Thread: What kind of honing decreases the width at the toe?

With this picture of an Empire Cutlery "Broadway" I have (that I turned into a round point), I was curious what kind of honing would create a condition that the very front of the blade, the toe area, would be worn down thinner than any other area along the cutting edge? I have seen eBay razors...many... that have been fashioned even worse than this example:



Knowing what caused it might help another honer on here to competely avoid such a situation.

years of honing with extra pressure on the toe

A lot of times there will be corresponding wear at the spine towards the point end. In the case of the pictured example I wouldn't be surprised if chip removal at the point end wasn't responsible for that imbalance. Saying that because of lack of wear at the spine towards the point.

+1 to what Jimmy said. From all I've read, if there's corresponding spine wear it's years of improper honing...most likely some guy doing his own the way he wanted AKA what worked for him, year after year putting too much pressure at the toe by torque or putting a finger on it to make sure he got the smile all the way across.

If there's no corresponding spine wear then it's probably due to chip removal. Could still shave well though.

My theoretical book learned $.02

Peace,

Ah, I have it now. If there was improper honing done there would be that wear at the end on the blade turning up "severe smile" but there would be corresponding wear at the spine as well. Lack of wear, somebody, had a chip out of the end, or light crack, and simply spend a lot of time on the stones kind of "grinding" down the end to get rid of the imperfection, and then went back to honing the rest of the blade. What is is now is a handy little razor. I honed it and shaved with it the other night (partial) to see how it handled and shaved. Very nimble, and really kind of handy around the nose-upper lips area. Extremely sharp on the end, and even barely nicked my ear a bit.

Originally Posted by Gibbs

Ah, I have it now. If there was improper honing done there would be that wear at the end on the blade turning up "severe smile" but there would be corresponding wear at the spine as well. Lack of wear, somebody, had a chip out of the end, or light crack, and simply spend a lot of time on the stones kind of "grinding" down the end to get rid of the imperfection, and then went back to honing the rest of the blade. What is is now is a handy little razor. I honed it and shaved with it the other night (partial) to see how it handled and shaved. Very nimble, and really kind of handy around the nose-upper lips area. Extremely sharp on the end, and even barely nicked my ear a bit.

Looks good! Tell me, how did you grind it down, and how much did you take of the end in length?

Peace,

Originally Posted by BigJim

Looks good! Tell me, how did you grind it down, and how much did you take of the end in length?

Peace,

I use a Harbor Freight belt sander with German 1" x 30" belts. They are NOT the coarse grit one usually see on belt sanders. Coarsest belt I have that I use is 320, but not on razors. I also have a 600 grit, but again, not on razors. I used a 800 to start, very wet leather glove and basically round it from the top on down slowly until I get about 1/8" from the blade edge and switch to 1000 grit. But, to simply cut off the end, I used the same very wet glove, electrical tape vertical, close to where I was going to cut, both sides, and a Dremel with a fine cut-off wheel. Slowly and getting good moisture around and during the cut. It's slow go toward the end. The rounding works well, and doesn't take up too much time to do it, but again it's a lot of getting and keeping your leather glove wet and very frequently pauses. Edge is still good even out to the toe for temper. you want to see grinding, you need to look at the video download of Randydance062449 that he posted, a HD video of the making of DOVO razors. All in German, but excellent. this thread -> http://straightrazorpalace.com/razor...ovo-video.html There is a LOT of grinding going on well after the initial heat treating and tempering. You just have to be careful.

Jim, I almost forgot, I toook about 1/2 " off the front. Since it is a straight down cut, I figured any heat at the last few mm would be eliminated in the rounding since if you look at it the vertical cut was about the furtherst point forward and the rounding wentt back from there on the spine and the cutting edge.

I don't have a photo of the spine, but with this razor the spine tapers by 1.5mm from toe to heel, which causes the blade to decrease its width towards the heel.