Thread: Razor Making Fail

Dang that sucks, but if it makes you feel better it was a nice looking piece of wobbly metal

Did that on the first razor I made. It’s heart breaking, I sat at the grinder for a day and half then had to throw it in the trash. The next one went much better and took almost half the time. Concentrate on the heel and toe when grinding and the middle will work itself out. Definitely get to Texas meet if you can, the cost of the trip will easily save you the equivalent
in materials and tool set up, let alone the education from the generous and patient makers who attend the meet and so freely share their experience.

The spine looks awfully thin for the width of the blade, if you make another one from that same stock make sure you can get around a 3.7to1 ratio spine width to edge to spine wodth. Make sure to calculate in tape thickness if you’re going to plan on using tape to hone.

I suspect that when you were getting close to finished the edge was deflecting away from the wheel so you were taking metal away from the area behind the edge, kind of like what happens if you hone a full hollow with too much pressure.

I support the edge with my fingertips directly behind the edge when things are getting thin. I get close to finish with 60 grit, and very close with 80 grit, then just clean up with higher grits. The coarser grits cut cooler and you can make progress with less pressure.

An 8" wheel should have a plenty big enough radius to keep from hollowing out the center if there is no deflection at the size of razor that you were making. But yeah if you're happy with a heavier grind use a 10".

Good first try!

Originally Posted by bluesman7

I suspect that when you were getting close to finished the edge was deflecting away from the wheel so you were taking metal away from the area behind the edge, kind of like what happens if you hone a full hollow with too much pressure.

I support the edge with my fingertips directly behind the edge when things are getting thin. I get close to finish with 60 grit, and very close with 80 grit, then just clean up with higher grits. The coarser grits cut cooler and you can make progress with less pressure.

An 8" wheel should have a plenty big enough radius to keep from hollowing out the center if there is no deflection at the size of razor that you were making. But yeah if you're happy with a heavier grind use a 10".

Good first try!

Will try that next time. Will use the 10” wheel and give myself a little more wiggle room.

Any site ls that give an idea of wheel size/blade width and the hollow?

I’d like to repeat the math lessen I got from Victor on the chalk board at Charlie’s to answer that specific question, but I’m not that good of a student.

Originally Posted by Doc226

Any site ls that give an idea of wheel size/blade width and the hollow?

Not that I know of. I've worked the math on several sizes.

Vic is always trying to show me math to explain things. I just wish it would sink in.
Keep trying and i know you will get it Doc!

Originally Posted by Gasman

Vic is always trying to show me math to explain things. I just wish it would sink in.
Keep trying and i know you will get it Doc!

Well, you can do the math and use the wheel that the math points to, and then adjust to what you actually got. As your skill improves the wheels start acting more true to size. When you're sloppy with your grinding the wheels behave as if they are bigger. If you are getting deflection the wheels behave as if they're smaller. So there is a bit of art to it.

Originally Posted by Doc226

Will try that next time. Will use the 10” wheel and give myself a little more wiggle room.

Any site ls that give an idea of wheel size/blade width and the hollow?

I would stick with the 8" wheel. I like the 4" wheel the best for most razor grinding.

There is a lot of great advice in this thread, I wish I could think of answer to why it happened. I have made the same error multiple times. I tend to pay so much attention to the edge and just assume it is thicker behind the edge. The area of the curve where the flat behind the edge transitions to the curve of the blade gets ground a lot during process, it is easy to make it too thin. Copying the way Bruno grinds the edge half of the blade improved my grinding a lot.

Another thing that I thought of; I mentioned doing most of the post HT grinding with relatively coarse grits because in another thread you said that you were using 320 grit. If your belt was getting dull it leads to using more pressure= more deflection.