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  1. #1
    Junior Member Magus's Avatar
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    Question My first bevel setting - parts not making contact with hone

    Hello,

    I am new to straight razor shaving, started a few weeks ago.
    I've watched some videos on subject and read wiki and forum posts to prepare myself
    So far I have already accomplished a few sr shaves without any major problems, each shave is better than previous with smooth feeling around the face + a little red irritation on neck.
    One of my 3 razors is not sharp enough (fails all available tests) so I decided to hone it.
    To make long story short, I finally figured out that any hones with grit above 1K will not change anything as this one really needed some serious bevel setting before going into any polishing stages.
    So I took my not so sharp and stubborn Dovo inox/stainless blade to 1K hone and I began my first honing practice. The hone I am using is Naniwa model MS19 (Micron Deluxe) grit 1000 with a stand (link)which I bought in some sushi shop. It is different from Super Stone (new ceramics) Naniwa 1K commonly known on this forum, but I guess the difference is not substantial.
    I lapped the hone and started with a few dozen of strokes, no change in sharpness. One hour of honing, two hours - getting better in some parts of the blade, lacking any sharpness in other. I decided to put a marker on spine and bevel to see what is wrong with this blade. The result I got after a few strokes with marker on surprised me.
    Below I attach a picture which shows in red color parts of the balde which are not making contact with the hone. In case it is not shown let me describe the situation:
    One side of the blade is almost perfect with only a short part of tip not making contact. On spine the part of the same length is not making contact (symmetrical to the edge part).
    It is the second side of the blade which is really a big trouble maker. There, only middle part of the edge is making contact, with quite long parts of heel and tip not making contact. On the spine the parts which does not make contact are not the exact symmetrical projections of the edge parts. They extend to the very end of tip / heel and are not as long as the trouble edge parts.
    It is my third day of honing, so far I did about 12 hours of honing on 1K. The middle part is quite sharp (shaves some hair in mid-air). One side of the blade is almost perfect, with the short tip area being the only trouble maker.
    It may be my imagination but on the second side of the blade (dark, bad side) I think a spine begins to even out because the marker is vanishing, but the progress is so slow that I wonder if it can be done in reasonable time. The edge part not making contact is still not even touched!

    Shall I continue doing X strokes for x hours until it all evens out (spine+edge will finally make contact)?
    Should I hone the trouble side more or is it still better to do even number of strokes on each side in this specific case?

    Since it's my first honing, I'd like to avoid advanced techs like rolling X as this will unnecessery complicate the issue and disrupt muscle memory of regular strokes which I suspect will not serve me well for start of my honing adventure

    Thank you for reading my post and any advice you can provide,
    Magus
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  2. #2
    Senior Member blabbermouth Joed's Avatar
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    Sounds like your blade is warped. Maybe this isn't the best blade to learn to hone with. If you use the top edge of the hone and not lay it flat on the hone you may get the complete edge to take an edge. When doing this tip the tow up a little and slide the blade off the side of the hone in an x pattern. Be sure you hone is properly beveled and that you are honing on the top edge of the bevel and not the bevel itself.

    Good luck.
    “If you always do what you always did, you will always get what you always got.” (A. Einstein)

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  4. #3
    At this point in time... gssixgun's Avatar
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    For Reference:
    If after 100 laps on a 1k stone you are not seeing a bevel and an edge form there is a problem... STOP!!! you are just wasting steel form that point on...
    You have to figure out where the problem lies....

    One single layer of electrical tape would have fixed this "problem"...

    Now that you have put 12 full hours plus and 100 years of wear on the razor who knows...

    Obviously you have a warp, honing around a warp is rather easy once you realize it is there, the marker test proved it... Now you have a warp the has been worn farther into the spine and the edge, so basically you have to pop yer wheels outta the ruts and drive along the top....

    I hate to diagnose razors without them being in my hands but I would suggest 3 layers of tape and some heel forward strokes down the hone maybe some circles to even it all up once you can feel an edge, pull two layers of tape and sharpen the razor....
    You could also use a rolling X and hone around the warp but from your first post I think you might have dug yourself a hole the you might not get out of easily...

    Good luck..

    ps: my advice above is if you want a nice even small bevel you can grind away and get the razor shaving sooner or later....

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  6. #4
    Senior Member blabbermouth JimmyHAD's Avatar
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    Welcome to SRP. Checkout this tutorial in the SRP Wiki here. It is from the 1961 barber manual excerpt and illustrates and describes honing with the x stroke to avoid a frown. From your illustrations it appears that you will be putting a frown in that razor if you keep at it. Read the tutorial and follow the method and you may be able to correct what you've already done.

    Alternatively you might send it out to a forum member for professional honing. Don't worry about corrupting your muscle memory by using a stroke other than dead flat. You have to use the stroke that works or you'll not only get nowhere but you'll make matters worse.

    How much damage you may have done would depend on how much pressure you've been using and how much metal you've already taken off. One layer of tape on the spine might be a good idea until you feel confident in your honing skills.
    Be careful how you treat people on your way up, you may meet them again on your way back down.

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  8. #5
    At this point in time... gssixgun's Avatar
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    I just re-read yer post, I think we are all assuming that the hone you are using is FLAT by the way....
    Last edited by gssixgun; 09-01-2009 at 02:20 PM.

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  10. #6
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    +1 On Jimmy and Glenn both. As Glenn has pointed out, and you might have already done this, make sure your stone is flat. Jimmy has recommended that you tape the spine. Do this, no matter what at this point. I would personally do the following with this razor. After taping the spine I would remark the edge. After it dries, take one stroke up and one stroke back on the stone. Make sure this is very slow, maybe 1 to 2 seconds. Look at the marking, it will show you exactly what you need to know. So know you have some areas that that stroke didn't remove the mark, that means you have to find the x or rolling-x stroke that will. Again, very slowly, do one of these and see if more of the mark was removed. If it was, continue doing this, again verry slowly, until the mark is completely gone. This is the stroke you will need to produce the bevel you are looking for. Next dry and remark the blade. Do one stroke up and one back and look at the blade. You should have, at this point, all of the marker removed from the edge. If not, keep figuring it out until you can do this last test. Once you can do that you can start to set the bevel. Again, Very Very Slowly. It should not take more than 20 or 30 laps to set the bevel. If you aren't close by that time, there is something really wrong.
    The key to this part is the speed. It doesn't matter how fast you go, you only have 8" of stone to work with. No matter how fast you move the blade over the stone, you will still remove the same amount of metal. Starting out slowly, while you are learning, will allow you to actually watch what is going on and develop better muscle memory.
    Jimmy is correct though in recommending at this point that you stop what you are doing and get this Inox to a honester before you totally trash your investment. Here is a link to the classified section.

    Get yourself a beater from ebay and practice on that until you feel comfortable with the process and then you can move up to your Inox without trepidation.

    Hope this helps,

    Ray

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  12. #7
    Junior Member Magus's Avatar
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    Thank you guys for insightful answers to my honing problem.
    This forum rocks!
    I didn't expect so many answers in such a short time!

    One thing is certain - as I understand from your answers I've done more than enough strokes on this problematic razor on 1K hone and I should stop doing it before killing the spine coz it will not "even out" if I keep doing it with no mods to my honing method.

    Therefore I am putting some layers of black electric tape around the spine, I guess I'll start with 3 pieces of that stuff following Glen's advice, then I'll degrade to 1 layer if I can feel the new formed edge and try to sharpen it keeping 1 layer on spine. All the time frequent marker tests in between strokes of course It should become clear by that time wheter to use x stroke or rolling x stroke with the leading heel - will proceed with a gentle rolling if warp proves too strong to attain an edge with 1 layer of tape on.
    Please correct me if I am wrong in my understanding.

    I'll update with fresh results.
    Thank you,
    Magus

    PS. I'm already hunting for some cheap beater (like Wapienica) on the auctions to improve my honing technique

  13. #8
    Senior Member blabbermouth JimmyHAD's Avatar
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    Sounds like you're on the right track now. I put the marker on and see what type of stroke I need to use to make contact with the hone for the length of the blade and then I immediately wipe the marker off.

    Use the 3 layers of tape until you can pass the TNT. Once passed go to one layer and repeat until you can pass the TNT again. From that point don't use the TNT anymore. Rely on the TPT. You can educate your thumb pad by using a new DE blade if you have one to be able to tell the 'sticky' feeling that you are looking for.
    Be careful how you treat people on your way up, you may meet them again on your way back down.

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  15. #9
    Junior Member Magus's Avatar
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    Lightbulb

    Ok, so far I finally arrived at the point of using 1 layer of tape. Even 3 layers of tape with normal X stroke couldn't accomplish the bevel on the whole length. However the length of bevel which I produced with 3 layers was longer than before But seeing that after about 30 strokes it was not increasing in size, I switched to slight rolling x technique (especially pronounced on that warped side) and I tell you that was a good move! Doing so the bevel began forming on the whole size of the blade, even the most distant parts were touched by the stroke and the marker on the new (smaller) bevel finally disapeared after a few strokes. Again, with marker I repeat the stroke until it felt like quite sharp on all points of the blade (TNT went smooth imho). Then I switched to 1 layer. This time I took me longer to make the marker disappear, obviously angle was more acute with 1 layer so at first the steel was being removed from slightly above the very edge and then, step by step the new bevel formed itself until all marker was gone. Again, I repeated the above until the marker disppeared a few times. Now I am working to make it sharp at this 1K level
    Maybe it's too early to go into 4K.
    Well, it's passing TNT on the whole length, HHT fail, trying TPT.... DE which I used about a week ago is gliding across my thumble pad almost without doing any nicks (already dull I guess) therefore I'll check with fresh one to feel the difference. BUT with the blade I am honing I am feeling a slight sinking into the skin when I position the blade under angle slightly more acute then normal perpendicular. If I do mid-air shaving test on the arm or leg (with dry hair, quite dense and thick), then one slow stroke on the whole length of the limb produces a few chopped off pieces of hair at most.

    Should I give it a few more dozen of strokes and expect more sharpness at this stage,
    or do many strokes, enough until it grabs almost all hair in mid-air
    or is it safe to move to 4K now?

    Magus

  16. #10
    Senior Member BHChieftain's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Magus View Post
    PS. I'm already hunting for some cheap beater (like Wapienica) on the auctions to improve my honing technique
    That's a really good idea. When I started out honing, somebody on this site actually shipped me a Double Arrow razor for free to use for practice. I already shipped it off to someone else who was learning how to hone, but maybe somebody else on the side might help out ...????

    -Happing honing

    Chief

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