Quote Originally Posted by mparker762 View Post
Hear hear! The hair test isn't a pass/fail test, it's more of a grade, and exactly what it means varies from person to person. I use the hair on my arm, and find that the first hair to pop is the stuff on the underside of wrist. Then as the edge gets more refined it will pop armhair closer to my elbow joint. Once it will pop the softest hairs on the inside of my elbow then its ready to shave, and it's rare for a razor to fail to shave well at that point. I figured this out in an hour using a DE blade, a Feather AC blade, a Joe Chandler blade, and a few of my own. Getting my honing skills up to the point where I could get them there myself took somewhat longer :-)

I also find that being able to fillet a hair is a really good sign.
(edit: the "also" comment is indeed seconding honedright's reference to this)
you mean hair, hair. Actually I've never been able to get the hanging hair test to work for me. I usually use the thumb test and do some arm hair shaving and based on how readily those arm hairs are piled up I know when the razor is ready.