Thread: 5th shave not as good

First of all, thanks everyone for your advice.

I decided to shower and shave tonight. I couldn't stand three days growth anymore.

Before the shower, I stropped about twenty on the practice strop. Then I moved to the linen for around thirty and the the good 3" strop for about fifty. I decided not to "baby" the stropping, and to apply a bit more pressure. It certainly felt and sounded a bit different than my last outing.

One thing I did notice on the practice strop was that a few times on the stroke toward the door, the toe of the blade left a arcing lighter colored drag mark. Frustrating. I think this is from uneven pressure on the strop with the razor. While doing the x-pattern, the anchor end (head) of the strop would twist also.

I concentrated more with the good strop and this didn't happen.

After the shower I made up some Tabac and Wars and kept it looser that the last time, also.

Anywho, the shave was much better than last time. Hopefully, it was insufficient stropping or bad technique last time and improved this time.

It took several passes but I am once again pleased. I read somewhere that you can probably count on as many passes with a straight as you did with a DE or SE. This was true tonight. Rarely am I a two pass kind of a guy, unless I absolutely have to stop. My beard grows every direction I possibly can, and that is in just one area.

Against the grain is out of the question for now. I tried, ever so lightly, a couple times. The razor stopped dead in its own tracks. A couple xtg were successful, though.

So.....we'll see what tomorrow brings......

Good shaving,
kevin

Seemed like the stropping idea could have been the issue. Also how does the razor stop dead in it's tracks when you go ATG? That seems like another issue to me also, like the razor may have been dulled by improper stropping. Next time you strop try a higher count of Linen and leather, something like 40/100. See if this eases the difficulty of the ATG pass. The razor should cut easily ATG, even on your neck as long as you stretch very tight and have a good angle. The razor should be almost completely flat on our face when you go ATG.

I do the same amount of passes with a straight that I did with my DEs. The only difference is, my neck feels smoother when I rub it atg, and my skin is a lot better than it has even been with a DE.

I wonder if starting out with latigo is a contributing
factor to stropping difficulties. A flatter, smoother
leather with less draw might be more appropriate.

Anyways, I recommend 60/60 as the number of
passes each day before shaving. I think I may do
an experiment with leather only to see how that
goes so I can be of more help to new shavers who
don't use linen.



- Scott