I have a week of straight shaves under my belt now and I guess it's going OK but there are a couple things that have got me stumped.

  • I'm getting the razor hung up sometimes.
    At the beginning of a stroke or sometimes part way through the razor will stop and I have to apply more pressure or lift the razor away and try again. I think it's more often happening XTG or ATG but I've done it at least a couple times WTG also. I've cut myself once so far on one of these hangups.
  • I sometimes skip the razor
    I'll be sliding the razor across my face and the blade will skip over a part of my face and land a fraction of an inch away from where it was.
  • My beard grows sideways on my neck and under the chin.
    So far I have not found a way to go exactly ATG here. Am I right that the length of the blade and the configuration with handle at one end is going to prevent me from going exactly ATG and I will have to go somewhere between XTG and ATG? And is it possible to get as close a shave with a straight going X/ATG as I can with a DE exactly ATG?

Am I not being firm enough? Bad Angle? Skin too slack? Not enough lubrication? Or something I haven't thought of?

I have noticed that my WTG and XTG passes - when done correctly - give better results than the WTG or XTG passes with a DE. I have also noticed that the ability to finely control the angle means I can do multiple passes with no irritation - a far better outcome for me than doing that with a DE. On the other hand going ATG without properly reducing the beard is frightening with a straight. So far I have not gotten a uniformly BBS shave using a straight. I get very close on some parts but chin and some parts of the neck are proving very difficult. And if I try too hard, that's when I start to collect nicks. So I'm trying to limit myself to three passes plus one touchup max and just settle for whatever I get for now.