Thread: Leather Flakes on Blade While Stropping

Originally Posted by eddy79

In your original post you mention that you stropped 3 times wiping in between and all 3 times got the flakes in the same spots. I would check those 3 spots very carefully under the loupe for nicks etc. If just breaking in etc should be more random. Good luck

Thanks eddy79 - I did check under a loupe and did not see anything obvious to me, but I've only been at this about two months so maybe there is a problem my uneducated eyes are missing. I kinda doubt that because it is a new blade and I would assume the fellas at SRD would have noticed if anything was wrong with it.

I appreciate all the suggestions and feedback. I stropped and shaved with it yesterday and got a wonderful shave. Its not leaving scratch marks on the strop; that i can tell, so I think I'll take your advice and just keep on using it as usual and see if the flaking goes away with time. As long as its not eating into the strop and I'm getting the performance out it I expect from a new blade then it's probably not worth worrying about. I'm including a pic so you all can see what I do after three of four laps on the strop.

Just watched Euclid440's vid about how to tell whether a blade is sharp and at one point he described 'blunting' along the razor's edge. That got me wondering so I examined my R.Aust under a better light and found something resembling exactly what he described. I also ran a plastic trimmer cap adjustment tool; basically a plastic screwdriver, along the edge going downward from the spine as Euclid440 demonstrates to verify the edge is blunt and got the same result. It catches on the part near the middle of the edge. That is where you see the biggest leather deposit in my pic above. I took another pic which shows what I can now see under a bright light w/out magnification and you can clearly see five spots on the blade's edge that appear to have been blunted or otherwise dinged in some way.




Does anyone know what may have caused this? I'm new to shaving with straights; about two months, but I've acquired nearly twenty razors, four of which are new and this is the first time I've seen one like this. If it were only one nick in the blade or maybe two then I may be convinced I could have done it somehow but five of them leads me to believe this happened before it left the manufacturer. Ideas?

Thanks!

Any sort of contact could have blunted or rolled the edge. Better get that sorted before you strop or shave with that blade again.

Originally Posted by holli4pirating

Any sort of contact could have blunted or rolled the edge. Better get that sorted before you strop or shave with that blade again.

Are you saying I need to get it rehoned, or would something less drastic be enough?

Well, it sounds like stropping alone didn't fix it, and it does look like it needs fixing, so a stone of some sort would be next. Impossible for me to say what it might need just by looking, though. I wouldn't keep stropping it on your leather for fear of damaging the strop.

That looks like some decent blunt spots. It looks like it will need to go to the hones. How much is hard to say but they don't look like small spots. The first 4 look very evenly spaced as though maybe all done at same time. Good luck and as said don't use it till you get it fixed.

I think it may be a wire edge/burr?? I've noticed more friction on the strop sometimes if I have a wire edge and sometimes is causes the leather (if on the rough side) to flip up a bit as it's ripped off of the strop by the burr; sometimes is has popped off the strop completely and landed on the blade.