophile
I have had pretty much total consistency with Gillette Silver Blue, Nacet, Feather, and Crystal. I have had a little inconsistency with Israeli Personna and with Astra in the green pack.
 
Gillettes are almost all consistent ZaZa blades are the dullest most terrible blades I"ve ever used and I have tried them all and have 3600 in storage.

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I agree with you for Gillette (all sub brands) consistency.

In furtherence I may say, Feather, Astra SS, Astra SP, Wilkinson, Personna Med Prep, Asco Stainless, Shark Platinum are consistent blades.

On the other hand ZaZa is also "consistently" dull blades...

If we want to list "inconsistent blades" I may say:
1- BIC,
2- Derby,
3- Mem
 
Which derbies? I find them consistently dull.

I am happy using 200 packs of Derby Premium and one out of 30 is dull (unusable).
Occasionally I use Derby Extra and Derby Usta. My average one out of 15 are dull (unasable) blade(s).

I prefer Derby Premium over Extra and Usta. Of course YMMV.

Blade choice is very subjectif. Other than blade itself, it depends on your experience, shaving angle, hair type, skin type, shaving angle, shaving tool, shaving tool agressiveness, face preparation, pressure amount that you are applying (pressure can be positive or negative) etc..

Which DE Razor did you matched Derby Blades (and which Derbies) ??
 
Even back when I was using multi-blade carts, I remember inconsistency. I’m guessing it doesn’t take much for a blade to be a little bit “off”, as I’ve yet to find a make and model of blade that has been 100% consistent.

The best have been Gillette Silver Blues and Permasharps, roughly 90% good based on roughly 30 blades used for 90 shaves.

I have not have good results from Feathers or Nacets which have either been awesome or utter **. It’s like flipping a coin, I don’t even bother any more, no time for that.

The above should be taken with a grain of salt however. I used several tucks of Voskhods until I ran into several consecutive turds, which was a huge bummer since nothing I’ve used to date can match the sharpness and smoothness of a good Voskhod.
 
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Similar to what others have said, my consistent list (so far) is: Kai, Feather, Astra SS, and Polsilver Super Iridium.
My inconsistent list (or garbage list, in some cases): Derby Extra (green), Shaverboy, Personna (all of em), Shark
 
Super Iridium, Feather, Astra & nearly anything made by Gillette is consistent for me.

I don’t test less known blades, so I really don’t know of any truly inconsistent blades, but my first ever blade purchase was Derby & they were consistently smooth and dull. Like a SI on shave 5.
 
I find Derby Extra, Rockwell, and Merkur blades to be consistently terrible, despite the latter two being absurdly overpriced. I would not even consider using one.

I agree with you about the Merkur's. I had a sample pack of them early on in my wet shaving experience and every one in the 5 pack was TERRIBLE. Just extremely rough.

I currently have a 5 pack of Rockwell (came with my latest purchase of a Rockwell razor) and I suppose I will get to them eventually but don't have much hope that i will be buying more of them based on reviews.

The Derby Extra's I actually bought a 100 pack of, and I have had good results with them. I basically gravitate towards duller blades because my facial hair is not up to Chuck Norris standards and I only shave every other day. The idea of a 2nd pass is actually SCARY to me :eek2:
 

JCinPA

The Lather Maestro
Best is probably Feather, Kai or Personna Lab Blue. Worst is probably any of the blades that are made in China, west Asia or the mid-east.
Id say, typically, if they are made in a 3rd world country, they can be hit or miss.

I can see why you might think that, but I'm about halfway through 800 Gillette SP Blacks from India and they are incredibly consistent. The only Chinese blade I'm using are Shick injector blades, the "Chicks" and they seem to be consistent and very high quality. Most valid generalizations have notable exceptions. These two blades, at least, are exceptions.
 
Voskhods have been the most consistent blade I’ve used. The same shave every time.

Gillette platinums are the most inconsistent blades I’ve tried. Each blade feels different. Sometimes I get a smooth shave on my head and face and sometimes the blade won’t even make it halfway through a single shave and become rough and dull. Extremely disappointing. I would compare them to derby.
 
for a good while BIC was my #1....until I ran into the "inconsistencies" in quality people would talk about, started to get poor shaves out of em, so far my new top blade is Silver Star
 
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