Thread: Having some trouble

Yes you will get better in time. It takes about 100 shaves to become truly proficient

Patience, practice, skin stretching, and the scything stroke fixed my east-west jawline. I don't remember how many shaves it was to get it BBS, it was a lot, but I think it took about 60 to get it DFS.

I do the top part of my neck with the scything stroke first. Then I pull my cheek upwards and go ear to chin.

And make sure you have a stypic pencil on hand when learning the scything and guillotine strokes.

I was just browsing through some old threads and found a description of scything as having the heel at a fixed point and rotating the toe, simple yet explanatory description. It made me think of military lines wheeling, where one end marches with smaller steps than the other.
Guillotine is where you hold the blade at an angle greater than 90 degrees to the direction of cut.

I'm going to try it tonite see what I can make happen. Thanks and I take any tips help I can get.

I have a hard time stretching my skin to slick. What do y'all do about that?

I always have a towel on hand and wipe my fingers on that, I also use the back of my fingers a lot, as it gives better traction, but that is mostly on my neck. I also make a lot of faces. A lot of guys use the alum block to help give their fingers grip, but my skin does not like the alum block.

Couple different ways to do it. Rubbing the tips of you fingers on an alum block can help a lot as it pretty much drys lather out as soon as it touches it.

What I do when doing my cheeks is start pulling up in my hair. Then as I clear a section of lather i bring my hand down stretch repeat.

When I do my neck I pull down around my collarbone and lift my head way up and away from the side I am going to shave.

In the mustache and mouth area it's pretty much facial contortion.

Pretty much those techniques keep my hands out of the lather.

I also use the heel of my palm for a better grip sometimes.

Originally Posted by Castel33

Couple different ways to do it. Rubbing the tips of you fingers on an alum block can help a lot as it pretty much drys lather out as soon as it touches it.

What I do when doing my cheeks is start pulling up in my hair. Then as I clear a section of lather i bring my hand down stretch repeat.

When I do my neck I pull down around my collarbone and lift my head way up and away from the side I am going to shave.

In the mustache and mouth area it's pretty much facial contortion.

Pretty much those techniques keep my hands out of the lather.

I also use the heel of my palm for a better grip sometimes.

Sounds very similar to me.

I am struggling with the neck area too. Though, I have only tried my neck 2 times now. I just shaved my beard off Tuesday I believe it was. I have only been shaving every other day. It was better the second time but I just couldn't get a decent grip. When I got my neck stretched out right. I couldn't see. If I can't see I don't know where to stop.
If I can see I cut myself because the skin isn't tight enough or has an odd curve to it. All my neck hair grows towards my right ear.

The grip on the razor is a funny thing. We all have our own way of doing it, although there are only so many ways you can do it so there are some similarities for sure. You will always be able to tell you are holding the razor correctly when it is comfortable and you have control. If you feel as though you are lacking control, then you should alway correct that. When I am doing a near sideway pass on my neck, my grip has the scales positioned at the first 90 degrees when opening the razor. I find them to be in my way if they are in the usual open position. It may seem odd but it gets them to where they are not banging against my neck or if straight down they touch my chest. I do not always hold the razor this way or that for an entire shave. There are often three positions for the scales for the most part. Often that is nearly straight down, but for thing like my mustache, I go with the commonly seen scales 90 degrees to the spine. My finger move around in my grip often. When my stroke changes something else like finger position changes too. If you are comfortable and in control, and getting good shaves you are doing it right. Do not be afraid to change things a little to find your perfect shave.