Thread: Cleaning the brush

My take on the subject is that if the brush starts feeling a bit hard or stiff to bend or use on the face, I will then set it fully into a solution of half cider vinegar and water for a couple three hours and slosh it around every time that I think of it during that time.
rinse well and dry for the next use. the first lather may be a bit puny but it will get better over a couple days.

I would only need to do this maybe a couple times a year at most. Once in six months on my boar so far.

This also makes a good solution for the cleaning of old brushes, especially in an ultrasonic cleaner.
respectfully
~Richard
PS. I have heard of folks using hair revitalizer shampoo when their brush gets a bit dried out.

I rinse the brush after each shave making sure to rinse out any extra lather. However I only "clean" my brushes once a year or so using a mixture of either borax or vinegar and water. After cleaning the brush I give it a good shampoo and let it dry thoroughly before using it again.

After each use, I gently message the bristles and rinse my brush under running cold water until I see no more soap residue. I then shake the water out of the brush and stand it up or hang it from its stand. My brushes have no residual odor and can be fluffed up using circular motions on the palm of my hand to look as good as when new after they are dry.

Leaving soap residue in the brush probably also leaves some skin residues in the brush. I am currently using a VDH boar and a Merkur Vision Set badger brush. I use MWF, Tabac, and Bigalow (Proraso) soap/cream. I do not know what these brushes would look like after many years of such cleaning, or of leaving the soap residue in the brushes between uses in lieu of cleaning.

I stopped washing my brush about 6 months ago. I use the same brush every day, generally, so a dense brush never really dries out in the center.

I noticed my favorite badger brush, which is pretty dense, started to stink (like a wet towel) when I was rinsing the soap out of it. so I've started to leave the soap in it, and now it doesn't stink. And it's not a perfume of the soap covering it up kind of thing, the stink was too strong for that.

I shake the brush out so that most of the moisture is out, but whatever lather is left on the bristles, I leave on it. I face lather, and the lather does not make it all the way into the base of the brush, so I haven't had any buildup.

I can't imagine that with a tallowate soap like MWF or tabac (the two that I generally use), that a comparison to a P&G-type shampoo product that's filled with both SLS's is a good comparison, but if something adverse happens to my brush over the next few years, I'll report back.

It saves gobs of time every day to just shake the brush out briefly (but briskly) and let whatever lather's left dry into the bristles, and I get a good easy lather the next day and use a lot less tabac or MWF.

IMO brushes, whether they be shave, tooth or hair should be cleaned with some level of regularity. It just seems to be the right thing to do.

I couldn't imagine not rinsing my brush out after use. I've got 3-4 that I use consistently in rotation and I've never noticed a wet towel (sour?) smell but they all smell faintly of shaving soap/cream.

I also open or disassemble my razor, rinse, and dry after use rather than just give it a shake like many do. Habit, I guess.

Originally Posted by captp

First I "scrape" the excess, leftover lather back into my mug.

A quick tip...you can 'scrape' this excess lather out and apply to your face (with your fingers) for your third pass. This should be nice thick and slick

I don't know, i'm still not convinced. After months of this so far, I see no adverse effect at all to the brush (both brushes I've done this with are badger). I'm leaving soap in the brush, not raw meat, so I'm not worried about just letting it sit in the brush.

What's left behind is a tallowate based soap that has not come close to reaching the base of the bristles, they are still fairly clean and looking anew. If anything, the tallowate base of the soap is probably good for the hair on the brush - it doesn't become rancid.

I only use one brush at a time - I don't want to rotate brushes, and as much money as I've spent on stones in my lifetime, I don't want to get into artisan brushes - the $20-$25 star shaving type of brushes work really well for me and I don't feel like I have to baby them.

The extent of skin cells isn't bad, I'm sure. I only shave straight out of the shower, always one pass with buffing (not lots of razor-exfoliated skin floating around), so the brush only touches the face once. A brush that is thoroughly rinsed will have skin cells left in it also, you'll never get them all.

I think in my circumstances (lazy daily straight razor shaver), this is the ideal solution that I'll only stop doing if something bad happens to the brush that I don't expect. If it hasn't in months, I'm guessing it won't.

(but like a lot of you, my wife is really bothered by it ...which just makes me want to do it more ).

Well, you score points for pissing off the wife anyway...

I used to not rinse my brush after shaving, but after a while the hairs started falling out. Now granted it was just a cheap vdh brush and it was probably not completely due to leaving soap in it but it only takes a few extra seconds to rinse it, so I rinse now after every shave. I give them all a good wash maybe once or twice a year.
-dan-