Thread: Verhoeven Paper Question

Originally Posted by mparker762

At one time a popular theory was that the abrasives in the hone left "teeth" or serrations on the edge, and that the sharpest razors had the best teeth. There were all sorts of heated discussions about the best way to create the best teeth on the hone, and the best way to align them using the strop. But the key prediction was that the edge was toothed, which means that the theory would be proven false if honing did not produce such a serrated edge. Verhoeven's paper and the Modern Mechanics article both had photos of edges at a high enough magnification to see such teeth had they existed, and failed to observe them. So this is an example of a falsified theory in our area of interest.

Since you've mentioned the teeth issue, I'll use this opportunity to bring up a question I asked long ago in another thread here: http://straightrazorpalace.com/razor...ess-steel.html

In post #25 there is a 500X photograph of a razors edge. It seems to show a serrated edge, or teeth. I asked Seraphim if he thought that the teeth were just an artifact of lighting since, supposedly, teeth do not really exist as mentioned above in the quote. Seraphim responded that he thought the teeth (serrations) were there, and not a result of lighting.

So I'm wondering is Seraphim's photo a fluke, or does his photo actually reveal a serrated razors edge and did Verhoeven and Modern Mechanics falsely falsify the teeth theory.


Scott