Thread: Correcting heels

I have had few razors for honing lately both new & vintage that had issues with their heels.
The older razors of course are usually just worn thru many honings causing the edge to meet flush with the rear stabiliser.
The new one , well, that's just poor grinding & honing at the factory.

Honing over the stabiliser can look ugly & cause odd wear due to the blade not sitting flat on the hone so I like to correct this.

I don't recommend newbs to try this but if you're a competent honer & understand the concept you can preserve a usable edge geometry. The process can be done a number of ways. Using diamond plates is the safest but I use a low speed wet grinder (140rpm) for the most of it.
You are essentially breadknifing a new shape to the stabiliser & trying to bring the heel forward a little so grind with the blade held in a slicing direction . Offering the blade up sideways is risky even at slow speed. At high speed disaster is a given. Don't even consider a 2850rpm grinder.

Going thru a progression of coarse to fine plates will give you a nice finish but final polish on a buff is ideal.

Anyhoo pics are prolly a better explanation than my ramblings.