Thread: 5/8" Straight Razor

Hi all

What do you think of the THIERS-ISSARD 1937 SPECIAL COIFFEUR WHITE 5/8" STRAIGHT RAZOR. Is this a good razor to start with. Also my question is I have a paddle strop I've had for a long time. I got this strop for stropping knives. Would this be okay to start stropping my new straight razor.

Roger

The razor would be fine. The strop is more questionable because the edge of a razor is a lot more refined than that of a knife.
You want to improve on it by stropping, not deteriorate it, so if the leather is not of sufficiently good quality, or has junk in say from the knife stropping, that won't work too well.

To be on the safe side I'd suggest you buy yourself a razor strop of good quality and use it just for your razor.

I'll agree with gugi the razor is a good one. One that's been talked about here many times.

The strop could work and probably would work. I have the same concerns that gugi has about metal particles from knives embedding in the leather and then ruining an edge on a straight razor.

So personally I keep a strop for knives and a strop for razors. Actually I have multiple for razors each for a different purpose.

But really just to be safe I would get another strop. Paddle strops if that is what you want can be found anywhere form a reasonable 40-50 on up into the high three digits depending on what you want.

I have a vintage THIERS-ISSARD 1937 SPECIAL COIFFEUR 5/8" in black and I found that the 5/8" messurement is actually the blade face only, but is actually 6/8" when you include the spine as normal
you should have no problems with the razor if honed up right
I would not risk damage to the razor with long term use of the either as the others have mentioned.

When I started maintaining razors, one of the things I had to swallow was that I had hundreds of dollars in stones and strops for my knives, but they simply were not ideal for straight razor maintenance. The wise course of action in terms of long term economics is to start to accumulate dedicated gear for your razors. Starting with a good strop, next a finishing hone, then edge maintenance hones, then bevel setting hones, then restoration hones...Oy!

Solid razor. A paddle strop is a great way to learn a good technique for stropping. (in my opinion) but I agree with the above statement that you should probably have a strop specifically for your razor. The SRD modular strop is pretty freakin amazing. If its within budget its something i would recommend.