Sheffield or Solingen the honing difference?

For the last twenty years or so I have shaved with only one razor, a Boker Red Injun 101 that was my great grandfathers. I maintained it with a Swaty barbers hone and a 2" Illinois strop nothing else. Then I started browsing this site a few years ago and RAD hit me along with the restoration bug etc. I started accumulating a rather large rotation and learning the basics of honing (thanks Lynn you opened a new dimension in sharpness for me, you are truly the Yoda of straights:chapeau) I thought German razors were it; until I discovered Sheffields. Cutting to the chase , does anyone out there think that the honing is easier , the edge lasts longer and the shaves are smoother with English blades? Maybe it's my imagination but I don't have anything German in my collection ( DD's,Bokers, Henckels,) that compares. Is the steel composition any different, the forging process? I don't think I do anything different with how I use or maintain them. They are pretty much all the same blade widths and types. Just one of those things that make you go hmmm. Interested to hear if anyone else has had the same experience.

Actually, there can be a huge difference not only in country of origin but in the time of manufacture. I have several razors of the same manufacturer that span at least 100-150 years and in some cases I can tell the difference in how long those edges last. At least that is how I perceive it, it could all be just my imagination once again running away with me.

I find my Sheffield razors come out smoother than my Solingen's
The germans seam harsher on the face even with the same honing and finishing process
Might be in my mind also but when asked a long term str8 user a similar question about my honing skills if I was doing something wrong as some blades felt harsher he also claimed that the Sheffield's usually kept a smoother feel

I've read quite a few posts proclaiming the Sheffield edges were smoother than Solingen razors. I wonder if it doesn't have more to do with the grind ? A wedge is generally a Sheffield product and since around 1850 (according to Robert Doyle) the Germans perfected full hollow grinding and began to dominate the market. Some of the razors I've honed, be they Sheffield, Solingen, Swedish, were easy jobs that came good fairly quickly , while others were frustrating so and so's that gave me a rough time. I think it depended more on the condition of the edge to begin with.

Some guys that I know won't even shave with a full hollow anymore while others can't understand how anyone would prefer a wedge. Anyway, if it is full hollow I tend to pass nowadays, preferring 1/2 hollows, 1/4 hollows or wedges. I guess they do feel smoother to me, wherever they originate from. Different strokes for different folks.

I'm by no stretch a honemeister, but the Sheffields in my rotation range from 8/8 W&B's to 5/8 Joseph Rodgers (my new favorite shaver) ,wedges ,full hollows, half, thru the gamut and every one is a joy to sharpen with little effort. Maybe I've just been lucky in my acquisitions but I really am using them over some fine german razors that I still appreciate. Ain't this a great hobby/obsession:rock:

The Monkey Wrench


Many of the German razors were/are made with Sheffield steel :)

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by gssixgun

The Monkey Wrench


Many of the German razors were/are made with Sheffield steel :)

---

Hmmmm, I would need to see some historical writings on that. If anything it would be the other way around. England doesn't have all the materials to produce a quality steel, they do have coal tho. During both wars, England depended on steel from her allies to sustain manufacturing of war needs.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by guitstik

Hmmmm, I would need to see some historical writings on that. If anything it would be the other way around. England doesn't have all the materials to produce a quality steel, they do have coal tho. During both wars, England depended on steel from her allies to sustain manufacturing of war needs.

---

Here is just one really fast example..

Vintage Straight Razors : Klass : German Hollow Ground : Sheffield Steel : Faux Horn


Just Google "German Ground Sheffield Steel" and some variations of that theme you will find hundreds if not thousnads of German Razors stamped "Sheffield Steel" and multiple variations of it.. to really make it confusing is that much of the German and English steels were actually made from Swedish ore.

Which goes back to what Jimmy posted about most of the difference in feel coming from Grind, Hardening, and Temper rather than type of steel


You might also look at some of the New Production razors Dovo, Wacker, Revisor, Aust, IIRC some of them did a few razors with Sheffield Steel. I want to say even TI outta France did some but I don't stay on top of new production razors quite as much as Vintage so I might be mistaken there..

I just recently noticed (Sheffield steel) stamped on German hollow ground razors on the bay. I am using some Sheffields right now and they do feel smoother. I think a lot of this is due to the weight of the blade and the grind puts that smooth blade face against your skin more. My habit is DDs and with very light pressure I get a nice smooth feel out of them too. As for staying sharp I could not compare the 2 as I don't use Sheffeilds that much but when it comes to honing Yikes. The hone wear on a wedge or near too it will add some time to the process without a doubt. To sum it up , your going to have to add more factors than steel to come up with an answer to your questions.

This may be why > " I don't think I do anything different with how I use or maintain them. "

I did a little digging and it seems that I need to brush up on my history a little more. From the 17th to the 19th century, England imported the majority of her steel from Sweden and Russia but the development of better more efficient iron and steel manufacturing cause the numbers to swing the other way in the later 19th century.

Keep in mind that technically speaking

Swedish ore is not the same as Swedish steel

So the Swedish or Russian iron ore coming into Sheffield can still be considered Sheffield "steel" after processing when it leaves..

But yes you will find English, German and even Japanese razors stamped "Made with Finest Swedish Steel" too

Actually, it gets convoluted with all the divergences and consolidations of the different steels because of trade between countries that fluctuates with economies and/or political climes. Sheffield, for example, may have found it more expedient to import rather than mine ore locally one year and then reverse it the next year. So I would say that it has more to do with the regional manufacture of steel no matter the iron ore origination. Heat treating and manufacture of the finished product, in my estimation, would seem to be the biggest factors at least until the industrial revolution when manufacturing started to become standardized.

Many Sheffield razors were stamped 'Sheffield Steel, Ground in Germany'. Many German and some French razors were stamped 'Made With Finest Sheffield Steel.' In another thread on this topic there were some pix of examples of some. Quite a few German brands, famous ones at that, lIke Puma, Bartmann, others, were stamped 'Made With Kayser Ellison Steel', a British company. OTOH, some were stamped Bohler steel, a German outfit, and I guess it was whatever they thought would sell razors.

This thread has some interesting pics illustrating the above statement on the second page ...........

http://straightrazorpalace.com/razor...-razors-2.html

Yes that is exactly what myself and Jimmy were saying..

It is more about the Grind, Hardening and Temper then the steel origin

(Don't wanna put words in Jimmy's mouth but that is the way I understood him)

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by gssixgun

Yes that is exactly what myself and Jimmy were saying..
.....
It is more about the Grind, Hardening and Temper then the steel origin

(Don't wanna put words in Jimmy's mouth but that is the way I understood him)

---

That is what I'm saying. I'm not an expert, but ...... since that never stopped me in the past ..... :beer2: ........ :my guess is that when you get into early to mid 1800s Sheffields the tempering/heat treating was done by eye. Major General Julian Hatcher wrote about how the WWI '03 Springfields had a run of blown receivers caused by the same thing. Heat treating by eye. The army, upon investigating the phenomenon, found that depending on whether it was a bright and sunny day, or cloudy and overcast, the color the forgers were looking for varied considerably with the actual heat of the steel.

Say that to say ......... I'm assuming that by a certain date and time ........ maybe the late 1800s, the razor makers had the tempering and heat treatment down pat. The alloys must have been similar. So I could see where an older Sheffield might have different characteristics, as far as feel of the hone and the shave, but once we get into the 'modern era' I'm thinking it is more grind than whether it was done in one country or the other. Just in my unlearned opinion though. Mike Blue, Neil and some of the other knowledgeable steel guys could probably shed more light. :thinking:

Just to mention I have an "Admirals" etched straight , that clearly states Sheffield Steel made in Germany. Must say its a mighty smooth shaver. That being said I have found that the grind changes everything due to the fact that it changes your angle of incidence in relation to razor to face angles just a couple of degrees but enough to notice if your muscle memory/hand coordination is familiar with just one style of blade. In my 7 days rotation I vary the types of grinds, and find through trial and error that my blades are plenty sharp ,it was the angle that I had to adjust to find each grinds sweet spot in relation to my facial structure. So basically just what everyone else said just stated differently.

I thought I read that Boker still get there steel from a Sheffield source?

Like producers of diverse other products, cost was a factor in the sourcing of ores in Sheffield, but greater than that was compatibility and reproducing the same characteristics. Early on its iron history (which went back to the 14th century but which had already reached a high point in the 1600s and the formation of the Cutlery Guild in 1624) sources were local. Stuff was mined from the blackband ironstone in the coal measures, ores were brought in from Devon, the Forest of Dean, South Wales, Somerset, Devon, etc.

But the writing was already on the wall for foreign ore imports to gain ascendency. One might cite crucible steel and Benjamin Huntsman as an agent of change, but huge amounts of ore came in from Spain, Russia and Sweden. In the mid 1800s output from local mines begin to reach a peak, coming in at about 3 million tons by the 1880s and then falling off as foreign imports began to supplant them. Sheffield, having undergone an era of industrialization was now acknowledged to be the home of 'bijou' or designer steels, making a huge array of steel alloys. Foreign imports had reached about 2.5 million tons by 1880.

The Bessemer converter is often cited as the precursor of cheap quality steel, but in its infancy Henry Bessemer was not able to make it work. It was left to Robert Forester Mushet (of the Darkhill Ironworks in the Forest of Dean, son of the noted iron master and celebrated metallurgist David Mushet of the Clyde Iron Works, the Calder Iron works and Black-band Ironstone) to iron out the problem. A foreign ore was the solution (spathose iron ore from the Rhenish Mountains, aka Speigl-glanz and spiegl-eisen). Bessemer, cad that he was, did not mention Mushet's contribution and went on to a life of fame and fortune, while Mushet spent his last years so poor that his daughter had to berate Bessemer in front of his peers in order to get him some sort of pension.

Since then, Sheffield Steel has been celebrated as being amongst the finest steels, used by Thiers Issard, many German makers, and exported aroung the world. Some of the most famous razor makers in Germany used Sheffield Steel supplied by the Sheffield company of Kayser Ellison & Co.

Regards,
Neil

Neil, any idea what steel/steels may have been used by W&B, Greaves, Rodgers, during the 1800s to make those wedges we love so much ? I'm sure they must have used more than one specific alloy over the century but I'm curious as to whether any of the specifics are known ?

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by gssixgun

(Don't wanna put words in Jimmy's mouth but that is the way I understood him)

---

I agree.

Grind and proportions have an enormous effect, as does hardness.

The large differences in centuries ago steel had to do with the natural content of the ores, but the days of modern metallurgy, or even crucible steel probably wiped out a lot of the differences above and beyond marketing. First stainless was from ore that was loaded with nickel or something similar, wasn't it? I can't remember where it was from, but not germany or england.

A friend of mine that's a toolmaker likes to say "solingen has been living on their reputation for at least two centuries". He says that when I say that solingen razors are pretty reliable, but no better than the stuff that was coming out of NY and NJ in the united states at the same time. He was charged with making 18th century tools and has gotten stuck studying various related items because of that.

I'm sure that many parts came together to form the whole, so short of model books and company accounts (which seem to be mysteriously short on the ground) we can only speak in broad outlines and then again, only for certain people and models.

The first hurdle is that not all razor makers made their own steel. Wade & Butcher did, Christopher Johnson, Thomas Firth & Sons, Greaves, Adam Padley, Pickslays, Stodart, Samuel Osborne, William & Samuel Butcher at the Philadelphia Works, T R Ellins, etc. etc.

The second hurdle is the longevity of some companies and different steel formulations.

However, we can ascertain that upon Benjamin Huntsman's re-discovery of crucible (wootz) steel and its marketing to France (and then back to the UK - Sheffield refused it at first, hence it being marketed in France), that Acier Fondue is Huntsman's recipe. Other ones that are notable include the early alloying of silver with steel by Stodart (whose logo was a mark for wootz) and Faraday and marketed by Pickslays and others. Adam Padley worked alongside these for a while, but set up on his own, using silver steel. The alloy seems to have come from silver mines in South America, and the name 'Peruvian' was adopted, so by a process of elimination we can trace that to being a silver and steel alloy first formulated by Stodart and Faraday in the early 1800s.

Although taken by some as marketing ploys, the use of, for instance, 'Fine India Steel' tells us that this was a crucible steel redolent of wootz. The early damascus blades by well-known and reputable makers are along the same guidelines as fine india steel, although certainly there are a multitude of lesser brands that used the name willy-nilly.

All we know about the earlier W&Bs are that they are among the very softest of steels (around 59 on the rockwell scale) which was the miniumum hardness set by Solingen Statutes. Much later we find the outstanding Puma razors, still made of fine sheffield steel, but having a rockwell of around 60-1, which is very high indeed.

So Jimmy, the short answer is no - we don't know!

Regards,
Neil

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by gssixgun

Keep in mind that technically speaking Swedish ore is not the same as Swedish steel...

---

That is almost the same thing we have experienced with the England football team - forging a team of many of the finest proponents from home abroad, does not guarantee that they will play football for us worth a damn...

Regards,
Neil

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by DaveW

...First stainless was from ore that was loaded with nickel or something similar, wasn't it? I can't remember where it was from, but not germany or england.

---

While we might very well describe some of the earlier (1800s - 1900s) 'surgical' steels as stainless because of the alloying elements (phosphates, chromium, nickel, etc) they contained, we have to recognise the invention as belonging to the 20th century, and its birthplace as Sheffield.

Harry Brearley was employed as a boy aged 12 by Thomas Firth & Sons, the same crucible steel forge that had employed his father. Firth & Sons had upgraded him to a lab assistant in his 20s and sent him away to college to learn his trade more fully.

In 1901 he left Firth & Sons for a while to work at Kayser Ellisons works, another fine english steel producer. A lot of Firths ore came from Riga and Harry experimented for a while with this. Later, Harry was to spend a great deal of time at Firths research labs, particularly to evolve a steel that eroded less than that commonly used for arms parts. He was not trying to make a stainless steel, rather he was more concerned about the amount of chromium and carbon that went into the alloy.

In 1913 he came up trumps and announced his new 'rustless' steel. Firths were less enamoured of the alloy, indeed it needed expert handling and the first two batches sent to various Sheffield cutlery firms were deemed a failure.

Harry wouldn't give up though, and oversaw the forging of another batch by a small firm called Moseley at the Portland Works. The name was changed fron rustless to stainless and the product took off, only to be halted in its tracks by the onset of WW1 and delayed another decade or so.

The criterion of stainless was a minimum 10.5% chromium cont that allowed the easily corroded low carbon iron steel to form a passive coating of oxide which resisted attack.

Regards,
Neil

I have one Sheffield to compare; a Wolstenholm pipe razor. It is a full hollow. It, coincidentally is the smoothest razor I own. I don't have many to compare and didn't think much of it until I noticed this thread.