Wade & Butcher and Wade, London Razors

Hi everyone,

I've been lurking since just before Christmas but only just gotten round to joining and posting today, so first of all hello everyone!

I'm very new to all this straight razor business and thought I would first try a cheap shavette loaded with feather blades to see if I liked it first - I know its not quite the same thing though. So far I'm loving every single shave and I'm now around 2-3 weeks in and I'm managing pretty well. I jumped straight into the deep end and did a full shave on my first attempt - I bravely (or foolishly) thought that I might fare better than most since I use a scalpel on a near daily basis, and didn't come out too badly fortunately!

Anyway, enough rambling. I recent acquired two razors, one Wade & Butcher which had a reasonable amount of rusting and pitting, and one Wade, London razor.

The W&B is a 6/8 whilst the Wade is a 9/16. Does anybody know anything about the Wade? I have searched around on the internet and couldn't find anything really. I'm assuming it isn't Robert Wade as it is stamped London rather than Sheffield but it is a Sheffield steel blade.

I was looking to restore both and the Wade has cleaned up very well, there is only a tiny nick on the blade edge. The W&B unfortunately hasn't faired so well - does the hone wear look too excessive or is it not too bad? The scales sadly are well beyond repair - they are bowed and there are numerous gouges out of them. The blade looks in good shape though and the surface stamping looks in great condition, sadly the anchor and arrow is a little faded.

I have only really sanded to 400 grit initially just to roughly clean them up, what do the resident experts think? Perfectly servicable, or not really worth the effort? I'm not looking to sell them on or have looking spotless, I just want to shave with them.

I have larger size images (and uncropped) if needed. Unfortunately I don't have great before shots of the Wade.

Thanks in advance and sorry for the length of the post!

W&B

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Wade
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Welcome,,,read over this section of the Library, see if it gives you a better understanding of your razors condition.
There appears to be a bit of a frown on the heel area of the W&B, but photos can be tricky.

Purchasing straight razors - Straight Razor Place Wiki

Hi and welcome. Both blades look like the can be cleaned up and made shave ready again. Might be a bit of work but well worth it. Good luck. Ed

Thanks guys. I've had a look at that thread before and was the basis for wondering whether the heel had too much frown or not. I've started to sand them down further and will see how they turn out :) I'm going to try and go for a nice satin finish to the blades although the Wade looks quite nice in a mirror-like finish.