Beginning my honing adventure
As some of you may know from my other posts, my Ern had grown a mite dull; pulling and tugging at my whiskers, it was time for me to get it honed. But the do-it-yourselfer in every man made his independent spirit known and, well, I just had to try my hand at honing rather than send it off!
But the expense and potential of completely ruining my razor had me a bit daunted; still, I couldn't not do it, especially with all the rich advice and tutorial here on this site. And so I headed over to Whipped Dog, dropped a staggering $15 on a "Chinese 12k Barber's Hone" and hoped for the best.
Taking advice from here (and the directions that came with the stone; thanks, Larry!) I took a deep breath, calmed my nerves and steadied my hands then went to town.
Now, I'm not sure what I expected; no, if I were honest I'd say I expected to butterknife my razor or, at best, lessen the pulling and tugging. 5 x-strokes and it passed the TPT but still didn't feel all that keen so I wetted the stone again and did 30s circles per side.
I attempted the arm hair test and it took a while to get the angles right but once I did... pop! pop! pop! Could this be true!? Had I succeeded? Now, I have no hairs for HHT so there was only one test left, the most important test of all; I did 100 passes on the leather then went to bed!
This morning, I took a deep breath, gulped, lathered up my ugly mug and with much trepidation brought the Ern to my face, assured I would have pulling, tugging, abrasion and skipping. I started to brush away the lather and...
HOLY MOLY MISS MARY ON A JELLY ROLL!!!! Butter? Meet hot knife!
Now, I'm not a honemeister by any means but wow! I honed my pulling-and-tugging razor to a mean, lean BBS machine! I now feel I can continue without having to worry about getting it rehoned every two months and man, it feels nice!
So thanks to everyone who has posted valuable advice, here in this forum and those who've written articles for the wiki! Thank you, thank you, thank you!
