Thread: HHT failures

Originally Posted by rayman

When I hone a razor, I do use the HHT as a precursor to the shave. It does give me a good indication as to weather or not I have honed the razor to the point I find acceptable for shaving.

Since I have real fine hair the HHT works really well for me. A while ago, I let my hair grow and when it was long enough, I washed it and had my wife cut it. I then took some of it and put it in a sealed contanier. I use this hair for my testing. This seems to help me for repeat testing to a known hair condition.

I also have set my own method for testing. This is how I do it.

Blade is held with the spind pointing down and blade up.
Hair is held between the thumb and index finger folicle end out towards the blade. This test will not work if the hair is backwards.
If the hair is curved, then the curve must be straight down.
When the hair is then touched to a point on the blade and slightly moved, it should fall over not pop.
I test minimum 5 points on the blade

If I test the edge by cutting hair on my arm or leg, the hair should just fall over when the blade touches it. Not Pop. If the hair pops, my edge is just not quite ready yet.

Hope this helps.

Enjoy!

Ray

Ray, that's how I do it, too, but we are both doing it backwards from how Bart says to do it in the Wiki, and Bart does have a good point... if you do it with the hair oriented as Bart says, the blade goes up underneath the hair's "shingle".

Originally Posted by JimmyHAD

Interesting.... I thought it was supposed to be the other way around.

Well, It won't work for me the other way around. Maybe for you it might.

Out here in the high desert the humidity is normally around 7-14 percent. Today it is 35% because of the storm hitting the west coast of Baha. Because of this fluctuation my hair is sometimes dry and sometimes oily. So I decided to make, at least, one thing on my indicators consistant. Seems to work for me.

Enjoy!

Ray

It puzzles me, that no one ever has problems with people that rely on the TNT and TPT for probing the edge during a honing job, while the HHT, that aims for nothing different, remains subjected to so much criticism.

The goal of honing is to make the razor cut hair, wouldn't we all agree on that?

These are obviously all subjective methods to probe an edge, and no one can use them without learning how to read the results. I believe that point is sufficiently made in my Wiki article and by Robin and Glen in this thread.

What I contributed in the Wiki is one possible way to how the HHT can be objectivated. It puzzles me that anyone would object against the presence of information, certainly when that information is thoroughly put in perspective. But if the Wiki crew would decide to remove the article, I would not take offense. Apart from that, everyone can alter or expand that article as he sees fit...

Best regards,
Bart.

I just re-read Bart's excellent article on the HHT and it's various stages and I find it an excellent addition to the Wiki just as I did when he first posted it there. Before that I read these pro and con HHT threads with differing views on the value of the test with no explanation of effective ways of accomplishing the test and interpreting the results.

I think it should stay in the Wiki regardless of any anti HHT feeling .... if there is any. I am pleased when I get it as I said in previous posts but if the razor shaves well but doesn't pass HHT I can live with that. Maybe I need to work harder. Just IMHO.

Originally Posted by rayman

Well, It won't work for me the other way around. Maybe for you it might.

Out here in the high desert the humidity is normally around 7-14 percent. Today it is 35% because of the storm hitting the west coast of Baha. Because of this fluctuation my hair is sometimes dry and sometimes oily. So I decided to make, at least, one thing on my indicators consistant. Seems to work for me.

Enjoy!

Ray

Now Ray, you had me doubt myself for a minute there. Because in all honesty, I don't know how the hair in my little box is oriented, but I do know that turning one over makes all the difference between passing (with ease) and not passing (with ease) and vice versa. Based on a hair's morphology, I always assumed that a hair held by the root would cut the easiest.

So, before typing this post, I did something I don't regularly do. I pulled a few out of my head. And tried them on the still oiled edge of my Friodur (that's right: I oil stainless steel blades). Anyway, those hairs sever when held by the root end, and do not sever (at least not on that oily edge) when they are hold from the other side.

If you get it the other way round, that is odd indeed.
Holding the razor in my right hand, I do tilt the edge a bit to the right, while I pull the hair to the left. Maybe if you were to tilt a bit to the left and push the hair to the right, it would offer a possible explanation for me, and all the more evidence that performing the HHT is a trade one needs to learn on an individual basis, just like performing the TPT.

To further clarify why I decided to turn my ideas for the HHT into a wiki article:
The problem with the TPT, in my case, is that I can feel the difference in stickiness when the edge isn't equally sharp along the entire edge, but it gives me no precise idea about the absolute keenness of an edge. If find it one of the strengths of a well calibrated HHT that it provides just that. And using it in my honing, I haven't had the need to go back to the hone, after a test shave, ever since I decided to simply not test shave before I'm happy with both the HHT before and after the first stropping.

On a tangent, I find it an advantage that I can send out honed razors and tell the (often inexperienced) owner, that he may expect the blade to pass the HHT. And that if it doesn't, something is wrong with the razor as I honed it. It may come as a surprise to those who believe that "there are vast differences in the way a hair behaves", that I have not once received feedback that the HHT was a no go. And believe me, they all try, and I don't expect them to wash their head before yanking one out.

I am not saying that a razor that doesn't pass the HHT is not shaveready. Some people claim that they shave just as nice, or even nicer. I'm not going to argue with that, because I simply do not know, for I have a complete lack of experience with non-hht-ing razors. It's just that I find it reassuring for a newbie, when he knows that his razor can sever a hanging hair. Then it surely must be able to cut a standing hair at skin level.

But at the end of the story, no one should feel intimidated about his self honed razor passing a HHT or not. If one gets nice shaves, who cares? I don't. And I'm surely not in the habit of HHT-ing my razors once I'm finished with honing them. I just use them till the way they shave tells me it's time to hone again.

Bart.