Thread: Trouble honing Wester Bros Wedge

Hey Fellas,

A little while back I bought a Wester Brothers Manganese Wedge 5/8ths in nice shape. My first hone on the thing, I was having some trouble getting it sharp. 4k, 6k, 6k with 8k nagura slurry, 12k....Finally I got it close to where I wanted it and finished it on the coarse leather with Chromium Oxide, then fine leather and it was pretty good, but I wasn't satisfied. I mean, it shaved hair, but I felt it could be better.

So tonight I took it back to the 12k Chinese river stone and the edge just turned to crap, won't even cut arm hair when begged.

Are wedges hard to nail initially? I don't want to have to take it back to the 4k stone to reset the bevel ( but may have to?) I don't want to grind it away, it's a nice little blade!

Any pointers?

thanks

David

Eliminate the Ch12k. Does it work well on other razors ? If so did razor shave well at 8k ?

All razors need a good bevel first, wedges are no different but can of course take longer to set.

There should be no mystery about the bevel. I find magnification as well as traditional tests will confirm if the bevel is set or not.

Wedges (near wedges) can sometimes be troublesome, and they have been known to try many a man's patience! The 1st question I would ask is whether or not you are using tape on the spine to hone this blade? If so ...how many layers?

I usually (pretty much by default!) use 2 layers of tape when honing a wedge...other folks may have a difference of opinion on this, but this is what always seems to work for me.

When I have an edge problem like this I will check the edge with a bright light and a loop. Flat spots are almost always the problem and they can be seen as very shiny sections on the blade edge. If this seems to be your problem, I would take it back to the 4K just long enough to fix those trouble spots and then move back up the ladder, using two layers of tape.

I am sure some more experienced hone-meisters will be along shortly to offer some advice as well.

WP34

"Are wedges hard to nail initially?" Yeah, usually.

As the honorable Wolfpack mentioned, tape can be your friend. I've you've not used tape w/ it before - this is important. A true, slab-sided wedge and some near wedges you either get that spine *really* well centered in the tape - or don't use tape and live w/ the massive, wide bevel & hone wear. Tape that's not centered - has you working a new bevel angle w/ each change of tape. Others can probably do it more easily than I, but once I get the heel onto the tape, I close one eye (don't want stereo vision), and use strong back light to guide the rest of the spine in to contact so I don't have the moving bevel.

I found this site http://www.coticule.be/wedges.html very helpful when I honed the second near wedge that I got. It explains well the issue with taping a wedge like pinklather said. It also has an excel app that allows you to plug in the blade width and spine width to determine how many layers of tape you need to set an acceptable bevel angle. The first near wedge drove me nuts trying to get an edge as I had not seen the linked site at that time. From what I have seem some razors referred to as wedges are more like just a heavier grind and hone up like a full hollow.

Bob

Sounds like the bevel was not set well. It takes a while to remove significant amounts of steel from a wedge with a 4K stone.

Many thanks to Onimaru55, Wolfpack, Eod7, BobH and Pinklarher for the excellent guidance. I will definitely look at the article and app on the usage of tape. The idea never made sense to me because I figured the tape would clog up the stones, but obviously there must be ways around that.

This Chinese 12k has done a good job on some other razors, so it must be my technique or insufficient patience.

I will learn the way of the tape!

I will report back once I have achieved success or after failing and needing more advice

Thanks again guys

David

David
WRT to the tape clogging the stones, I find that a non issue on my 1k Nani that I usually use to set the bevel. I do find it necessary to change out the tape, top layer if multi layers are used, frequently at the 1K level. At the higher levels I usually change out the tape when going t the next higher level, the grits being finer and less time being spent on the various higher grit stones than at the 1K level. Seems to work for me and good luck.

Bob

Just to add to what has been said already, the manganese steel, if that is really what it is, could be making it more work too. When I was an apprentice ironworker 40 years ago, I read a book called, "Metals and How To Weld Them." In the section on metallurgy it said that manganese steel was used in applications such as dragline buckets where wear resistance was desirable. So I say 'if that is really what it is' because it may have been a marketing ploy and who knows how much of the stuff is really in the steel. If enough of that manganese is in the steel it may account for why they would be tougher to hone.

I've never had a Wester's Bros Manganese steel wedge, but I've got a few of their manganese full hollows. I personally found them to be a lot of work to hone to shave ready. Speaking from bevel set, on used and dull razors, to shave ready. So I can just imagine what a manganese wedge would be like. I have a Beau Brummel wedge that is 9/16 and not manganese. It was a brute to get to shave ready. I've read threads that claim that the old Sheffield wedges are softer than the later Solingen blades and maybe they are. If so that might also account for why some of the 'modern' wedges are more work.

What interests me about this thread and problem is the fact that the edge fell apart after going back to the 12k. Does anyone have any ideas what went wrong there?