Thread: General maintenance on straight razor ?

Here is a question I have not seen answered looking through the forums.

As far as an oils go Mineral Oil is up there in the list so I went out and got some from my local Pharmacy store (Walgreen's brand).

How do you put the oil on the blade?

Do you pour it over the blade?

Do you rub it on with something, like a Q-Tip?

Do you dunk it in the Mineral Oil?

Can you add some Mineral Oil or Isopropyl Alcohol (91%) and dunk in that to get a coat of oil on the blade, plus disinfect?

You need _just a very thin coating_ of mineral oil !!!! Don't dunk the blade !

My full ritual, FWIW:

After shaving, dry the razor, and strop the razor 5-10 times. That removes water from the edge.

I put a drop of oil on the pivot area, and use a piece of toilet paper to soak most of it up. [It's easy to tighten the pivot; it's very hard to remove rust from the razor.]

Then, I put a drop on the blade, and use a piece of toilet paper to rub it around on the blade -- both sides. You'll see a thin coating of oil -- that's _plenty_ !

And then -- before you strop the razor again -- wipe the oil off the blade.

You should treat the razor the same way you would treat any other steel tool that was wet.

Charles

PS -- I'm using "Corrosion-Block", not plain mineral oil. But the principles are the same.

PPS -- Yes, somebody has worked out an "oil-in-alcohol" formula. Look through the Forums for "alcohol" and you'll find it.

I use about a 1:200 ratio of oil to alcohol. Basically, that translate into about teaspoon in a standard size rubbing alcohol container. Start with less, as you can always add more.

Be forewarned though, I've done this for years without trouble, but I mainly used pure isopropanol. However, I did once try over the counter rubbing alcohol and it worked the same way. Anyway, another member used over the counter rubbing alcohol recently and got staining on his blade. I don't have an explanation for that. Even if it has a higher water content, causing it to evaporate slower, I would not have thought it would cause this. Because it did happen to one person though, you might want to consider using an alcohol that has less water in it. I would guess that the 91% alcohol would be fine.