Thread: Horse hair franken brush

Quite a while back I got a Via Long blonde horse hair brush and took an immediate dislike to horse hair knots. I removed the knot and reset a TGN badger knot in the handle and all was well. I've now had this horse hair knot hanging around for about a year with nothing to do. Being bored I decided I would revisit horse hair knots to see if somehow I could figure out how to get along with them.

I needed a handle to put the horse hair knot into so removed the knot from an inexpensive Wilkinson's brush, reamed out the opening to fit the horse hair knot, put lead in the hollow handle and filled the hollow with 5 minute epoxy and set the knot. The horse hair knot was set a few mms higher than factory.

On trying it the other day I found that when face lathering you really do not want to make it splay and do circles to build lather. It is far too prickly for that. Oth if you just use light pressure without splaying it and do circles to build lather it feels very tolerable on the face. I am starting to think that my initial bad impression was, at least in part, due to me trying to use it like all my other brushes, boar, badger and synthetics, instead of modifying my technique to more suit that the knot.

Just goes to show that it is beneficial to revisit something that you initially gave up on to try and get a better read on it. I don't think horse hair knots will ever make it off bottom place for my knot preferences but at least I think I will be able to enjoy them more.

One last thing too about the donor handle. It does not have a classic shape for shave brush being a tapered triangular form having an oblong base. Yes, it is inexpensive molded plastic too. I will say it is very ergonomic and feels good in the hand to use. I guess it is elegant in it's simplicity.

Bob

So what your saying is sometimes brings them back to life ? I been meaning to try one someday. Was planning on collecting my own hair though. Shouldn't be too hard :<0)

Originally Posted by 10Pups

So what your saying is sometimes brings them back to life ? I been meaning to try one someday. Was planning on collecting my own hair though. Shouldn't be too hard :<0)

Ah no, it means a lot of time failures are of our own making not the gear. Yes, it shouldn't be too hard to collect mane and tail hair if you are good at grooming.

Bob

By coincidence, I too have been returning to Vie-Long horse-hair knots and their siblings, the Vie-Long horse-badger knots. It's true that they are a bit different from boar and straight badger knots.

One problem that caused me to move away from theme was the knot clumping together after a soak. More recently, I've turned to just dunking the horse-hair or horse-badger knot in water for around 30-45 seconds prior to loading. This has helped tremendously, and they have returned to being my favored hair type. Personally, I do not think that they are all that cut out for face-lathering, which involves a certain amount of splay and also resulting in prickle in this case. Rather, here I prefer to build a lather in a bowl from loaded brush, by adding droplets of water from the faucet until the desired consistency has been reached. Following this method, I've been very happy with these brushes over the past couple of months.

A few years back, Vie-Long brushes were a breed apart from the Anglo-American line of brushes. Lofts were longer relative to the knot diameter and handles were shorter. I really don't like the recent move to shorten lofts and lengthen handles in this case. For example, a 21mm x 55mm horse hair or horse badger knot was a nice all-around size with a handle tapering from being wider at the knot to a second wide lip at the base. With creams, one could back off on the handle to the lip at the base and the 55mm loft acted like a much larger brush. Conversely, with hard soaps, one could choke up on the loft with one's fingers, temporarily shortening it this way. Now the loft has been shortened to 50-51mm, more or less making it a brush only to be used with soaps, and the handles often look like the company has been purchased by Edwin Jagger or Muehle, as they are identical in styling and not conducive to multi-function as before. Where there used to be a number of handle styles that used to please me, both with the small and large knots, now there are only one or two from each knot type and the length is becoming closer and closer with only the diameter being different.

Originally Posted by 10Pups

So what your saying is sometimes brings them back to life ? I been meaning to try one someday. Was planning on collecting my own hair though. Shouldn't be too hard :<0)

That make me laugh!!!!

Originally Posted by Brontosaurus

By coincidence, I too have been returning to Vie-Long horse-hair knots and their siblings, the Vie-Long horse-badger knots. It's true that they are a bit different from boar and straight badger knots.

One problem that caused me to move away from theme was the knot clumping together after a soak. More recently, I've turned to just dunking the horse-hair or horse-badger knot in water for around 30-45 seconds prior to loading. This has helped tremendously, and they have returned to being my favored hair type. Personally, I do not think that they are all that cut out for face-lathering, which involves a certain amount of splay and also resulting in prickle in this case. Rather, here I prefer to build a lather in a bowl from loaded brush, by adding droplets of water from the faucet until the desired consistency has been reached. Following this method, I've been very happy with these brushes over the past couple of months.

A few years back, Vie-Long brushes were a breed apart from the Anglo-American line of brushes. Lofts were longer relative to the knot diameter and handles were shorter. I really don't like the recent move to shorten lofts and lengthen handles in this case. For example, a 21mm x 55mm horse hair or horse badger knot was a nice all-around size with a handle tapering from being wider at the knot to a second wide lip at the base. With creams, one could back off on the handle to the lip at the base and the 55mm loft acted like a much larger brush. Conversely, with hard soaps, one could choke up on the loft with one's fingers, temporarily shortening it this way. Now the loft has been shortened to 50-51mm, more or less making it a brush only to be used with soaps, and the handles often look like the company has been purchased by Edwin Jagger or Muehle, as they are identical in styling and not conducive to multi-function as before. Where there used to be a number of handle styles that used to please me, both with the small and large knots, now there are only one or two from each knot type and the length is becoming closer and closer with only the diameter being different.

I never soak any type of knot so the clumping problem never came up. I just swirl the tips of any brush in water, give it a little shake and go to loading the puck prior to face lathering. Add water while building a lather by dipping the brush tips in water. I can see where a horse hair brush might be better suited to bowl lathering and just using painting strokes on your face.

I can't see why anyone would want a short lofted horse hair brush with a short handle either. I face lather exclusively and still find longer handles better than stubby ones for that. It would be even more so when bowl lathering. It is easy enough to buy a horse hair knot and fit it to a handle long enough to suit you and at a higher loft.

Bob

Actually, it's the longer handle I'm railing against. Longer lofts with shorter handles as before is what I'm after; that way the hand has more control over the loft itself. The Vie-Longs are sold as finished pieces with nice knots across the board, except perhaps in the boar realm. I just wish that they would knock off their recent trend to ape what other brush manufacturers are coming up with and return to their roots so to speak.

Originally Posted by Brontosaurus

Actually, it's the longer handle I'm railing against. Longer lofts with shorter handles as before is what I'm after; that way the hand has more control over the loft itself. The Vie-Longs are sold as finished pieces with nice knots across the board, except perhaps in the boar realm. I just wish that they would knock off their recent trend to ape what other brush manufacturers are coming up with and return to their roots so to speak.

Sorry, I misread that. I sometimes choke up on the knot with my fingers if I want to load a little extra soap from a shave stick after applying the stick to my face. Works for me even with longer handles.

Bob