Thread: Why is the 1st shave after honing so disagreeable?

Originally Posted by Bart

Johnny, I know you do 10X Chromium and 50X leather right after honing, but what do you do before that?

The following progression of barber hones:
A really coarse Swaty (around 1K grit)
Cushioned strop hone
Gem hone
Lithide hone

Depending on the razor, it will take around 20 laps on each (maybe 10 on that coarse Swaty b/c it's so aggressive). I use a jeweler's lupe & that feeling of suction to decide when to stop. I use the hones dry.

Originally Posted by Bart

And what do you use for the Chromium part? (a paddle? or a hanging strop?)
Bart.

Loom strop which was coated with Cr02 on one side from the factory.

PS: the Swaty is a freak hone, probably from a bad batch. But it serves a purpose for me: it has replaced 1K sandpaper & glass as my go-to bevel-setter.

Edit: I just re-honed after the newspaper stropping disaster, and instead of finishing with 20X Cr02 + 50X plain, I finished with a double-dose (100 stokes) of plain leather. The results are quite good. Once my linen is cleaned up, I'll try doing maintenance with the linen instead of Cr02 and maybe I can get by without the Cr02 altogether.