Thread: Hello!

Originally Posted by Havachat45

Don't be too dissappointed - I bought TWO 'titanium' razors before I found this place - and their strop was s^it as well.
You're on the right track now though.
Hang on and enjoy the ride

Ha, I don't feel so bad. I figure it's part of the learning curve. Thirty or so bucks to learn a valuable lesson.
The B&B strop and razor showed up today, along with the 4/8k stones.

The strop is a POS.

The razor... cheap and crummy. The blade isn't even straight. It's got a frown 2/3 of the way to the toe. Lesson learned. I'll practice my honing on it. As for the strop, I'm going to be looking for a decent one, starting... now.


I stropped my Engels singing blade on the crappy strop, being very careful not to nick the leather and keep the spine in contact. I suppose this is testimony to the quality of this blade, but I was able to shave my sideburn areas, and around my van dyke rather quickly and with only one little nick by the curve of my chin. Still... it's a fine shave!
I'm excited that it only gets better!

I think about disposable razor cartridges and say, "Man! What were we thinking by getting away from quality steel and a fine edge?!?"


I'm impressed, and it takes a lot to impress me.

I've found a lot of good reviews here for Star Shaving's strops, and ordered a 3" bridle strop. The price was nice, and I've read they're good quality.

I'm sure it's a fine strop to start with, and have read a few posts here from guys who started with them and still use them, even though they've bought other strops!

That's a good sign.
On Wednesday, I'm going to prepare my hones and practice on the cheapy B&B blade. Heck, I will practice stropping with it, too... since it has that dip in the edge and will probably never touch my face.

Hi Scott,

Well, you're lucky you've got a matched blade and strop you can practice with. The education from them will be worth their price.

That Engels looks like a very nice blade. I've bought two antique store blades that were very close to shave-ready; sometimes you just get lucky. It's a good sign when the razor has its original box; that says that someone took good care of their stuff, or that it didn't see much action before you got it.

Sounds like you're making good use of the site. We're here for you.

Where are you located?

Best wishes to you

If you want to, send the razor to me and I'll hone it up for you on me. That will buy you some time to practice honing and learning to shave.

Have fun

Lynn's a pretty classy guy!

Thanks for the info and offers!
I'm located in MA.

I went to see Howard at The Perfect Edge this morning after my shift. He showed me how to lap my 4/8k, and then gave this singing blade an edge, and a great hone on Shapton stones. He took the time to show me how to use a hand held magnifier and watch our progress as we honed, and let me tell you... the edge was SHARP and polished when he was finished. It took no effort at all to remove hair on a shave test!

This Engels is a mighty fine little blade. I had a fantastic time with Howard -he's a really interesting fellow. I learned so much. We could have hung around shooting the breeze all damned day! Our discussion turned toward razor manufacturers in Worcester, MA, (since I work there and Howard lives in the next town over,) and I told him I had located the original building that J.R. Torrey made his razors in, and shared the address with him. He happened to have a J.R Torrey, (of course,) so I bought it. It's "The Artist" -a smiling blade that is about a 4/8. Very handy blade, it looks like. It was in fine shape, too, with the box. I took it home and honed it, stropped it and it easily removed hair in a shave test. I'm excited to try it out on my face!

I lathered up after a shower when I got home... and took my time to make a first pass with the Engels. I had practiced the sideburns for the past week, and moved on to the rest this time. As you can imagine... I got a few nicks. I'm not discouraged though. It'll get better. I was able to make WTG and ATG passes. Pretty smooth except for the nicks hahaha. I finished with my own recipe of aftershave lotion and was done. I posted about that in the post-shave section if anyone's interested.
http://straightrazorpalace.com/post-...e-cologne.html


The strop I ordered from Star Shaving was here, and it's a dandy. Highly recommended.
It's 3" wide, very fine quality bridle leather with an additional felt strop. It makes stropping with the proper technique easy! No cross passes are necessary -it's wide enough to handle the whole blade. Me likey.

Oh, man, you are so lucky to be able to walk into a place and meet with a professional like that! I bet only about 1% of us can do that. And working in the original Torrey building--that's cool!

I was just thinking yesterday about how useful a 4/8 with a smile would be. You can work into some tight crannies with that!

I'd recommend that you still practice an X-pattern on your strop, even though you don't need to. That way, if you do get a little ding in it in the future, your stropping pattern won't hit the same part of the blade over the same ding on every pass.

From what I've heard and experienced, hollower blades are a little less forgiving of technical lapses. My near-singer is a hungry little thing, much hungrier than my full wedge. You'll learn impeccable technique with that Engels, whether you want to or not! I look forward to hearing how the 4/8 smiler shaves, too.

Thanks for a very happy post, and best wishes to you.