Hope it all works out.
Stubborn and obsessive seems to be a good thing with straights.
Scott did one of my razors for me and it shaved fine (not that I have anything like the US honemeisters to compare with)
My first razor was sharpened by the House of Knives (the Petone store sent it to their guy in Akld) probably not as good as Scott but another option and had no problem learning to shave with that edge.
Let me know how you get on.