Time to Rehone?

[pcdad]

so..its been a fun 4 months with my 7/8 Sheffield
(Thnx for the purchase sham!)

I have a very coarse beard and this afternoon I went for a shave..my thoughts..it tugg'd in certain areas..for some reason under my chin going up...usually that never "tugs"..watcha guys think?..just certain areas and going up "tugg'd"..but going right to left and left to right straight movements didn't have much effect..I'm feeling like it's time to hone her up again..any thoughts or suggestions?..My wife had a good point..I don't have soft whiskers so after months of use 2-3x a week before I got my other 2 blades as of last week..I would go through more "shave wear"..lol
...too bad there isn't some sorta "get ready to hone" visual..lol..but I guess thats called scraping if you know everything else is correct...

(yes I have 2 more newly honed blades in case)


pcdad

[Scipio]

After that time period from shave ready, I would say its ready for a touch up. If you've got other shave ready blades thats great so you can send it out for honing.

Have you used pastes at all? And do you have a finisher or a barber hone? FWIW, you could try and touch it up yourself, its definitely something I'd recommend learning.

[pcdad]

I don't wanna start teaching myself to hone on my own blades..I would rather later in life try with cheap blade to practice on...I have nothing cept my razors n double sided paddle strop n soaps..so I have nothing like pastes/hones..etc..I'm only into it 4 months

pcdad

[Scipio]

I don't wanna start teaching myself to hone on my own blades..I would rather later in life try with cheap blade to practice on...I have nothing cept my razors n double sided paddle strop n soaps..so I have nothing like pastes/hones..etc..I'm only into it 4 months

pcdad

To be honest, touching up is the best way to learn honing IMO. Remember that touching up and honing are really two completely different things. All you are doing is polishing an already sharp edge. You could buy a barber hone for under 50 dollars and use 4-6 strokes which I doubt you'd go wrong. Or a Naniwa 12K and do 10-20 strokes, if you want to purchase from SRD.

I personally dislike pastes and while I don't discourage them, you will need to use a hone at some point as pastes are only a quick fix at best - they will round an edge eventually.

[grsparks]

Re: Time to Rehone

+1 to the barber hone. Today my Mentor Del1r1um demonstrated and confirmed that I was using my Swaty correctly. It's quick, easy, and effective. Best of all----if I can do it, so can you!

Gerald

[pcdad]

I took a look on SRD's hones..they go from a 200 grit to 1000?...which is a better grit for a 7/8 Sheffield blade?..or does it not matter?..or what about a Japanese or Chinese hone?


pcdad

[BingoBango]

To be honest, touching up is the best way to learn honing IMO. Remember that touching up and honing are really two completely different things. All you are doing is polishing an already sharp edge. You could buy a barber hone for under 50 dollars and use 4-6 strokes which I doubt you'd go wrong. Or a Naniwa 12K and do 10-20 strokes, if you want to purchase from SRD.

+1. Just keep it super light and you'll do fine.

You might find a barber hone in the classifieds... A Nani 12K would also work for touch ups, and I know SRP sells those.

As for judging when to do a touch up - it's pretty obvious you're in need of one now, but usually I judge the shave-readiness of a razor with a WTG stroke on my sideburn. I can tell by the resistance if I need to hone or not. It removes all of the other variables and let's me judge just the edge itself.

[Ru4scuba]

To be honest, touching up is the best way to learn honing IMO. Remember that touching up and honing are really two completely different things. All you are doing is polishing an already sharp edge. You could buy a barber hone for under 50 dollars and use 4-6 strokes which I doubt you'd go wrong. Or a Naniwa 12K and do 10-20 strokes, if you want to purchase from SRD.

I personally dislike pastes and while I don't discourage them, you will need to use a hone at some point as pastes are only a quick fix at best - they will round an edge eventually.

Good stuff here...thanks!

[dave5225]

My rule of thumb is , when the razor isn't shaving as well as it should , it's time to give it around 5 strokes on my finish hone . Don't try to milk more shaves out of the razor , hone it .