Thread: Tape wear and Bevel

As said above, as long as the bevel is good (two sides meet at a point) unevenness is cosmetic. I have an old soviet razor with a wide spot in the bevel due to funky grinding. Hey comrade this razor meets the 5 year plan goal, lets hit the vodka!

As to Stainless scales, You may find the razor very heavy and poorly balanced. Metal scales are rare...I have a couple Robesons in aluminum but the gauge is .O2thin.

I have seen this on unevenly ground razors. Take some measurements of the blade thickness at the spine and edge, probably poor grinding or heavy sanding.

Yea, pass on the Stainless Scales, have honed a lot of AOS stainless scaled razors and they are clunky and way out of balance.

Originally Posted by andrewmurray86

Passes the TNT, slightly cuts in, no jumping, smooth along the way. I'm glad to hear that it's not uncommon, I'm pretty chuffed to have my first wedge.



What do you mean by check the apex Rez?

The apex being the point of the bevel. As long as the apex is formed nice and even and coming to a nice sharp point then it is most likely a grind issue. It is after all the apex that we shave with.

I think that's likely to be poor grinding of the hollow. Measure the blade thickness immediately around the wide bevel and compare it to the same place further along - If the area where the bevel is wider is thicker, it tells you that the grind was off and the only way to even the bevel up is corrective grinding - or lots of hand sanding.

If you can see uneven wear on the tape, that may indicate a problem with the spine.

Move on to finer hones and see what happens, I've had a bunch of Wade & Butchers with uneven bevels and they all shaved fine. Don't get to aggressive trying to correct as you can't put metal back on if you go to far with it. You could also try more tape layers, some wedges might need 2+ layers

It's very common to have a slight warp. The bevel is big at the heel and small at the toe on one side and opposite on the other. Like others have said, if the bevel is complete on both sides and meeting at the apex the issue is only cosmetic. You can modify your strokes on the hone to even it out, but don't over do it. You can do toe or heel forward strokes and shift pressure accordingly. Whatever strokes you choose to go with, stick with them throughout your progression. I generally watch a blade closely during bevel setting and make these adjustments early in the process to keep bevels small and even. Too much pressure will really exaggerate the wide parts of the bevel, especially on thinner grinds.

Interesting, I am restoring my first wedge and am having nearly identical problems. Gssixgun has a YouTube video for honing a wedge. Using his techniques has been helping. I am thankful for the timely advice.

What type of strokes are you doing on that blade? Circles and the X? Maybe try the X with the 45 degree angle or rolling X stroke? Exhaust all methods to see if maybe those help. Use a magic marker to on the edge too. Warpage could be an issue as was pointed out. Seems the blade has a very slight smile to it. Just adding my 2 cents worth.....

Good luck

Slight smile indeed I proceeded up the hones and it's a great shaver! I think it was a grind issue. The rest of the bevel is even and it wasn't too hard to get there.

I used quite a number of strokes to get it there.

Last night I picked up and old no name solingen wedge, the spine at the toe end was very worn, about .035 so 3 layers of tape and 4 hours later the bevel is set, 4 edge kills, 2 times back to 1K, Talk about learning and teaching ones self, the old wedge will be teaching me for some time to come...