Thread: my first razor

So, honing... does what exactly? I'm a bit confused about the difference between honing and stropping.

Honing is sharpening the blade on a stone. Stropping is refining the edge on leather by "stropping". Honing is done first and stropping follows that to make the edge even sharper.

You'll find much information on both in the Wiki, probably all the information you'll need.

Trust me. Get the razor professionally sharpened by one of the members or advertisers here. When you get it back you'll know exactly what a sharp, shave ready razor feels like. Remember that feeling and use it as a guide when do your own sharpening.

Most razors advertised as shave ready are not. The sellers are either too lazy to hone the razor before they send it out or they don't know how.

I got 2 more razors in the mail today. 1 nice swedish one and 1 trashy german one to practice sharpening. The german blade was chipped up real bad so I broke out my entire stone collection and went to work. I took all the chips out on the side of my beston 500 and then went through each stone up to kitayama(8K). Then I noticed that I had another chip in the blade. I'm not exactly sure how it got there. I decided to call it quits for now and wait till I get my new finisher.

It seems like the steel in this blade is very brittle. Is that typical for straight razors? I have some inexpensive japanese knives that will chip if you look at them wrong, this razor reminds me of that.