Thread: Honing Advice Joh. Engstrom Eskilstuna

On your way from L.A. to Berlin you'll fly over my home: please throw it out of the window at that very moment!

Off the 1K it will only cut arm hairs when you got thick hairs growing on your arm.

Just a suggestion; try stropping it 50 laps on linen and checking your arm hair again. I think you will be amazed. Then finish honing.

What I'm confused about is where to move off the 1K...some are suggesting it might not cut hair and I should move off to the 3K, others are suggesting I snap arm hairs, and then of course an alternate suggestion is that it only need to cut arm hairs when I shave the arm. This is a confusing point for me since I feel I am moving too early or late off the 1K.

Originally Posted by Croaker

Just a suggestion; try stropping it 50 laps on linen and checking your arm hair again. I think you will be amazed. Then finish honing.

The arm hair test is not 100% accurate, no hair cutting test is...

We ran into a guy at the NC meet up that could not get the AHT to work with a shave ready razor...


Study up on the TNT, TPT, and shave test, and see if maybe you might go that direction...
This is why we giggle at the people that think there is some kind of science involved with this, Honing a Straight razor to shave ready is really an art and you have to learn slowly and yes it can get frustrating...

Just a different data point from my end.

I would find it confusing to have anyone tell me they think they are moving off of 1K to early or too late.

I would go up the stones, and maybe even strop, and then see where you are at.

Then if I failed I would go back down, to about 3-4K.

I can see a good 1k bevel from here, on the Internet, 3,000 miles east of you.

The challenge of honing is about two grit levels up from where you are now. Personally, I wouldn't even try to open a letter with a razor honed off 1K.

The only sharpness test I use starts around 8K, when the testing becomes more relevant.

Whilst I would agree that a good time to move off the 1k is when it'll shave arm hair (thats my usual test) it doesnt seem to apply to all razors without exception. On odd occasions I'll get one that really doesnt want to play ball..!

I honed a Japanese razor for a member here and that would barely shave arm hair at all off the 1k. After carrying on for a bit and thinking to myself "Why wont this bl&*(y thing shave?" I decided to carry on up the grits. By the time I'd finished it on an Escher and stropped it was pinging the hairs away with ease and had turned into a terrific little shaver.

Another way to approach the bevel set is to get to the point where you have passed the TNT, and then do another 20 X strokes, then move onto your next stone. For razors that are playing hardball this has worked well for me. And then if you get to the end and it still isnt right then drop back down again.

So I guess what I'm really doing here is agreeing with Alan...!

1k arm hair test will differ from the stone which you are using it.
i think you said you are using 1k shapton .
if this is the case you would be able to cut arm hair off 1k shapton.
1k norton will not cut the arm hair.
Now Try to move to 3k and see what happens.
you should help us by telling where are you at then we could help better.
if you have skype let me know we can have life discussion and sharpen that blade.
gl

New around here, but I do have lots of experience with this situation(though not with straight razors so far...just every other blade). Don't forget that your hair might have something to do with it. Let someone else try. My wife has very coarse hair and if I can't get my blades to pass the HHT or the AHT I get my wife to try, and sometimes it is just my hair. Of course, I go to town and take it to higher grits, really polish the edge until it does.

A blade in s30v did this to me. It was a deburring problem.

Thanks everyone. I put it aside for a moment because I was getting really, really angry; and then I took the sage advice to do some stropping and then get back to the 3K and 8K in tandem and n edge that started singing when I pulled my thumb across it. I am going to try it on a shave test when I'm back from LA since I get my bag ripped up everytime I travel with my razors so I will report back when I'm home next week and can do a shave test and see if it's any better (which I think it is). I feel like Glen sums it up when he says this is really an art and sadly (for us in Germany) there are no rules and regulations governing the razor edge. Schade!

THANK YOU for all the helpful hints and advice in trying to solve this razor problem. If I cant shave on it I am taking up Hi Bud's Skype offer to see if I"m doing something wacky.

More reports soon....

Hi guys,

in dsg10715's absence, allow me to get slightly off topic:

Originally Posted by hi_bud_gl

you would be able to cut arm hair off 1k shapton.
1k norton will not cut the arm hair.

Why Shapton and not Norton?

Thanks,

Fred