Thread: How to get a better edge (ie. help me troubleshoot my honing)

So, I am struggling to getting a good edge. I feel like I am consistently making a worse edge than the factory edge my razor had when it arrived.

A little background on the shaves I get:

I never get burns or weepers, but there is a considerable amount of pull when shaving, especially the neck. I never get BBS shaves, WTG on the neck leaves stubble (only felt when running hand ATG though). I do not dare go ATG on the neck with the razor, from experience it feels like it will cause razor burn.

A little background on how the razor holds up over time:

I can get a few shaves between each honing, maybe 3-4 before the pull is enough to make me unable to shave the neck area. I strop before each shave, which does improve the situation a lot.

A little background on how I hone:

I use Japanese Chef Knives brand waterstones, 1K, 4K, 6K and 10K. They are my first waterstones but I like their feel. Does anyone have any experience with them? Are they terrible stones?

I've tried a few different techniques, the one that works best for me is going 50 circles on 1K, 50 circles on 4k, 50 laps on the strop, 50 circles on 6K, 50 laps on the strop, 50 circles on the 10K and 50 laps on the strop, in that order.

Without the strop in the middle of honing, the edge is considerably worse.

What should I do differently? A recent insight I've had is that I might actually be overhoning something fierce, creating a wire edge multiple times during the honing session which i repeatedly remove using the strop. The result is a semi-sharp razor that manages a few shaves before being completely dull. What do you guys think? Is it a credible technique to strop while honing? Should I hone much less?

When progressing through the grits, should I increase or decrease laps with the grits? eg 10 laps on 1K, 20 laps on 4K etc or 40 laps on 1K, 30 laps on 4K etc?

Thanks for reading!

A couple of things. At no point did you mention what razor you have. If the steel that your blade is made from or the workmanship of the blade is crap it will never take and hold a great edge. I never do anything always. Honing needs to be assessed on a blade to blade basis. Your number of strokes will always vary so there is no recipe for honing. It start with finding out what a blade needs. Give it a shave and decide where to go. If the bevel is good, the blade should shave but not usually with any great comfort, at which point you would try to use your 10k to refresh the edge. If it won't shave comfortably after the 10k move down. If at the start it won't shave set a new bevel. At the 1K until it will cut hair and then progress up. Stay on each hone until all the scratches from the previous grit are gone. Depending on how good your eyes are as to how you will need to do that. Many use a loupe. Some where between 10 and 40x. I think most use a 30x. I have no idea on your stones and how fast they cut

+1 on RezDog's advice.
Stay on the 1k until it pops hair. Then and ONLY THEN...move up in your progression.

Also make sure your hones are FLAT.

May want to look at this to Category:Honing - Straight Razor Place Library

Originally Posted by MaxM

I can get a few shaves between each honing, maybe 3-4 before the pull is enough to make me unable to shave the neck area. I strop before each shave, which does improve the situation a lot.

Are the shaves any good before the blade looses its edge?
What razor are you using?
post a pic of the razor if you can.

My biggest leap in learning how to hone was learning to set a proper bevel. Once you master this, the rest is really quite straightforward.

I use a loupe to examine the bevel and make sure it shaves my arm hair VERY easily before progressing to higher grits. I spend as much time as it takes to get the bevel perfect and then polish the edge on the higher grits. I also make sure the bevel is perfect all along the blade. You have to assess each razor to see what style of stroke is going to work best - i.e. straight stroke, rolling stroke etc.

Post pics of the razor so we can point you in the right direction...

-john

As Rezdog said above there is no recipe for honing. The pyramid method is as close as it gets. But what it sounds like is that you have a very common problem in that you're not sure when to move on from one grit to the next. Its a very tough nut to crack because the answers to that question are not easily conveyed. As everyone has suggested a good bevel is paramount. Assuming you have a good bevel, there are a few things that I founded that aided in my own discovery. First, I use a hand held microscope (200x). Having a closer look at the edge helped me a lot. Looking at a 1k edge vs. a 4k edge under a standard loupe was not really of much help. They looked so similar at that point that I had no idea if I was ready to move on or not. YMMV. Consider how well you're able to see the differences with what you're using. And next, you have to ask yourself if you've achieved what you needed to do with each grit. In the early stages, I want to see 4k scratches completely replace 1k scratches. The razor should be able to shave hair at skin level after 1K but neither the 1K nor the 4k will be a comfortable shave. So the proficiency of how they shave at this point is of less concern to me yet I will want to see improvement there as well. If you have not removed the 1k scratches with the 4k, you'll have deep scratches left over when you get the polishing stage. And along the way with each stage, I want to look through my scope and see the very edge straight and clean. If its not, I stay where I'm at until it is. No peaks and valleys, no chips, and few sparkly spots that indicate imperfection. By the time you get in the 8k neighborhood, you should see a very clean and relatively polished bevel form. And at these stages, I'm usually leaning on the scope a little less and watching how its performing cutting hair. But I'm still looking through my scope and looking for clean, even edges that are progressively getting more polished with each stage. If the edge seems to be breaking down, I either stay at the same grit or even drop down one for a few strokes to clean it up. Its not easy to describe this on the forum. I started examining my professionally honed edges very close and compared them to my own. When I did that, I could easily see the differences. Knowing that a 4k edge won't be able to produce the same edge as professionally finished edge, I tried to make my 4k edge look as close to the professionally honed edge as possible knowing that I had further grits to refine it further. But I tried to squeeze as much refinement out of each grit along the way. Hopefully something here helps.

I truly suggest getting hold of a second razor (good condition antique) and then send one of your two razors out to get honed by a master ( check the classifieds on SRP). My first razor was an antique, and then I bought one from a vendor off SRP that was shave ready. I was able to practice technique with the shave ready razor while I practiced honing on the other one. You should be able to maintain a shave ready razor with a strop and a barbers hone for a LOOOOOOONNNNGGGG time if technique is good. Hope you can get some good shaves soon!

Andrew

One thing I want to add about feel... As you reach the limit of one hone the coefficient of friction for that hone will peak and then not increase - i.e. you'll feel the resistance to forward motion on the hone increase - some say it feels sticky or like the blade is sucking down on the hone. As you polish off the peaks and valleys the blade has more contact with the hone - like a slick tire on a racing car - this adds more friction as the area of contact is greater. With each new level in higher grit this process repeats.

I hone by feel only. Once I feel the blade peak out in friction I know it's time to go to the next highest grit.

Hope this helps!

John.

Personally after the 4k I would be switching to standard laps and using weight of the blade only. Watch some of the vids by Glen(Gssixgun) and Lynn Abrams on YouTube