Questioning some things...

I'm at my 5th shave and have shaved my whole face for the second time. Sometimes my razor seems like it is having trouble cutting my whiskers. This last time I shaved I stropped about 70 times lathered (after pre shave of course) shaved a couple passes with ease. After a couple more it felt like it was tugging, so I stropped mid shave, and finished up. The second strop didnt seem to help any. I am getting nearly BBS shaves, except for my chin and parts of neck, but I leave with some razor burn.. I am wondering if my stropping isnt that good, if its my angles, or that the razor was shave ready from the hone man but I messed it up stropping ?

I dont know but the shaves seem to be getting better, and with less irritation. Maybe I should just keep on truckin and see if it gets better?

If there is anyone in the Baton Rouge area willing to meet up and help out that would be awesome

BTW thanks everyone for the help in getting me started ! I am having fun doing this despite my insecurities!

There are a lot of factors that come in to play. My suggestion would be to focus on one at a time. Give us some specs of the equipment you are using and some particulars and it will help.

A couple of suggestions, check how your lather is holding up. Is it possibly drying out as you get to your 2nd/3rd passes? Also watch the angles. They will change as you move to different passes. I find that the blade must go progressively closer to my face as I go from wtg to xtg and almost flat to my face as I go atg.

Also, certain areas will just be more difficult until you find the right angle of attack and angle of blade. One of my trouble spots is on the right side of my chin. Bugger until I tried a weird, backhanded attack, then voila. Got it.

Others will come along and give you better advice. I'm still fairly new to this. Stick with it and it'll get better. You'll have one of those "ah-hah" moments and it'll all click.

Charlie

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Originally Posted by tcadien

I'm at my 5th shave and have shaved my whole face for the second time. Sometimes my razor seems like it is having trouble cutting my whiskers. This last time I shaved I stropped about 70 times lathered (after pre shave of course) shaved a couple passes with ease. After a couple more it felt like it was tugging, so I stropped mid shave, and finished up. The second strop didnt seem to help any. I am getting nearly BBS shaves, except for my chin and parts of neck, but I leave with some razor burn.. I am wondering if my stropping isnt that good, if its my angles, or that the razor was shave ready from the hone man but I messed it up stropping ?

I dont know but the shaves seem to be getting better, and with less irritation. Maybe I should just keep on truckin and see if it gets better?

If there is anyone in the Baton Rouge area willing to meet up and help out that would be awesome

BTW thanks everyone for the help in getting me started ! I am having fun doing this despite my insecurities!

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Have you tried using slow and short strokes? That's something that I constantly remind myself.

It takes time for you face to get use to shaving with a straight. The irritation will go away. Dont let the lather dry. Dont worry about getting a bbs shave just try to get a good shave. After over a year of shaving with a str8 i still dont get a bbs shave everytime, i too have trouble with my neck because the way my hair grows sideways and i just cant get a good angle to get at it. Keep at it and it will get better.
Colin

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Originally Posted by TrilliumLT

It takes time for you face to get use to shaving with a straight. The irritation will go away. Dont let the lather dry. Dont worry about getting a bbs shave just try to get a good shave. After over a year of shaving with a str8 i still dont get a bbs shave everytime, i too have trouble with my neck because the way my hair grows sideways and i just cant get a good angle to get at it. Keep at it and it will get better.
Colin

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Well state Colin. I have the same issue as you on the neck. I just do the best I can.
Also, I like your avatar, it's clever.

At 5 shaves you're a complete rookie and if you had said you were getting good shaves that would be extraordinary. Just keep at it and things will improve. By this time next month you should have substantial improvement. If they don't improve with more practice then you can look at the various parts that make up technique and the razor itself to find what is going on.

I agree with all of the above . If you haven't tried this already ; try shaving with the razor almost flat to your face , and see if shaves better . If it doesn't , then raise the angle very slightly , until it does . If it still doesn't shave right , you may have messed up the edge , and it may need a touch up honing . When I first started shaving with a straight , I was using too much pressure , my shaving angle was too steep , and I was not stretching my skin the right way . I had plenty of red faced shaves , until I got those 3 things figured out . Like everyone says ; learning to shave with a straight takes a little time , but it's well worth the effort .

I am three shaves in and in a simmer situation. My first two shaves went surprisingly well, this morning was a disaster. My neck is cut up irritated and sore. However I shall not be deterred. My old man always says "Nothing worth having comes easy"

I mean similar ....damn iPhone autocorrect

Don't try to get perfect shave in your early straight razor shaving.
No pressure while you shave and not many strokes in same place.
what happens is you want to get perfect shave and just make strokes and more pressure each time.
As a result you have razor burn etc.
Be patient.
gl

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Originally Posted by Bingham

I am three shaves in and in a simmer situation. My first two shaves went surprisingly well, this morning was a disaster. My neck is cut up irritated and sore. However I shall not be deterred. My old man always says "Nothing worth having comes easy"

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Originally Posted by thebigspendur

At 5 shaves you're a complete rookie and if you had said you were getting good shaves that would be extraordinary. Just keep at it and things will improve. By this time next month you should have substantial improvement. If they don't improve with more practice then you can look at the various parts that make up technique and the razor itself to find what is going on.

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I think the real question is how you define good :). As a rookie myself I consider my shaves all good so far. That being said, I define good as being on par or better to a normal razor with no nicks. So I have pretty basic requirements. That being said my goal for straight razor shaving at this point isn't to get a closer shave. Actually the main reason I decided to start using straight razors is because I generally only shave on a weekly basis. The problem with this is that my beard grows long enough that shaving with a multi-blade razor becomes quite a hassle and getting the hairs out from between the blades seems to be an impossible task. But with a straight razor it doesn't matter how long my beard is, it still comes right off in a single pass. Right now my goal is to shave with the fewest passes possible (and no nicks). So I don't do the 5 passes that many people seem to do in order to get that extra close shave. Instead I do a single pass which gives me basically the same quality shave as a normal razor, but it seems to be less hassle for me and my skin seems to appreciate it as it is far less irritated.

Tcadien: "I dont know but the shaves seem to be getting better, and with less irritation. Maybe I should just keep on truckin and see if it gets better?"

Your advice to yourself is good. Follow it.

It takes a number of shaves before it all comes together. Just take it slow and it will happen.

Happy Shaving!
:rock:

thanks guys !!

Hello Charlie thanks for the advice !! I am using castle forbes soap, a cheap wal-mart brush and bowl (that actually builds good lather), a hand made leather strop with the rough side pasted, and my razor is a refurbished Hibbard Spencer Bartlett & Co. "Our Very Best" 5/8 full hollow. Since I posted this I realized it was my angles and forgetting to stretch. just wanted to throw my list of gear out there for approval. The razor was honed properly and after stropping gives a good shave and also passses the hanging hair test on all parts of the edge.

Like so many challenges, this cries out for a haiku.


Minimal pressure
Wipe away lather with blade
Barbs are gone, No burn.

Glad you're getting things figured out. It can be frustrating at first but you have to stick with it, concentrate on the basics and suddenly you'll have that AH-HAH moment and it'll all come together.

Charlie