Thread: Many questions but where to start?

Hey guys,

I am new to the forum and new to straight razor shaving. I have been at it for a couple of months and am wondering what mistakes I am making. I have a Theirs Issard blade and I use an old Red Imp strop. It seems that when I strop, the blade does not last till the end of the shave. should I use a strop with a handle or one that is smaller? I know that my technique may not be the best but I have not received that baby smooth shave that people talk about. I also have trouble with the mustache area. I know this is a lot all at once but any advice would be helpful.

Welcome to SRP!

There is no reason a good edge shouldn't last through a shave. I suspect your razor is not very sharp.

welcome to the SRP.
Your problems seem to be not a shave ready razor, and/or bad stropping technique.
If you apply too much pressure while stropping you are eithe rolling the edge or rounding it too much.
your problem with shaving the mustache is not sharp enough razor.

Hi Slyuna,
Welcome to SRP! You've come to the right place...I think if you gave a little more information though we'd be able to help you a bit better.

Did the razor come shave ready or have you have the razor honed by a honemeister? Many razors say that they are "shave ready" or "honed" out of the box, but they are not. I would suspect that this is the culprit, but...

Is your strop flat (ie no huge nicks and zero bumps)? Is it clean? Does it have any abrasive on it? Do you hold it taught and do you use very light pressure on the blade when stropping?

Hopefully this can give us a better picture do diagnose what's going properly and what to do to fix them.

Mark

Originally Posted by Milton Man

Hi Slyuna,
Welcome to SRP! You've come to the right place...I think if you gave a little more information though we'd be able to help you a bit better.

Did the razor come shave ready or have you have the razor honed by a honemeister? Many razors say that they are "shave ready" or "honed" out of the box, but they are not. I would suspect that this is the culprit, but...

Is your strop flat (ie no huge nicks and zero bumps)? Is it clean? Does it have any abrasive on it? Do you hold it taught and do you use very light pressure on the blade when stropping?

Hopefully this can give us a better picture do diagnose what's going properly and what to do to fix them.

Mark

Thanks for the replies. Sorry for the lack of info. The razor did come shave ready. My strop does have some nicks but I have put paste on it. When I strop I try to hold it as tight as I can but I don't know how tight it is all around since it does not have a handle and is pretty wide.

So you do not have a clean leather strop with no paste now?

Originally Posted by slyuna

Thanks for the replies. Sorry for the lack of info. The razor did come shave ready. My strop does have some nicks but I have put paste on it. When I strop I try to hold it as tight as I can but I don't know how tight it is all around since it does not have a handle and is pretty wide.

No I only have one with the the paste with a yellow stripe

Well, I'm sorry to have to be the one to tell you but you're gonna need a clean leather strop with no paste. A strop is to micro align the edge of the blade, paste is to hone it (ie actually remove metal).

Just another quick question - how do you know the razor is shave ready? Did someone hone it for you, or are you using it straight out of the box?

Not to sound petulant, since I don't know how much experience or reading you've done, but I know that the Beginner's wiki has a ton of info that can really help with the learning curve.

Mark

I am going by the info I received at the art of sahving. They told me it was shave ready and carbon steel blades did not need to be honed as often as steel. I have done some research online. I was under the impression that the yellow paste was for conditioning the leather not so much honing like the other pastes. Am I completely wrong in this impression? What would be a good strop to start out on a wider or more narrow one? thanks for all the help.

Well, the people at the Art of Shaving are pretty clueless as far as what shave ready razor should be. They go by the paperwork from the manufacturer, which says their razors are good to shave, however that is more of a really rare exception.

You should have your razor honed by one of the people who know how to do that and I'm pretty sure you'll notice a very big difference.

Your strop is probably very good, at least my redimp is. I think the yellow past is conditioning too.

Edit: and stainless steel generally needs less frequent honing than carbon, but that's a very loose rule.