Who Here Shaves Off Diamond Paste?

[Twelvefret]

Thanks.

Are you at all curious if after your convex stone a few laps of 200k balsa might be to your liking? I consider the balsa a type of stropping.

 

[ajduplessis]

I have dedicated CBN loom and leather strops, no balsa or backing. CBN cuts very, very fast.

 

[kelbro]

I have been using a balsa 'strop' for a little over a year now with great results. I use a 200K spray, not a paste. Two razor rotation. Only been back to the hones once in all of that time shaving 5 day a week. Yes, it works!

 

[mglindo]

Okay! After post #4 where I said I haven't yet but soon!

I had this razor that I had been using just because I haven't used it in quite a while. The shave was lousy and not very clean or comfortable. I figured I had to go way down, short of an actual hone, so I started with a .5 micron diamond pasted balsa strop. I did 100 laps then rinsed and dried the blade and my hands. Then a 100 laps on my .25 micron diamond pasted balsa strop and again rinsed and dried the blade and hands. Then 100 laps on my .1 micron diamond pasted balsa strop. I ran the bevel laterally on the strop twice. Rinsed blade and hands again dried both then stropped the razor 100 laps on leather strop and shaved. Not perfect but what a surprise! It will probably need more laps on the .1 micron strop before only daily minimal 40-50 stropping will be done but I am becoming a believer in this system.

This is an ideal system for the new straight razor shaver and also for someone who just does not want to go the whole shebang of many many different kinds of expensive hones just to maintain their razors. This is also great for many of us who are aging and getting harder to handle heavy stones or see the bevels of the razor.

I still have many hones and will probably still use them but this was a fun experiment for me and I will probably use this system for a bit just to see how far I can get this edge.

I have a lot of this paste in these three syringes I purchased so it will go a long way and last a long time.

Mike

 

[Twelvefret]

Okay! After post #4 where I said I haven't yet but soon!

I had this razor that I had been using just because I haven't used it in quite a while. The shave was lousy and not very clean or comfortable. I figured I had to go way down, short of an actual hone, so I started with a .5 micron diamond pasted balsa strop. I did 100 laps then rinsed and dried the blade and my hands. Then a 100 laps on my .25 micron diamond pasted balsa strop and again rinsed and dried the blade and hands. Then 100 laps on my .1 micron diamond pasted balsa strop. I ran the bevel laterally on the strop twice. Rinsed blade and hands again dried both then stropped the razor 100 laps on leather strop and shaved. Not perfect but what a surprise! It will probably need more laps on the .1 micron strop before only daily minimal 40-50 stropping will be done but I am becoming a believer in this system.

This is an ideal system for the new straight razor shaver and also for someone who just does not want to go the whole shebang of many many different kinds of expensive hones just to maintain their razors. This is also great for many of us who are aging and getting harder to handle heavy stones or see the bevels of the razor.

I still have many hones and will probably still use them but this was a fun experiment for me and I will probably use this system for a bit just to see how far I can get this edge.

I have a lot of this paste in these three syringes I purchased so it will go a long way and last a long time.

Mike

Thank you @mglindo. I enjoyed reading your experiment with diamond paste. Please catch us up if you decide to do more laps.

 

[kohalajohn]

I use diamond on balsa. To answer some previous questions, I use an acrylic backing plate. Every few months I lap it and reapply the diamond.

I use two methods now. A convex black ark, and .1u diamond balsa. Both work very well. They are both as nice as a jnat finished by doc226, which is a very nice edge.

With the convex black ark you have to do regular and frequent finishing initially to get your razor where you want. But once you are there, it's easy to maintain. Just forty laps every week or every month, depending now how much you use it and how perfect you want to keep it.

Same with the diamond balsa. You have to use a mid range, then a nani12, then .5 then .25 then .1u. But once you're there, it's just .1u forever after that.

The diamond balsa is very good, but my personal reaction is sometimes feeling that it is a bother to do fifty laps on balsa after every shave. I know it's only a minute or two, but that's how I feel.

These days I prefer using the ark. No particular reason why. It doesn't shave better. Both methods shave very well. I just prefer the honing process of one over the other.

 

[Twelvefret]

I use diamond on balsa. To answer some previous questions, I use an acrylic backing plate. Every few months I lap it and reapply the diamond.

I use two methods now. A convex black ark, and .1u diamond balsa. Both work very well. They are both as nice as a jnat finished by doc226, which is a very nice edge.

With the convex black ark you have to do regular and frequent finishing initially to get your razor where you want. But once you are there, it's easy to maintain. Just forty laps every week or every month, depending now how much you use it and how perfect you want to keep it.

Same with the diamond balsa. You have to use a mid range, then a nani12, then .5 then .25 then .1u. But once you're there, it's just .1u forever after that.

The diamond balsa is very good, but my personal reaction is sometimes feeling that it is a bother to do fifty laps on balsa after every shave. I know it's only a minute or two, but that's how I feel.

These days I prefer using the ark. No particular reason why. It doesn't shave better. Both methods shave very well. I just prefer the honing process of one over the other.

As you know, I had applied way too much diamond paste to my balsa and was not getting the best effect from my efforts.

Interesting you think the diamond balsa edge rivals those of a respected, oft suggested, honer/member. I am not surprised as I have shaved off professional edges myself and find my current set up to produce the most efficient edge since I started using a SR.

I used the same razor for 5 days a couple weeks back. Some days I would just do 25 linen and 50 horse hide. Other days 60 on balsa and then the strop. Some days the strop only edge did better, but have no idea why.

I enjoy holding a stone under water and doing many laps better than lapping diamond pasted balsa, but right now the quality of my shave is more important.

 

[kohalajohn]

Yes. At first all I cared about was the quality of the shave.

Years ago when I didn't know how to maintain razors, I had bad edges and uncomfortable shaves. I was so desperate to just have a comfortable shave that I didn't care about anything else, like which method of honing I preferred. Tuggy edges combined with poor shaving technique meant it was no fun. Man, it was so bad back then that I'd go back to DE for months at a time.

I don't know if I would have had the patience to become proficient on coticules and jnats. Maybe, maybe not. But Slash's balsa, and Jarrod's arks and film, came along just in time and made it easier. So now I have the luxury of choosing which honing method I prefer.

And when I say my diamond edge rivals a doc226, I don't mean it's the same. I just mean they are both sharp enough to shave well. I'm not great at defining subtle differences. You know, when some folk say "hmmm, this feels like the bevel was set on a Washita, then a three nagura progression through the mid range, and then finished by oh, gosh I would say David Anderson was the honemeister, and it feels like he was using an ark from the paleolithic crust uprising period, no wait, no, this feels more like the Jurasssic period of noviculate formation..."

Nope, I can't do that so good. I just noticed doc226's edge was very sharp.

 

[Twelvefret]

Yes. At first all I cared about was the quality of the shave.

Years ago when I didn't know how to maintain razors, I had bad edges and uncomfortable shaves. I was so desperate to just have a comfortable shave that I didn't care about anything else, like which method of honing I preferred. Tuggy edges combined with poor shaving technique meant it was no fun. Man, it was so bad back then that I'd go back to DE for months at a time.

I don't know if I would have had the patience to become proficient on coticules and jnats. Maybe, maybe not. But Slash's balsa, and Jarrod's arks and film, came along just in time and made it easier. So now I have the luxury of choosing which honing method I prefer.

And when I say my diamond edge rivals a doc226, I don't mean it's the same. I just mean they are both sharp enough to shave well. I'm not great at defining subtle differences. You know, when some folk say "hmmm, this feels like the bevel was set on a Washita, then a three nagura progression through the mid range, and then finished by oh, gosh I would say David Anderson was the honemeister, and it feels like he was using an ark from the paleolithic crust uprising period, no wait, no, this feels more like the Jurasssic period of noviculate formation..."

Nope, I can't do that so good. I just noticed doc226's edge was very sharp.

I rate the shave based on a GEM open comb Micromatic. Whatever I need to do to accomplish my standard, is the norm and the goal for me. I never used a professional honer and don't intend to. That said, I received razors which were professional honed. Each one was re-honed to suit my beard by necessity.

The honers have taken over the forum in some regard. The problem is we don't know if they shave their whole face and we don't know if what they consider a good shave would be a good shave for us.

Not being intentionally disrespectful, but if it doesn't suit me, it doesn't matter how many years you've been honing. Diamond provides me with the best shaves.

 

[kohalajohn]

Yeah, totally, it's a personal thing.

I think people rave about how their method is the best, because they have been using it for so long that they have really dialed it in and gotten proficient at that particular method.

Then someone else tries it and of course it sucks for them.

I remember when Slash did his diamond paste pass around. Intending to show how foolproof it was. To his surprise, there were some members who did it wrong, who somehow let the blade go south. So even diamond balsa can be done wrong if it's new to you.

 

[SliceOfLife]

It’s the honing forum. Everyone posting here is a honer or is looking to be one.

The difference experience makes is that after so much time shaving, your standards stop shifting. Someone shaving for a year might have been posting that anyone saying they found a better shave than off a welsh slate is full of it six months ago, and this month be telling people the same thing about a shapton 16k, next month it’ll be chromox, then next year a goku. Guys who’ve been doing this a few years usually have a broader sense of what is out there. It’s like an adult’s favorite food vs a child’s. Yes chicken fingers may be your favorite food when you grow up, but when you’re ten, maybe they are just because you lack experience with what is better out there.

 

[kohalajohn]

Exactly.

I am, after many years, discovering that all of the methods can create good results if you do them right.

 

[Steve56]

+1, the regulars aren’t going to find the first way that works and stop. We’re going to try everything that we can get our hands on, arks, jnats, cotis, thuris, diamond, CBN, a slate from Home Depot, the rock in our backyard, and whatever else that comes along that looks like you could rub a razor on.

BTW, that ‘grit is grit’ idea is wrong. There are different grit scales for different media. Bonded abrasives use a different scale than waterstones or diamond paste. That 0.5u diamond is equal to a 15k waterstone, and there are finer waterstones available, and finer naturals. 2k sandpaper is equal to a 4k waterstone.

And in synthetic whetstones, some makers are reporting the average or median grit, others the smallest grit at 95th percentile, so even synth numbers can be difficult to decipher.

This chart is from Norton abrasives.

 

[buca3152]

I spent a lot of time on super keen edges when I started. Wicked sharp! Lol. But found that it didn't allow me to get a great shave. Too many weepers. And there were areas of the neck that didn't tolerate it. That's when I put my scopea also. .1 micron film, cbn etc. Not for me. It takes a little time to learn to use the thing. Slicing strokes make quick work of the beard. And the edges last a long time.

 

[Twelvefret]

Yeah, totally, it's a personal thing.

I think people rave about how their method is the best, because they have been using it for so long that they have really dialed it in and gotten proficient at that particular method.

Then someone else tries it and of course it sucks for them.

I remember when Slash did his diamond paste pass around. Intending to show how foolproof it was. To his surprise, there were some members who did it wrong, who somehow let the blade go south. So even diamond balsa can be done wrong if it's new to you.

Lol, I remember when that happened. Don’t remember his response, but it was funny to read.

Since getting the new piece of balsa, the diamond works to produce the closest thing to a manufacturers blade to date. Good shave every time.

 

[kohalajohn]

Yeah, Slash was honestly shocked. Like watching your five year old screw up eating spaghetti. "good God, how could you, it's so simple... damnit!" I could imagine him getting purple in the face.

But he was intellectually honest enough to admit that he was wrong. That technique is still important, even with pastes.

That's what I found. The first time I did diamond balsa I was unimpressed. The second time I set up the three balsas, it went better. Of course it was the diamond dust that was getting better. Not me of course.

Kinda like when I turned eighteen and my dad's intelligence plummeted. In my early twenties he suddenly got better.

go figure.

 

[Twelvefret]

Yeah, Slash was honestly shocked. Like watching your five year old screw up eating spaghetti. "good God, how could you, it's so simple... damnit!" I could imagine him getting purple in the face.

But he was intellectually honest enough to admit that he was wrong. That technique is still important, even with pastes.

That's what I found. The first time I did diamond balsa I was unimpressed. The second time I set up the three balsas, it went better. Of course it was the diamond dust that was getting better. Not me of course.

Kinda like when I turned eighteen and my dad's intelligence plummeted. In my early twenties he suddenly got better.

go figure.

Great point. Five year olds can eat spaghetti, but it’s not pretty.

Well, thank you for participating in my thread . Hopefully a new SR person will read it and give it a try.

 

[Lord Fatboy]

It’s the honing forum. Everyone posting here is a honer or is looking to be one.

The difference experience makes is that after so much time shaving, your standards stop shifting. Someone shaving for a year might have been posting that anyone saying they found a better shave than off a welsh slate is full of it six months ago, and this month be telling people the same thing about a shapton 16k, next month it’ll be chromox, then next year a goku. Guys who’ve been doing this a few years usually have a broader sense of what is out there. It’s like an adult’s favorite food vs a child’s. Yes chicken fingers may be your favorite food when you grow up, but when you’re ten, maybe they are just because you lack experience with what is better out there.

+1
I've only ever seen people bring up their experience level - usually in a relatively deprecating manner - to point out to another member that they are not as experienced (and / or smart) as they think they are... Or as a last ditch to add weight in convincing them that their take on a well-worn subject is not new, enlightening or rhetorically meaningful.

As a side point, are there any "Professional" honers?

 

[Steve56]

...
As a side point, are there any "Professional" honers?

I hope not, the better you are the less money you’d make.

 

[SliceOfLife]

Just for razors? Professional as in they make money doing it? Yeah quite a few. Professional as in it’s their primary source of income? I doubt it.

If you’re talking knives and other tools, then yeah, there’s a whole industry of honing.

It’s mostly a volume game though. A “pro” knife honer will grind a chip out and edge a knife in 30 seconds. He won’t put an edge on that beats what your average cook can do with a trihone. The exception may be those sword sharpeners who charge for days of labor to sharpen a sword.