Thread: Newbie Problem with DOVO.

CBMC, was yours a stainless blade, or carbon?

I had the same issue with my Dovo Tortoise 5/8. I thought it looked curved even before I sighted down the edge. (Blade width narrower in the middle, wider on the ends) I thought I'd just live with it, but then realized it was making stropping difficult because the middle part obviously doesn't press against the strop with the same pressure as the ends. I sent it back to Jim at Vintage Blades today and he's replacing it no questions asked. I just added a note asking if he'd check the blade edge before sending me a replacement so I don't have to go through it again. I have to admit being disappointed in Dovo. I have always found German-made stuff to be high quality, so this is a bit of a letdown. Obviously this is a problem with Dovo and NOT Vintage-----it was in the factory-sealed box.

Did anyone with Dovo issues check the blade edge for a frown or smile?

I've looked at two brand new ones as received from the factory and they both had frowns. This might also contribute to the razor being hard to hone.

Mine wasn't frowning.

But I was!



I did however score a vintage (circa 2000) Dovo #41 blade and rescaled it today...

Originally Posted by Seraphim

CBMC, was yours a stainless blade, or carbon?

Carbon Steel.

The warping of the blades is due to an in-balance is stress fron one sire of the blade to the other. Think of a sheet of paper with a piece of elastic laid on one side and taled down to the paper with out stretching it. The paper will lay flat. Turn the paper over and tape one end of elastic down, stretch the elastic holding the taped end down and tape the other end. The paper will curl in oh the side with the stretched elastic. This is an example if in-balance of stress on the paper. The same happens with steel but may take some time or may be released by other forces like additional heat. In metal the in-balance can be caused by un-even quenching after heat treating where one side cools faster than the other side. Another cause may be that one side heated up more during grinding or one side was ground more that another. A double temper (or double draw) will reduce the stress in the metal after heat treating (hardening of the steel) and the metal will not move as much when stress is released during machining.

I have several str8s that have warped blades that I picked up at an antique shop in a lot. WHile honing I noticed, as you have, that the blades were warped and almost gave up on them. I found a vid on YouTube where someone was giving a demo to a group on how to hone problem razors. I may also be here on SRP but I don't have the tome to search for it. In this vid the guy was performing an X patern on the edge of the hone and refered to is as similar to how some sharpen a knife. Very little pressure, just the weight of the blade and when he come to the last third of the blade he layed it flat to complete the stroke. The end of the blade never came off the side of the hone.

I used this method to set the bevel on my 'problem' blades and finished the honing the same way. These 'problem' str8s now shave very well. Remember, we are not shaving a surface as flat as as a piece of glass (which isn't really flat by my standards), we are shaving our face (and maybe other areas) which is a very irregular surface.

It may be worth your time to search for this vid and add this method to your sill set. Each razor is different and if you add to your heard you may come across more like this. Remember that you said the blade shaved good until you went to hone it. That means that someone else honed it in a method similar to what I mentioned above or the stress in the blade was released after it was honed.

Good luck.

Originally Posted by Seraphim

Mine wasn't frowning.

But I was!



I did however score a vintage (circa 2000) Dovo #41 blade and rescaled it today...

Those scales are incredible!

Originally Posted by Joed

The warping of the blades is due to an in-balance is stress fron one sire of the blade to the other. Think of a sheet of paper with a piece of elastic laid on one side and taled down to the paper with out stretching it. The paper will lay flat. Turn the paper over and tape one end of elastic down, stretch the elastic holding the taped end down and tape the other end. The paper will curl in oh the side with the stretched elastic. This is an example if in-balance of stress on the paper. The same happens with steel but may take some time or may be released by other forces like additional heat. In metal the in-balance can be caused by un-even quenching after heat treating where one side cools faster than the other side. Another cause may be that one side heated up more during grinding or one side was ground more that another. A double temper (or double draw) will reduce the stress in the metal after heat treating (hardening of the steel) and the metal will not move as much when stress is released during machining.

I have several str8s that have warped blades that I picked up at an antique shop in a lot. WHile honing I noticed, as you have, that the blades were warped and almost gave up on them. I found a vid on YouTube where someone was giving a demo to a group on how to hone problem razors. I may also be here on SRP but I don't have the tome to search for it. In this vid the guy was performing an X patern on the edge of the hone and refered to is as similar to how some sharpen a knife. Very little pressure, just the weight of the blade and when he come to the last third of the blade he layed it flat to complete the stroke. The end of the blade never came off the side of the hone.

I used this method to set the bevel on my 'problem' blades and finished the honing the same way. These 'problem' str8s now shave very well. Remember, we are not shaving a surface as flat as as a piece of glass (which isn't really flat by my standards), we are shaving our face (and maybe other areas) which is a very irregular surface.

It may be worth your time to search for this vid and add this method to your sill set. Each razor is different and if you add to your heard you may come across more like this. Remember that you said the blade shaved good until you went to hone it. That means that someone else honed it in a method similar to what I mentioned above or the stress in the blade was released after it was honed.

Good luck.

The issue I take with this comment is that while our face is not flat, blade geometry does make a big difference to shave quality.

Our face is curved, so it would seem that a razor with a frown should fit the curves of the face nicely, and give a great shave.

However, a razor with a frown shaves horribly.

A razor picked up for short money at an antique store that has issues is no big deal. The issue I am raising in this thread is that I find the same issues on a brand new, full priced razor is certainly unacceptable, and newbies should be aware of it.

I've been meaning to switch to straight razor shaving for a while and finally have gotten around to shopping razors. I don't want anything fancy, but I also don't want something that's going to turn me off to this from the start.

What I was looking at is this classic Dovo razor:
DOVO Straight Razors

Given what you folks have been saying here, would you recommend not going with the Dovo? And if not, what would you recommend? I think I'd prefer a new razor as I'm not sure I'd trust myself to buy a used one at this point as I wouldn't even know what to look for- but it's a little worrisome if new razors are also problematic.

Serapim,

Thank you for your feedback on my comment. I understand your point and there is nothing wrong with it. My point is was to address CBMC's comment, which is noted below, on how well it shaved until he felt it needed to be honed. Based on that statement he was satisfied with the quality of shave he was getting but was having problems honing the razor as one wold if it was flat. I have a couple of razors that I discovered were not flat when I went to hone them and they are antique shop finds for little money spent. While they require a different honing process they shave fine for me as the Dovo shaves fine for CBMC. While these razors may not shave as well as a perfectly flat one (I haven't noticed amy difference) they can not be compared to the shave quality of one with a frown.

[quote=CBMC;264971]I bought a straight razor several months ago. Shaved great for a while, I realized that I was ready to hone my Dovo.

With that said, when I buy a new car I am expecting mint condition. I don't want to have to lift the door to get it to close or any have any other problems I can detect. I agree with you that we should get everything we expect with aly and all purchases we make. Unfortunately that is not always the case as CBNC found out. It would be interesting to find out just what the flatmess tolorances are for Dovo razors compared to other. If the razor is out of sped there is no question about sending it back.