N00bs First Shave....Almost

I apologize for the long rambling post... I'm not very good at saying what I mean to say

Well I had my first straight shave today... I couldn't finish with the straight :cry: ... I did both cheeks/sideburns WTG, I tried to do the neck and chin and below the nose, it just would not work.
On the Plus side, after taking the fusion (:gaah:, Hoping I didn't have to go back to that thing) to the cheek I shaved with the straight, there was not many whiskers for the fusion to take away! :rock:

I've got a few problems/questions that I would like some help from you guys with. I'll post what I did then ask the questions...Sorry for the long post.

First I had a hot shower and when I got out I left my face wet and used Proraso pre shave creme, then I made up my lather using the proraso shaving creme and an Omega Boar brush. I rinsed my blade under hot water to warm it up, stretched my skin by pulling up on my sideburn and started the first stroke WTG. The blade seemd to get stuck and stick to my face, I thought that maybe this was a problem with the lather maybe it was too sticky, it was fairly think whiter and I could not see any skin through it at all.. It looks quite different from the lather shown in vids and on the wiki, but I found it to work great with the fusion.

You can see in the pics How much I used and what it looked like, but it completely covered my face in a thick coating and I could not see any skin or hairs..this lather seemd to make the razor 'stick' to my face.. so I thought maybe it was too thick and sticky...So I tried a soap lather

The soap lather looked nothing like the wiki, but I could rub my brush on the soap and then rub it on my face and I got a white coating that was semi see though. I could lightly see the skin and the hairs were poking out, this seemed easier for the razor to glide though.

So I kind of messed up by changing lathers :nono: I should have stuck with one the whole way through ... Ill have to work on my lather.

I guess the whole question is, what is the feeling of the razor going though the whiskers? should it just glide though?

Another Important note is that I did not strop... horrible I know.. I was too anxious to try my razor out and I don't have a strop for another week or so..It's in the mail.

There seems to be a whole lot of rambling above...

Would improper lather effect the blades ability to shave and cause it to stick?
How fast should the 'swipe' with the razor be? I was going fairly slow and cautious
How vital is the stropping on a shave ready razor?? I was thinking that If I did a poor job stropping that I would ruin the shave ready edge.

anyways.. hopefully what I said made some sense, and your not totally confused or asleep.

Thanks and if I left anything out please ask

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Bivouhac

I guess the whole question is, what is the feeling of the razor going though the whiskers? should it just glide though?

Another Important note is that I did not strop... horrible I know.. I was too anxious to try my razor out and I don't have a strop for another week or so..It's in the mail.

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I will try to answer these two for you, The razor really doesn not slide right through your beard, at least it doesnt for me. I did exactly what you did my forst time around, I also did not have a strop .

You definitly need to strop before you shave or at least have the razor stropped before your next shave. Hope this makes sense.I find that I take short strokes with the razor , you will hear some noise like buttering toast , this is normal. On my second time around when I relather I can go with a longer stroke and the blade then seems to slide better.

One very important thing I forgot to mention, Did you buy a "Shave Ready " razor ? You will hear a lot of this when others chime in and explain better what this means.

First question, is your razor professionally honed yet or did you try shaving with it out of the box? If it is honed properly, then that should not pose an issue. Second, by looking at your lather/shave mug, it seems a bit small in amount of lather and it looks thick /sticky to me. The amount of cream in the first pic looks right. Try adding small amounts of water as you build the lather. Remember, a good lather sometimes can take up to 5 minutes to build. As far as how it should feel, you should not experience pulling or tugging, but the razor does not quite glide though. Especially with a course beard. Like Mike said, try shorter strokes on your first pass and you will be able to do longer strokes on your second pass. Keep reading up on lather, shaving , stropping here in the wiki. Do not try and shave your whole face until you get comfortable with the blade. Especially if it is not sharp enough. You will end up with a nice razor burn/irritation if that is the case. Keep at it bro and enjoy the whole shaving/lather building process! Jeremy-

Good advice so far. You need to strop your str8 before you shave or it will pull. The exception is when you receive a shaveready str8 from a hone meister who has stropped it for you. Is your str8 shave ready?

Your str8 blade angle should be 30 degrees or less.

I use about half the cream you use and get a lot more lather. I use a dab about the size of a dime and add hot water, probably about a tablespoon. Experiment by adding hot water to your mug and swirling up a good lather. It's easier to add water to your lather than to remove it, so just add small amounts of water. Your lather should make peaks like whipped cream. If your lather is too wet, it will be sloppy and runny and drip from your face. Check out Jockeys' video on making ueber lather http://straightrazorpalace.com/video...er-lather.html . Mainly watch how he adds a little water at a time to build his lather. Also note that he mixed cream, soap, and glycerin, so mixing soap and creme is not a bad thing. As he says, making lather takes practice. I hope this helps.

:gl:

The lather should be easy to fix - just spend half an hour making it over starting with very little water and adding more until it's too much, you'll get the hang of it.

Don't worry about messing up the razor while stropping, just keep the spine on the strop and you'll be good. Try the TPT as you strop you should notice a difference as the razor gets sharper, the edge will be stickier.
And since I'm giving you the advice, I promise, if you mess up the edge while stropping, I'll fix it for you.

Is it possible the cream dried out too quick? The blade should slide smooth and there should be no sticking. Make sure to strop before every shave.

gugi what is TPT ?

Im trying to figure it out

The Pickle Test , Two Plus Two,

The Paper Test

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Mike257

gugi what is TPT ?

Im trying to figure it out

The Pickle Test , Two Plus Two,

The Paper Test

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Thumb pad test. Its a learned feeling.

In my experience the first shave is always the hardest. I find quick short strokes are the most comfortable until you really master the straight shave. Your shaving with the lockwood right?

If so, I am the seller, the blade was shave ready when it left America. Probably needed to be stropped because I only started stropping for people after I sold my first few razors. :gaah: That said, the Lockwood gave me one of the best shaves I have ever had in the test shave. Probably needed stropping, I take responsibility for that. :(

The 2 things that come to my mind are:

1) You didnt strop, which caused the stuck feeling, the razor stuck into a whisker

2) Its more than likely a technique issue, keep with it and youll be alright and I doubt if the thickness of he lather had anything to do with it.

@ Leighton, you shouldnt have told Mike what the TPT is, hes got one of my choppers and now....Oh well, we'll see what happens.;)

Mike, there's a list of acronyms in the wiki (a link to it in my welcome post in this section too), but I think if you just search TPT in the wiki you'll find it.
Here, I think I just managed to dedicate 10min of your life to reading acronyms :)

I keep forgetting about the Wiki and when I do go there I spend more than 10 mins. The other day I went there to read about Witch Hazel and ended up spending half the day there.

Thanks everyone, Theres a lot of helpful information here,I really appreciate it.

The razor is the Lockwood I bought from Leighton, so it is shave ready, although before I use it again I will be sure to give it a good stropping! :p I'll try the TPT when I strop the razor, I'm not sure if I'll be able to tell, but I'll read up on the TPT and see if I notice anything.

I'll keep working on my lather and try mixing some up tomorrow morning using the method gugi suggested... thinking more about the lather.. it really was pretty bad stuff :thinking:, I didn't use any water except what was in the brush, and when I tried to rinse the razor under hot water, the lather stuck to it and I had to rub it off with my finger :w Ill take a good look at the Video and wiki and keep practicing it the mean time. Can't blame it all on the lather... I'm sure my technique played a part as well :o.

I've read through that acronym list a few times now and still have to keep checking it and every time I go to it I read the whole thing... It's not hard to kill time reading up on the wiki, theres always good stuff there! :bow

That uberlather wiki article was one of the most useful for me. I can't stress enough how helpful improving my lather was to the overall results and enjoyment of my shaves. After reading that wiki and practicing it about 4 times, I'm an ubermeister, and I'll never shave again without it. Definitely a case of UAD. I even microwave a scuttle of water to set my mixing bowl in once I whip it up so I get nice hot creamy lather.

Best of luck, hope your strop comes in soon!