Thread: Shave the neck

We all seem to want that baby butt smooth feel to the skin and we all think that this is the hallmark of shaving nirvana but consider this. I submit that it is not. You can shave with an electric razor and you will achieve that effect but 5 hours later the stubble returns. You can shave with one of those five blade gizmo's and still have a tiny bit of stubble but that stubble will not appreciably grow for many hours past what the electric gives. If your neck has some roughbess to it after shaving with a straight 12 hours later that roughness isn't really any worse than after you shaved. (of course this is all from my own experience). So can someone explain to me why the electric shave appears to be the closest but isn't?

An electric doesn't cut the hair, it tears it. It splits and frays the end of the hair so instead of a thick hair, you've got little shredded strands which are relatively soft so you don't really feel them. I think this is related to the phenomenon where stubble is much more noticeable 20 minutes after shaving than right away when you still have a razor and lather at hand -- once the stubble dries out it's stiffer so you notice it more. This is only a hypothesis, though.

Being a reformed electric user (unfortunately over 25 years experience) let me suggest another reason an electric shave feels closer initially but you soon feel stubble. The damn things damage your face and cause swelling! When the swelling subsides, the stubble reappears.

Opinion only, but I'm convinced that throwing my electric against a brick wall last November was the only temper tantrum I've ever had that had a happy ending.

Ed

That's true too. I used electrics for several years and had real problems with blistering (not right away, but a few hours after shaving).

Originally Posted by ForestryProf

Being a reformed electric user (unfortunately over 25 years experience) let me suggest another reason an electric shave feels closer initially but you soon feel stubble. The damn things damage your face and cause swelling! When the swelling subsides, the stubble reappears.

Opinion only, but I'm convinced that throwing my electric against a brick wall last November was the only temper tantrum I've ever had that had a happy ending.

Ed

You may have a very valid theory there. I know any time I've ever gotten a clean shave with an electric, the abrasion made my skin feel very hot. It seems to be similar to the hot prep phenomenon I mentione above.

Originally Posted by mparker762

An electric doesn't cut the hair, it tears it. It splits and frays the end of the hair so instead of a thick hair, you've got little shredded strands which are relatively soft so you don't really feel them. I think this is related to the phenomenon where stubble is much more noticeable 20 minutes after shaving than right away when you still have a razor and lather at hand -- once the stubble dries out it's stiffer so you notice it more. This is only a hypothesis, though.

I notice that phenomenon with all wet shaving.

By experimenting I found that it seems to be caused by hot preparation. You heat up the skin and it swells. That limits how close you can shave. Later, when you cool your face down the skin shrinks back, and then you feel short stubble.

I've been able to deal with this by doing a final touch up after cooling down my skin. The stubble you remove that way doesn't show up again.

Originally Posted by thebigspendur

We all seem to want that baby butt smooth feel to the skin and we all think that this is the hallmark of shaving nirvana but consider this. I submit that it is not. You can shave with an electric razor and you will achieve that effect but 5 hours later the stubble returns. You can shave with one of those five blade gizmo's and still have a tiny bit of stubble but that stubble will not appreciably grow for many hours past what the electric gives. If your neck has some roughbess to it after shaving with a straight 12 hours later that roughness isn't really any worse than after you shaved. (of course this is all from my own experience). So can someone explain to me why the electric shave appears to be the closest but isn't?

After you learn good shaving technique with any razor, you will be able to get BBS. The only issue is how hard you're willing to work and/or how much discomfort you are willing to tolerate.

BBS is not a measure of closeness but a measure of cleanness. In other words, although we all use the term "close shave", BBS is really only a clean shave (smooth to the touch?). Closeness is measured by how long it takes for the smoothness to begin disappearing. So, you can get BBS with an electric and abrade your skin in the process. Or you can get it with a sharp DE or str8 and shave off a thin layer of skin. Although you experience burn in both cases, it's different. You worked diligently to remove every last hair, abrading your face with the electric in the process or shaving off some skin, but the sharp razors shaved much closer, and the shave will stay clean longer (a closer shave).

You can get BBS (almost- don't be obsessive) and you can get it every day without irritation. It's a matter of using a sharp blade (don't pluck the hairs out with the electric and tear the skin), and being gentle. That means reduction (progressive removal of whiskers) and not trying to cut to clean skin until you have a fine stubble. At that point you have much finer control of the razor so you can avoid shaving skin along with the whiskers.

One other thing that causes irritation is a steep angle of the blade to the face. You can understand that if you use the blade at a really steep angle (short of cutting yourself) it's more of a scraper than a cutter. Well that changes continuously, so there's a little bit of scrapng there all the time. The amount depends on steepness of the blade. The most gentle cut will be made by the blade being as flat as possible but still cutting. You need to experiment with each razor to see what will work for you, usually something around two spine widths off the skin. If you can do it with less, it's an advantage.