Thread: Base line sharpness

Originally Posted by KCC088

Angle, I think is about the same in that I tend to start flattish on the spine and raise very slightly until I get the best cut, which is usually 1 or 2 spine widths. Of course for subsequent passes, I flatten even more.

The difference b/w the two shavers is really pronounced when doing the neck XTG from adams apple to chin. The Shavette glides up, cuts well and leaves a smooth skin finish and I feel very confident performing the pass, but with the St8, it feels like it's scraping the hairs off, is uncomfortable, leaves some redness immediately after and is not that smooth after the pass.

If you use a really flat approach sometimes even with spine contact & there is discomfort I think something is possibly wrong with the edge.

Originally Posted by onimaru55

Stropping is often the culprit with those symptoms. If I honed it please send it back & will touch up F.O.C.

Thanks for your kind offer, onimaru55, no, it wasn't you that honed it, and as mentioned before, it was great after the honing for a little while (so was honed very well), which sort of points to my own stropping :-(

cheers,
K

Originally Posted by KCC088

I'm checking my stropping technique to see if that's the culprit. Before each shave, I do approx 20 passes on the cotton side, and 40-50 on the leather side of a Dovo 2 inch hanging strop, holding the strop firm and flat but not too tight, doing the X pattern and only the weight of the blade up and back.

Cheers, K

You may want to up your lap counts some. The dovo/jemico strops tend to be on the shorter side for strops nowadays. So if your following what you are seeing on the forum you probably are not getting the blade on the strop as often as others here.

I have a jemico leather strop and I do 80 laps before a shave and 60-80 after a shave so really I am getting about 140-160 laps before a shave.

I love my jemico and wouldn't trade it for anything else just takes some more laps

The jemico and dovo strops are made by the same company and are the same strops just branded differently.

No probs. Stropping is a bit of a challenge at first.
My offer holds even tho i didn't hone it but maybe whoever did it will help you out too. Doesn't sound like a big job.

Alot of times when I noticed something I didn't like during the shave it usually happened when I didn't stretch the skin enough or if I was using too much pressure.

Originally Posted by JSmith1983

Alot of times when I noticed something I didn't like during the shave it usually happened when I didn't stretch the skin enough or if I was using too much pressure.

Hi JSmith1983 - that's a thought, as the Shavette is ultra light and I may (unconsciously) be using very little pressure compared to the heavier St8. I'll check during tomorrow's shave. Many thanks!

After responding to this post I decided to shave and wouldn't you know I was leaving the skin loose and pressing pretty hard. You would think that I would know better especially after posting about doing exactly that.

Why do we use SR if the disposable is going to be sharper? Maybe I just have not had a properly honed blade yet

Originally Posted by JulioFundora

Why do we use SR if the disposable is going to be sharper? Maybe I just have not had a properly honed blade yet

1/ A disposable is not necessarily sharper.
2/ You don't have to throw away a SR after a few uses.

Pretty likely our not really stropping. Don't baby it. If you fail to use any pressure at all you're at the whim of the perfection of your technique alone.

A properly stropped edge should provide consistently good or bad shaves, based on honing or technique. Honing, prep, and technique would produce consistent issues, too, either good or bad, I think.