Thread: Newbie - made a major mistake... Major!

Hi all,

I'm new to straight razors - bought one from the art of shaving - forget the brand - some french company... long story short - I use a 1 inch belt sander to hone my kitchen knives to a "razor's edge" or so I thought. After my new razor seemed to dull out I took a 3000 grit belt to it and am now in the process of trying fix the damage I've obviously done! I've watched all the videos by Lynn and am trying the 4k/8k circular honing technique as he describes in his video. I cannot seem to get an edge that will even shave arm hair - I can see a new bevel forming but after several reps through the process I'm no where near where I need to be... Please help me save my expensive razor! I also have the Norton 220/1000 stone but have not tried to go down to this yet... any expertise would be greatly appreciated...

-john

Send it out to be hone. That's my recommendation. You would have time to learn how to hone a razor with a good shaving razor. What you are trying to do is like rebuilding an engine in a car, when your experience has been to only changing brake pads on your car. Your in deep! Double O

Wellcome to SRP,subscribing
we need pics pls.

You need a new bevel. Its impossible to say how off the blade is without looking at it. If you keep the spine and edge on the hone, eventually you will create a bevel. I have no idea how long that may take. I would use a black permanent marker and mark the edge and spine with it. Take 5 laps on your hone. Which ever one and see how much black remains. This is the amount of metal that needs to be removed. Thats why its done by hand as machines can destroy things quickly. And once you remove it it cant bw put back. Try that and see what you have. Pictures would help.

Another problem you could be facing is if you held the spine off the belt like you would a knife; there is a chance you could have slightly change the geometry of the blade itself. If you are bent on doing it yourself, I would drop down to the 1k and use three layers of electrical tape on the spine. Run about 40-50 x-strokes, drop down to 2 layers, run about 40-50 and check the size and evenness of the bevel. If it's wavy and funky lookin; then you may have ground down some of the blades width unwittingly. If not, drop to one piece then start the circles and go from there. Holding the spine off the belt will grind farther up the bevel and could have essentially flattened the upper portion, so you would be best to just cut a whole new one from scratch rather than trying to save the original.

Originally Posted by bill3152

You need a new bevel. Its impossible to say how off the blade is without looking at it. If you keep the spine and edge on the hone, eventually you will create a bevel. I have no idea how long that may take. I would use a black permanent marker and mark the edge and spine with it. Take 5 laps on your hone. Which ever one and see how much black remains. This is the amount of metal that needs to be removed. Thats why its done by hand as machines can destroy things quickly. And once you remove it it cant bw put back. Try that and see what you have. Pictures would help.

Like I said, send it to a pro, I'm serious! I'm all for doing it yourself, but I even have a mechanic that I take things that I know are over my head. As I learn, I do more things my self. If you fail to do good strokes on the stone (which you need muscle memory to do it consistently right), you could end up with a very uneven bevel, at the least. Yes you would learn and muscle memory would come, but I would not want to possibly ruin a nice French Thiers Izard.

Once you have a good bevel, the strokes to keep it going are much less (less probability of messing it up). Less strokes=good concentration on each stroke, as you learn muscle memory. Double O

Actually,Before you spend alot of time on the stones,Did per chance the edge of the blade turn Blue when you hit it on the belt sander??

Originally Posted by pixelfixed

Actually,Before you spend alot of time on the stones,Did per chance the edge of the blade turn Blue when you hit it on the belt sander??

Was wondering the same thing myself. Be a pity if it did to have to trash the whole razor if the temper is shot.

Bob

Originally Posted by BobH

Was wondering the same thing myself. Be a pity if it did to have to trash the whole razor if the temper is shot.

Bob

Almost no way it would not have overheated

I don't know if I should laugh or cry. A new Theirs on a belt sander.