Thread: First of many posts but first of little questions

Originally Posted by Slartibartfast

watch for water/lather inside the scales too....................

+1.... This really is a common problem for new guys. When shaving it is best only to rinse the blade and not the scales. A lot of folks actually run water over both. What then happens is that you wipe the blade and scales thinking you got all the water dry and there is water inside the scales, so when you close the razor, you end up with the stain spots and eventually, rust.

As indicated, when you catch it early, you can generally remove the spots with Maas or something like it using a dremel or a quick pass on the buffing wheels.

Welcome to SRP!

Lynn

Welcome to SRP mate.

Even if you'd left the blade damp, I'm surprised to see so much spotting after one day.

I've never heard of Artamis razors before, so I did a search and came up with this.

Buy Artamis Shaving Products from My Smoking Shop Tobacconist

I don't know where you got your razor from but to me £17.99 for a new straight razor seems too good to be true (and probably is), at that price point I'd expect this to have been made in Pakistan/India from questionable quality recycled steel.

My advice would be to buy another entry level blade, but one of good quality that's actually going to serve you well.

For example...

A shave ready 'Gold Dollar' from Ruprazor

Or a shave ready 'Wapienica' from Fendrihan

Either of these are superb shavers, and are about the cheapest new "quality" razors I'm aware of. Either of these would serve you really well.

I'm going to make an educated guess from bitter experience, that if you persevere with the Artamis you could well be in for a rather uphill struggle.

Maas is sold in the UK at Lakeland stores amongst others, but if you can't find it then Autosol from Halfords works too.

I think this is going to be one of those times where you buy cheap and buy twice as I'm fairly sure your razor will be poor quality and not worth trying to shave with. Read the wiki here, learn as much as you can by watching Youtube videos and browsing these forums, then buy a shave ready vintage razor from the classifieds here. You'll be thankful you did in the long run.

WelshC,

Looks like it's time for some MAAS metal polish

You can get it at Lakeland in the UK.

There are a number of oils etc you can apply after the blade has dried to prevent corrosion.

I am very partial to TufCloth/TufGlide as this leaves a dry film.

You can get this from SentySolutionsUK or from Heinnie Haynes.

Best regards

Russ

Thanks for all your kind words of welcome.

I've thought about my options and thought it might be best to cut my losses with the poor quality Artamis Razor and get a better entry level razor as suggested by some of you. Although the ones suggested are from the USA and the total cost is going to be out of my price range for a student. Can anyone suggest some respectable British websites/stores to get a razor from?

Steven at "The Invisible Edge" has been a pleasure to do business with.

Originally Posted by ursus

Steven at "The Invisible Edge" has been a pleasure to do business with.

+1 to this.

I'd give some serious thought to getting a razor from the classifieds here though.

I found that I also had rust spots on my blade but here's the solution: When you finish shaving run the hottest water you can on the blade for a good 20-30 seconds, then dry it off. The blade will be hot to the touch and any rust causing moisture still on the blade will evaporate.

Rich

"There is no native criminal class except Congress,"- Mark Twain

Hi,

+1 on TheInvisibleEdge; also Mr Neil Miller at www.strop-shop.co.uk

Best regards

Russ

Don't throw away that razor you bought though, you can dull it and use it to practice with. By practice I mean practice your stropping and even practice shaving strokes with it while you're not actually shaving.