Shaving against the grain.

I have been shaving with a straight razor now for about three weeks. I feel that I am beginning to get the hang of it and starting to feel an increase in my confidence. I primarily used the safety razor and would make my final pass ATG. I tried to go ATG this morning with my straight and was very frustrated that I was unable to achieve an acceptable angle to do this. I tried going ATG on the sides of my face, is it possible to go ATG on the sides of the face? I could not figure out how to hold the razor at such an angle. Any advice?

You may want to do some XTG passes first before going ATG. This will help with the ATG movements in certain areas of the face.

Trying to cut too much too soon only leads to more and bigger weepers.

Pabster

I go ATG on my sides and neck, and the way i do it is first i straighten out the razor and grab it more by the tang and heel for the most stability, and hold it at a 5 degree angle, and make sure your well lathered up, jockeys has a good vid in the wiki and he has the similar angle im talking about

I do not attempt to go ATG without first going WTG then XTG. I understand it is all angles, just having a hard time achieving that. I have seen Jockey's vids before but need go go back over them. Thanks!

It depends on which way your hair grows. Under my jaw and on my neck, the hair mostly grows from the left to the right, so a standard ATG pass doesn't do the trick. To get the close shave I like, I need to do some scything motions.

I would recommend reading some of the threads on that, and see if that helps. Otherwise, just take your time, and eventually you'll have a moment of enlightenment while shaving.

Good luck

docjamo,

I had the same problem when I started ATG with straights.

I used to get red lines where the blade cut into my neck; I got some very strange looks at work :)

Then one day it all suddenly came together, and was well after that.

So please persevere with it.

Best of Luck :)

Best regards

Russ

Russ, those red lines on the neck definitely starts up conversations. My secretary asked yesterday if I was trying to cut my head off. Thanks for the encouragement.

I start my neck with an ATG pass. Strangely I have trouble shaving my neck; but the straight razor can start it ATG rather than WTG no problem, so why not?

Sensitive skin and hair like iron wire.

I can do ATG for a first pass on most of the neck, but there are limits before I uneccessarily generate Weepers. Nor does this movement get the area shaved BBS without additional N/S passes or scything passes.

It will take some time before each person discovers the proper movements to make their shave "efficient" to achieve BBS results Even after six months I was refining my technique to get an even better shave.

Pabster

Thanks for the advice. I have decided not to rush things. I will just go with what I can do right now and as I get better doing that, I can build on the basics.