Thread: Advice from experienced shavers required!!!

Hey,
I'm completely new to straight razor shaving and would appreciate your advice on 2 topics....one thing i do know is that i should strop before shaving....however i have a book that says you should strop after shaving to completely dry and realign the blade....then some websites say never under any circumstances strop after shaving...PLEASE HELP ?!? which is it? Ive stropped my dovo bismarck twice after shaving....based on this book!!!! I guess twice shouldnt have done any harm though??

Also, i find i give myself a really good SAFE shave if i leave the hair grow 2 days or so, so theres a bit of length in the hair...however, does anyone else find that if the hair is not long enough they get a bad BITING shave with a few nicks? I think maybe its because the skin at the hair folicles is still projecting outwards???

Any help would be great!!

First off welcome to SRP !!!!!!

Stropping:
Many here strop after the shave about 10 laps to clean and prep the edge... It will not hurt the blade as long as you strop correctly....
The before shave stropping is way more important, most recommend between 40-60 laps ....

Yes I agree with the second day being a great shave but I enjoy my shave time way to much to skip a day on purpose
As you gain more experience the shaves will become even smoother....so it won't matter as much....

Hello and welcome!

I always strop before I shave. I typically strop a few times after shaving simply to properly dry off the shaving edge. A lot of older sources say to refrain from stropping after shaving since the metal is prone to micro-chipping because it's brittle afterwards, but I think that's mostly seen as a myth.... I haven't seen any adverse results from stropping afterwards at least. I typically do 30 strokes linen then 60 leather before each shave.

If you're getting bad results shaving only 1 days growth then chances are that you're using too much pressure/the angle is off, or that your razor isn't quite sharp enough. I got irritation from my first shaves, t's just a matter of practice . You're only going to improve from here,

Dave

As to the first question, I always strop a few times after the shave to dry off the edge and no problems so far. Strop correctly and there's no harm to be done in my experience. The second is I think, probably more down to the fact that your face just isn't used to it yet. I could never shave two days in a row before using a straight (well I could, but it hurt) and for the first month it was the same. Now, a year or so in, it's rare that I don't shave every day, may give it a miss tomorrow due to a horrible cut on the chin today though that was due to not stretching and too much pressure, a second's inattention is all it took.

Welcome!

I'd like to see information that instructs a person NOT to strop post shave. I can't understand why anyone would advise against such a prudent practice.

Depending on the razor's environment, micro-corrosion (rust) can occur rapidly; even minutes after a blade is at rest. Micro-corrosion contributes to a bad shave (who wants to shave with a rusty edge???)

I always give my razors 25-35 post shave strops. For me I generally use the flesh side of my strops that I've hand finished to a velvety surface. Velvety, but the flesh side of my strops have more nap than the grain side. I visualize thousands of soft absorbent fibers sucking up any moisture and cleaning the edge of any gunk.

Chris L

Chris:
After reading that description I just got the mental image of you stropping on a ShamWow !!!!!!

I strop post shave on linen to clean the bevel from the dead cells and soap remnants that are saturated with moisture( for my oppinion, this is the purpose of linen or cotton canvas side of the strop)
I strop pre shave on leather to realighn the edge ( the only reason is to allow time on lather to soften my whiskers)

Originally Posted by gssixgun

Chris:
After reading that description I just got the mental image of you stropping on a ShamWow !!!!!!

I laughed out loud when I read your post, Glen. I guess you're right; what I wrote does make it sound like I should have a microphone headset on and a crowd gathered around me; wait, I do have a mic headset on. Yikes, I hope there's no crowd coming!

Chris L

Welcome to SRP ! I always do 10 round trips on my horeshide strop after shaving. The other folks explained why as well as I can. Here is some reading to get you started and here are some videos that my be helpful.

When shaving if you are trying to get it all in one pass that may be part of the problem. Here is a little writeup on multiple pass shaving. Read my sig at the bottom of this post and that my help you avoid nicks.

Welcome to SRP!
Just in case you need any reinforcement, I always strop my blade about 20 times or so on horsehide after shaving.
Before shaving, it gets about 60 laps on latigo and 20 on horsehide.