Custom Hand File Razor

This is the first attempt in fabricating a straight razor for myself, & from my good friend Tom a.k.a. Sharptonn. We have been calling it Billy Baroo (a homage to Ted Knight in Caddyshack). It was made out of an old bench file.I ground the blade on a Harig 612 & Bridgeport surface grinder. To get the hollow grind I set the blade up on magnetic chuck and with the cross slide dragged the wheel the distance of hollow. I then flipped the blade over on the spine and repeated on the other side. All the while flooding with coolant. My greatest mistake was thinking I could put a stabilizer on it. Big Mistake. Scales were made from ebony which I cracked by the way, and a lead wedge.
Sharptonn did the hard part, he made the lump shave. By honeing his heart out turned my useless hunk into quite a fabulous shaver. He smiled the blade, fixed my stabilizer debacle, repaired the cracked scale, polished, pinned & turned it into a beauty.
Tom is a true Mentor in every sense of the word. And a great friend. Many thanks goes out to him!
Hope You like,
Darl (a.k.a. Tarkus)

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Wow!!! I did not expect that when I entered this thread, amazing job you've done there :tu

PS! Nice touch with the etching :)

Very nice! That's a hell of a first try!

That is magnificent,one of the finest customs I have ever seen.
what is the blade size? lovin the bridgeport also,makes my 90 yr old brown and sharp look like a toy:(

Its a full 8/8" in the belly. Probably the heaviest blade I ever shaved with. The spine is 1/4" thick which I form ground a 1/8" radius on.

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Indeed, Billy Baroo turned out nice! Tarkus and I talked often of design and function. I am guilty of encouraging classic design and fit. The only mistakes made were in the double stabilizer and (possibly) material. The ridge of the stabilizer gave me fits. Every time I thought it was gone, I would put it to the DMT and it would fall off the ridge and I would lose heel. This is why it smiles so! I finally got really aggressive and got it to go. Honing was different. I found that the file steel was super hard, yet brittle. It surely did not like the DMT as it was a literal saw after. A technique of slurrying my Norton 1000 and bringing the bevel in slowly yeilded fine results , Then 4000/8000 and finished on a Barber's hone(did not like a Naniwa 12000 either!). Breadboarded and started over 3 times. Got oversharpened and raspy easily, so the last go was quite mild. It shaves nicely, with a very different sound as it sings! A very heavy shaver, I am glad Tarkus went with the lead wedge! I think this will work with a leather only regimen, but time will tell. Another friend lazer etched the tangs in his spare time at work. A beautiful piece with wonderful scales and a tight fit. A great job of machine work here from a Professional Toolmaker! Me? I am a hammer and screwdriver guy!
Nice work and excellent outcome, My Friend! Super fun working with you, as usual! Congratulations on a job well done! :nj
Tom

That is amazing.! Absolutely beautiful.

Tom You Rock. I never could of imagined it turned out so great. All thanks to you!!

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Originally Posted by Tarkus

Its a full 8/8" in the belly. Probably the heaviest blade I ever shaved with. The spine is 1/4" thick which I form ground a 1/8" radius on.

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Well, I must add, once you get used to the 8/8,you may never look back,love your razor man,nice job all around.:)

Gotta say I'm impressed. A really stellar job of work from both of you gentlemen. :bow

That is beautifully precise razor, I admire the razor and the techniques you used to make it, very very nice,

Charlie

I so admire those who can take a project from concept to reality. Outstanding talent! Great job!

Now that is unbelievable!!'

wow ! interesting !

Colour me impressed!! :rock::bow

from an old file to a beautiful razor, just incredible. Use it in good health.

I think you did one heck of a job. it looks absolutely fantastic.

Thats beautiful. Excellent work!

Great work and great looking razor, but most of all thank you for showing the machine and grinding work you put into the razor.

Jamie.

Fantastic! I'm working on my first razors now. I had been wondering if anyone had used a surface grinder to put in the hollows; seems like a great way to do it if you have access to a tool.

Thanks for posting the work,
-Holly

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Originally Posted by HollyGates

Fantastic! I'm working on my first razors now. I had been wondering if anyone had used a surface grinder to put in the hollows; seems like a great way to do it if you have access to a tool.

Thanks for posting the work,
-Holly

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Its great up until you get near your finished edge and your sweating bullets because surface grinders run way too fast. so you have to use the softest wheels you can find and you can only take .001"-.0015" at a time or else you burn it up. Must of dressed that wheel 40 times as well.
Oh and flood the living daylights out of it with coolent.

Super cool Darl! You made me proud. :D That surface grinder is the bees knees. Thanks for sharing.

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Originally Posted by Tarkus

Tom You Rock. I never could of imagined it turned out so great. All thanks to you!!

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I give you the credit, Darl. Were it not for your skills and resources, much less the desire to do it, the razor never would have come to fruition. No one taught you how to do this. You thought it up as you went! Very commendable work.
So? what is it like to shave with a razor of your own making? Must be quite rewarding! ;)
Tom

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Originally Posted by sharptonn

I give you the credit, Darl. Were it not for your skills and resources, much less the desire to do it, the razor never would have come to fruition. No one taught you how to do this. You thought it up as you went! Very commendable work.
So? what is it like to shave with a razor of your own making? Must be quite rewarding! ;)
Tom

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If I have to be honest, I smile the whole time thru the shave. Hell I smile just looking at it. You know? The proud papa kind of smile. :D

That's a good job, and with a surface grinder too. The hollows should be mechanically perfect, for sure. Well done.

Very very cool. That file just like a huge block of marble was hiding a razor in it.

WOW, your razor turned out very well. I love the classic Sheffield look. I know I love my 8/8- 1/4 makes short work of the two calics on my neck.

Very innovative, turned out great!

Beautiful work, and ditto on the etching.

I also will add that personally I can never get enough "process" pics, but you've added greatly to the value of the thread (IMO) by including so many clear, precise images of the work in progress. Thank You!

I had the privilege of watching this project from day one. I knew from the day you showed me the beat up old file that it was going to be an amazing razor! But even then I could never have imagined that it could ever come out this Godly for a FIRST RAZOR!!!!! I see custom straights all the time, I have made knives and razors and I have to say without question that this is the best first razor I have ever seen. My first razor looked so bad I gave it away to the garbage man ;) I cannot imagine what your SECOND razor will look like!!! If it is for sale I get FIRST dibs! My hats off to your Sir!

P.S: I would love to post that razor in the Vintage section at classicedge lol!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! In my dreams I know!!!!!

Phil and Jane
The Classic Edge Shaving Store

Marvelous...
I very much appreciate the comments about hardness, brittleness and the
raspy edge. I would wager that this razor loves a CrOx pasted strop and will
get smoother and smoother for weeks after honing.

The scales look fine... If you had not commented on cracking them a bit
I would never know.

Did you temper this back at all, or just leave it file hardness? If you just left it file hardness, it's no wonder it didn't like the DMT.

It looks awesome! I really like the look of it, very very vintage.

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Originally Posted by medicevans

Did you temper this back at all, or just leave it file hardness? If you just left it file hardness, it's no wonder it didn't like the DMT.

It looks awesome! I really like the look of it, very very vintage.

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Are not most files around 62 HRC?

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Originally Posted by pixelfixed

Are not most files around 62 HRC?

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I assume so. This was a very old file, American Made.
As my Grandfather always said: "Hard as a 4 bit file!" ;)

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Originally Posted by sharptonn

I assume so. This was a very old file, American Made.
As my Grandfather always said: "Hard as a 4 bit file!" ;)

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Reminds me of my first wife:(

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Originally Posted by Tarkus

Its great up until you get near your finished edge and your sweating bullets because surface grinders run way too fast. so you have to use the softest wheels you can find and you can only take .001"-.0015" at a time or else you burn it up. Must of dressed that wheel 40 times as well.
Oh and flood the living daylights out of it with coolent.

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Right, that makes sense. I admit I had been thinking mostly of the pre-heat treat grinding, which you could just go to town on without fear of ruining the hardness. But I think this razor is all the more mind boggling because you shaped the whole thing from already hard stock!!

It would be a lot less work to start from annealed bar stock (maybe another razor...?), but its cool that you ground it straight from an old file. Makes you feel like it has a deeper heritage than a chunk of new steel from a mill.

Absolutely beautiful work. I love the design and very well executed.
Grant

Truly an inspiration! Anyone would be proud to have that one in their shave den. Well done :tu

Sensational looking razor. Very nice. Well done Darl.

Stu