Razor 12, me 0

I took my old antique store razor to my barber to have honed and stopped and he gave it back to me shave ready. I found that I can barely shave a hair on my face. I took it back to him when I got my last haircut just to make sure that it was indeed shave ready. He took me into the back room and gave me a honing and stropping lesson and again said that the razor was indeed shave ready.

Not sure what I am doing wrong but I can do nothing more than shorten the stubble on my cheeks. Everyday I try to use the straight razor to shave my cheeks and then have to complete the shave with my DE.

I've tried playing with razor angles (shooting for 30 degrees) to no avail. Any thoughts on what I might try or is this a normal learning curve? I've been trying this for a couple of weeks now.

Thanks.

Describe the sensation you are getting. Does it tug or pull (painfully)? Not all barbers know their business for when it comes to straights (sadly).

You can send the razor to me if you'd like. I can check it out, hone it, and send it back.

Only speaking for myself, I get the same results until I go ATG.

spin,

Were it I, I'd jump at AFD's offer. He's an old hand at this and if the razor shaves well for him, once honed and tested, you have just eliminated a bunch of variables.

:beer2:

Go back to the barber and ask him to shave himself with your razor. If he refuses, I wouldnt trust his honing, if he shaves with it, then the problem most likely lies with you and your technique. Are you stropping after he hones it and before you shave with it? You could be messing up the edge stropping.
When I started, even with a SRD honed razor, I had tugging and pulling. Then my angles got better, my pressure got better, and I started feeling more confident and that translated to more confident strokes. Tenative strokes will cause bad shaves too.

Good luck.

AFDavis will give you a good edge, or be able to tell you what the matter might be with the razor. One way or another you'll be able to focus on your technique rather than worrying about sharpness.

If you use the width of the spine as a guide, try to keep the spine about 1.5 spine widths from your face. That's much easier than trying to eyeball 30 degrees.

If you get a lot of tugging/pulling it's probably poorly honed. IME, a good razor shouldn't tug unless your technique is WAY off. Sure, it won't be as nice, but it'll shave. Since you're new to this it's always a good idea to check out your prep, stropping, etc., but I'm gonna stick with the others and say get that sucker honed by someone you can trust knows what they're doing. If AFDavis will do it for free, jump on it.

@AFDavis11:
How much do you charge for this service? It would sure be nice to rule out the razor, at least then I would know where I stand.

I hate to think that my barber is not knowledgeable about these things though. He has been my barber for 20 years now, is about 80, and as such is certainly an old style barber. But a second opinion sure can't hurt.

As far as what it feels like, it is just a real tugging, basically like I'm shaving with a dull disposable. When I go over it with my DE it shaves as clean as can be so I doubt that it is in prep.

Thanks for all of the help!

take alan up on his offer.

Yes, I would very much like to take him up on his kind offer. I requested details from him and will go from there.

Thanks again for everything.

If you have been using a DE razor, then you also need to adjust your expectations. What I mean is that a straight razor has a different feel on your face from a DE razor. Start a pass with the spine of the razor virtually flat on your face and make a pass. This probably won't cut many whisker but you will be able to tell what the shallow angle feels like. Next pass move over slightly on your check and elevate the spine more, make another pass. Using this gradual increase in angle there should come a point where the razor cuts the whiskers. If the razor is cutting the whisker but you have a strong pulling sensation as the razor goes, then lower the angle just a bit. If that slightly lower angle equals no tugging and no cutting then the razor is not honed right.

Also you might make a second XTG pass and see how the stubble reduction goes. You should certainly notice a significant reduction between the two passes combined.

Just a thought... Have you tried the thumbpad test on the edge???... it could be useful along with several other tests that can be found on the wiki. Of course with the addition of the other valuable info everybody gave you already.

Good luck!!!

I am going to take AFD up on his gracious offer and send the razor to him to inspect and hone if necessary. I did discover something though. I have another razor that I've been playing with, honing and stropping, but not expecting much of it. I went to shave with it this evening and it actually did a not half bad job, not as good as the DE, but I can certainly chalk that up to my lack of experience. Overall, that razor did pretty good compared to the one that my barber honed for me. This leads me to believe that he did not do such a great job. To bad, he's been my barber for 20 years now, oh well.

Before I jump to conclusions though, I'll let AFD take a look at them and tell me what's up.

The razor has been mailed to Alan. Looking forward to his opinion. Thanks Alan!

Your welcome. The razor is back in your direction. Looking forward to your thoughts.

Just because he's been a barber for 20 years, unfortunately doesn't make him a good honer :(

Glad someone made the offer, or I would have offered (just saw this thread.)

I'm in Barber school right now, and while they DO teach honing as well as stropping, they probably wouldn't know a set bevel if they saw one. I haven't had the honing part of the class yet, but once I do, I'll be able to comment better on what they're teaching and how good it may or may not be.

First off, I want to thank Alan for honing the razor for me. I have not yet received it so I cannot, at this point, comment on it.

I do have a few questions though. First, you mentioned that there was spine damage to the razor. What is that and what would have caused it?

What is it about the razor that you were not able to fix that makes it only a satisfactory shaver?

I am pretty sure that I will be looking at the classifieds here and purchasing a shave ready razor for $50 or so. I'm going to wait for my razor to come back before I make that purchase though. I would prefer to put that off till I know more of what I'm looking for, such as width, spike point or rounded, etc.

Thanks guys for all of the advice!

Todd,

It was spine wear from aggressive honing for the most part. Once the spine gets torn off there are big problems to deal with.

A re-grinding will probably fix the problem or four or so more hours of honing. But it is a very challenging problem to deal with.

That being said, the razor is now quite a bit sharper, so use a little caution when shaving.

I actually purchased my first store ought razor from SRD, mostly, (at the time), so I could have a bench-mark for what a properly honed razor was like. With the credentials stated and vertified by other members, I would send the razor to the gentleman who offered...then there will be no question. From there, you will have a source for re-hones, or, if you decide to embark on honing your own razors, you'll know what to shoot for!

I got the razor back and there is no doubt that it shaves worlds better than before. Thanks so much Alan, you did a great job and I appreciate it.

The shave was so far better than anything I have yet done with a straight but still not a real shave. Not counting the fact that I am not skilled enough to get the curves right, even the flat parts of my cheeks are still a bit stubbly when I'm through. That I'm sure is technique. I'll keep working at it this week and see how it goes.

As long as you feel that this razor (while not in excellent condition) is at least suitable for a decent shave I will continue to work with it until I save enough for a restored shave ready razor.

Thanks again Alan for all that you have done, I really appreciate it!

Todd,

No problem. Thats why we're here.

Alan