Thread: Buying a Hone and a Second Razor

You sound alot like me. I've been straight shaving for about 2 months now and I've been lurking here for almost as long. I went with a starter kit from vintageblades.com and that was one of the brighter decisions I've made in life. It included a great brush, a good strop, and I got a great price on a norton 4k/8k stone with it.

One word of caution about getting into honing. It isn't cheaper. It doesn't save you time or money. I think it does provide immeasurable satisfaction in exercising a skill yourself, just like straight shaving. I would PM some of the honemeisters and LISTEN to their advice, vet your thoughts and purchases with them before pulling the trigger, and try your best to listen.... listening is very hard.

One more small piece of advice, the norton 4k/8k may look flat, but it's not flat. The one I bought had a small nipple rise in the center of the 8k side. I thought it would wear off. I was wrong. It turned out that the nipple was actually a winding S-curve in that entire side of the stone:

That little S-curve took 30 minutes to flatten out using a piece of marble as a base and 320 grit wet sanding paper. I decided to check the 4k side, since I was already laboring on the 8k side and it showed some very minor bowing in the center, which only took a few passes to flatten out.

Lucky for me, I didn't learn this lesson on my brand new Dovo. I learned this lesson on a freebie Golden Dollar <-- Comparable to your Pakistani razors. I spent a good few days working the edge of the GD. It would cut hairs off of the 4k, but I had to play with my strokes to work around the poorly shaped shoulder in the GD. I suspect that the Pakistani razors have similar issues. I think there is much to be learned from this. There are threads on many shaving forums that will tell you what to look for in terms of pitfalls with these razors. With that said, they can still be sharpened and they can still be shaved with and skills can still be developed with them. Mind you, you are still trying to polish a turd, but I believe there is merit in trying to polish a turd too... even if all you learn is that you don't like playing with poo.

Good luck on your journey. I'm going to post a more thorough article in the Honing forum.

Originally Posted by Nphocus

One word of caution about getting into honing. It isn't cheaper. It doesn't save you time or money. I think it does provide immeasurable satisfaction in exercising a skill yourself, just like straight shaving. I would PM some of the honemeisters and LISTEN to their advice, vet your thoughts and purchases with them before pulling the trigger, and try your best to listen.... listening is very hard.

Nphocus, luckily I'm not really looking to save time or money. You are right, it does provide quite a bit of satisfaction.

I did decide to go completely different and get a Boker Edelweiss.

I am looking over the honing information. I have a lot of studying to do!

I recommend that a person have at least two razors. The reason for that is that a person can quickly tell when one is dulling. If I shave with one razor and get a nice shave and the next day with the other and receive a poor shave I know what is wrong.
Hones are something to get into after a time spent shaving. Read on the honing threads to get an idea of what works and how long it takes to get good at honing. If you live near a hone person, PM them to ask if they would hone for you and/or teach you to hone.
Some folks buy a lot of hones and then don't ever use them due to time constraints or loss of interest. Read a lot and don't get caught by the latest buzz as to the Über hone of the week.
Respectfully
~Richard