Thread: Another "Not quite sharp enough" post

I have been watching all the videos on You Tube and Lynn is a great teacher and there are others that have other ideas about honing and they all seem to know their craft. I am using Norton hones and I have the 250/1000 and a 4000/8000 and from what I hear that will get you shaving. I have made several attempts to sharpen 2 razors; one is a newer Dovo and the other is a nice 1906 Hibbard Spencer Bartlett. I have used the pyramid method as well as Lynn's circle technique and they both yield similar results where they will pop a couple hairs on the HHT but the shave is not comfortable and not even good. One improvement I had was lightening up my blade pressure to a weight-of-the-blade only pressure. It feels like the blade is just floating across the hone when the pressure is light and flat. In each case I set the bevel with the 1000 so it would "drag" across my thumb nail. From there I would lighten up the pressure throughout the pyramid method. After honing I use AOS strop paste on a nylon strop for 20 licks, bare nylon strop for another 20 and the leather for 40. Could I be stropping for too short a period. Any suggestions would be much appreciated and my bleeding and irritated face thanks you in advance.

Originally Posted by dpompian

I have been watching all the videos on You Tube and Lynn is a great teacher and there are others that have other ideas about honing and they all seem to know their craft. I am using Norton hones and I have the 250/1000 and a 4000/8000 and from what I hear that will get you shaving. I have made several attempts to sharpen 2 razors; one is a newer Dovo and the other is a nice 1906 Hibbard Spencer Bartlett. I have used the pyramid method as well as Lynn's circle technique and they both yield similar results where they will pop a couple hairs on the HHT but the shave is not comfortable and not even good. One improvement I had was lightening up my blade pressure to a weight-of-the-blade only pressure. It feels like the blade is just floating across the hone when the pressure is light and flat. In each case I set the bevel with the 1000 so it would "drag" across my thumb nail. From there I would lighten up the pressure throughout the pyramid method. After honing I use AOS strop paste on a nylon strop for 20 licks, bare nylon strop for another 20 and the leather for 40. Could I be stropping for too short a period. Any suggestions would be much appreciated and my bleeding and irritated face thanks you in advance.

Hands on experience is the best there is and you have several members in your area who would more than likely help you one on one.

They also have had several 'Meets' (a meet is where the guys get together and show things like honing, stropping chip removal etc. It's also a great time to just shoot the crap.

Here's a link to the last meet:

https://sharprazorpalace.com/get-tog...11-2018-a.html

A well know Pro Honer has said something similar to this--

"Honing's Easy---Till It Ain't"

Originally Posted by dpompian

I have been watching all the videos on You Tube and Lynn is a great teacher and there are others that have other ideas about honing and they all seem to know their craft. I am using Norton hones and I have the 250/1000 and a 4000/8000 and from what I hear that will get you shaving. I have made several attempts to sharpen 2 razors; one is a newer Dovo and the other is a nice 1906 Hibbard Spencer Bartlett. I have used the pyramid method as well as Lynn's circle technique and they both yield similar results where they will pop a couple hairs on the HHT but the shave is not comfortable and not even good. One improvement I had was lightening up my blade pressure to a weight-of-the-blade only pressure. It feels like the blade is just floating across the hone when the pressure is light and flat. In each case I set the bevel with the 1000 so it would "drag" across my thumb nail. From there I would lighten up the pressure throughout the pyramid method. After honing I use AOS strop paste on a nylon strop for 20 licks, bare nylon strop for another 20 and the leather for 40. Could I be stropping for too short a period. Any suggestions would be much appreciated and my bleeding and irritated face thanks you in advance.

You might try to find a mentor that is close to you. A one on one session would probably solve a lot of your problems. Are these blades curved or straight? Are they hollow ground or wedges? Are you using electrical tape? If so how many layers? A 60x loupe would also help you keep track of your progress as you go from one grit to the next. I would strop 50 laps on the coarse material and 100 on the leather. Skip the strop paste for now.

Process of elimination.
First make sure you are shaving with a good lather & the razor nearly flat on your face.
Then shave minus the leather strop then the nylon then the paste etc, right down to 1k. Once you get down to a 1k shave you will see which stage your problem is.
90% of the time the problem is at bevel set.

And/or buy some magnification & learn to see what edges look like. Depends on if you are a visual or kinesthetic learner.

My success (at least %98 of the time i'm successful) came when understanding that most of the work starts at the bevel set. There are different ways of testing the readiness of the edge before moving on to the next hone. I use a combination of the thumb pad test (you'll feel a sharp sticky feeling when the thumb is lightly touched on the edge moving away at a slight angle) and the shave test. It must easily shave arm/leg hairs all along the edge before moving on to the next hone. After that there is comparably little time spent on the other hones to finish the edge.
I would try the x stroke rather than the pyramid method and see if you get different results, A lot depends on the amount of pressure you apply for any method. I spent hours honing using just light pressure with little success just because that's what i understood i should do. As was stated before finding someone to help you is the best way to learn (I was fortunate enough to have some hands on experience with Lynn the proved invaluable). JMHO Good luck on your journey.

If you are learning to shave with a straight razor and learning to hone at the same time you are up against it. It will be hard to know if it is your shaving technique, lathering/stropping technique or honing that is the real culprit. I'd say to have one of the razors honed by a person known to put a shave ready edge on a blade. That will give you a benchmark of what a good edge should do and feel like if you do not strop it before the first shave. If the shave is bad then you know your lathering/shaving technique needs work. Strop it before the second shave and if the edge is worse you have an idea that your stropping needs work.

The best way to learn honing is one on one with a mentor if at all possible. Honing is one of those things that looks easy, it is once you get on to it, but can take a while to get consistently good results from doing. It takes time and practice which can be greatly shorten by having a mentor. Almost everyone goes through that period of frustration in learning to hone.

There are a few variables when you start shaving with a straight razor and by adding honing to the equation it adds to that. It is not impossible to do but may take a bit longer. Take your time, slow and easy does it.

Bob

Hi MisterClean thanks for the response. I think a mentor is a great idea and I do see there's at least one in Denver than I will reach out to. To answer your questions they are both straight hollow ground blades and I don't use tape. I think the idea of a loupe would be a good idea for me too because I like to see what is happening as I work. I will also try your counts on the strop and skip the paste for now. I appreciate the tips.

I think a beginner honing without tape is a bad plan. In the beginning it is difficult to keep the honing concentrated on the edge, and the result is the spine wearing way faster than the edge, and it throws your geometry into the obis. Tape is your friend. When you get to a point where you can get through a honing session without wearing out the tape, that is the point in which tape is optional. In the mean time there is this thread, that shows great picture as to what the proccess looks like through a loupe.
https://sharprazorpalace.com/honing/...ggestions.html
As already suggested, I encourage you to work with someone that knows the proccess. There are a few guys in your area. It would not hurt to have them hone one of your razors while working your way through the progression with the other. It is not rocket science, but it does take practice to get repeatable result.

Welcome to SRP from The Springs.
We will meet someday if you get to our meeting in Denver in the future. It's too bad you didn't join last month as we just had our meeting and it only happens a couple times a year. Now to the meat of your issue...

As Bob said!
Trying to learn to shave with a straight NEEDS to be done with a PRO Honed razor. Not one you are learning to hone with. Honing take a long time/many many hours of sitting in front of the stones to figure out exactly what you're doing and when to progress to the next stone. You can learn to hone and shave at the same time.
I did!
BUT, I shaved with Pro honed razors and learned to hone on other razors. I have been honing for almost two years, every weekend I have, and I'm now getting to the point where I get good results 80% of the time. At a guess, I bet I've honed 150+ razors now. Now I'm not saying that it takes this long for everyone to learn. But I would guess for most it does take many months of honing before it STARTS to come together. Then depending on how much perfection to are into it could take even longer.
A loupe is a big plus and learning to use it often. You need to see what you are doing to the edge with each stone, looking at the edge every 10 or 20 strokes, understand what you see and why it now looks that way. Then to know its time to continue on. This also takes hours of staring thru that little glass to know what you're seeing. You can find lots of pics of Edges being honed on this site that will help you to learn what you're seeing.

The one thing that will help you right now is to send out a razor or two, to someone that will hone them up right for you. Learn to shave, lather and strop. If you want to learn to hone at the same time, don't do it with a razor your learning to shave with. Good luck and I know you will get it in the end, but as the old saying goes, after 100 shaves with a straight you will be just starting to understand what it's about. And I say, After 200 shaves with a straight you will then know that at 100 shaves, you really didn't know much. Just don't give up!

do you even know how to shave with a straight and strop correctly? make lather ? all these make a difference in honing also. cause until you can you may not know when its sharp and smooth enough.. plus its always easier on videos. plus some have honed lots of razors. so one on one help is the best, but lots to learn before you can get a shaving edge. Tc