Thread: Hot water affecting edge - myth or fact

I always rinse my razor under hot water for about 30 seconds before I shave and rinse the blade during the shave with hot water and I haven't noticed any ill effects.

I not only rinse in hot water, but in te absence of linen, I'll use hot water to warm the blade in prep for stropping.

My old barber Jim, who didn't use linen told me it was necessary to strop quickly in order to heat the metal for responsiveness to the stropping. I opt for the linen. Maybe once I've been straight shaving almost as long as he was at that point (oh, 30 years or so) I might discard the linen for speed. Until then I'm protecting my strops.

X

I always heat the blade up with hot water prior to shaving and take excess lather off with hot water during the shave, I swear a nice hot blade gives me a closer shave......but that could just be my imagination.

steel gets hard because of the formation of martensite which is incredibly hard. Softening of martensite is tempering and is a function of time and temperature. It has to be well beyond the temperature of hot water to even begin softening it. You could run it under a hot water faucet for days and not soften it, course it might rust all to heck but thats a different item all together

If nothing else, a warm razor feels much better than a cold one.

-Rob