Thread: At a loss.

Well, I think I jumped the shark and tried to blame the hone for something that was not it's fault. Still, I might just put the barber hone away and focus on the Norton hones and strop work for my daily shaving razor.

We'll see what happens if I ever manage to get it honed again. I tried Sunday but I was a bit sleepy and trying to hone was just like a tranquilizer so I had to set it aside for another day. Well, the edge is straight now at least, so it has that going for it.

Just set the bevel, make absolutely sure the bevel is FULLY set, then polish the bevels.

Use tape and ink…

That's the thing that's driving me nuts. I was certain the bevel was set before I shaved with it last. Well, back to the grind-stone. Literally.

Observation time - I thought I was using light enough pressure before. But the sheen from the edge on the 1k level would only get so thin. Once it stopped I thought I was good enough to move onto the 4k. Turns out I should've been getting even lighter on the pressure. Man, these things are finicky.

This go around I got the edge polished better at the 1K and 4K level than ever in the past. I'm not sure I'm happy with it looking straight down at the edge. I can still see a sliver of light glinting off it, just barely. Under my 60x loupe it's like looking at the edge of a sheet of paper. But it's still easily visible and that bugs me.

The barber hone - I lathered it up and honed just the toe as suggested because curiosity killed the cat. I looked under both a 60x loupe and 200x pocket microscope. 4 swipes, no notable difference, and the same could be said after another 7. Seems like it puts a similar polish on an edge to a Norton 8K hone, and I can live with that. That being said, I'm still dropping it from the rotation. If nothing else it's one less variable.

Tomorrow I'll drop back to 1K and run it up to the Norton 8K again to see if I can't thin that edge up just a tiny bit more, then give it a shave test.

Alternatively, if you are patient but want to learn, strop and shave with it after the 1k. Then hone on the 4k and repeat. Continue up each hone and shave with it to assess what each hone is actually accomplishing for you.

That isn't a half bad idea. I've been meaning to try the 1K shave challenge, no time like the present I suppose.

If your bevels are set, you hopefully will be rather surprised by how well the 1k shave works.

PLEASE report back on this!

When I was learning to hone I decided to see what each step of honing felt like and shaved like.

After making sure that the bevel was set I then gave it a test shave right off of the 1K hone. Then repeated after a lengthy stropping session.

I did the same on the 4K 8K and later on with the 12K.

I found it a very enlightening and informative experiment and I highly recommend it for every new honer.

If you are going to shave with it, strop and shave half your face.

Then strop on linen, joint the edge straight and re-set the bevel, should only take 10-20 laps, strop again and now test it. It will be much improved.

So, when normal honing, especially when new and haven’t yet learned to calibrate your pressure, stropping on linen or canvas, then jointing and resetting a 1k bevel, will set your edge for the 4k and you will have a stronger edge, less prone to chipping on the higher grit stones.

Early on, don’t be afraid to use pressure, to get the bevels flat, if you need to. But if you do, get rid of the chippy edge, that pressure will leave on the 1k edge. If you don’t, you will fight the edge, all the way up the progression.

I ran the blade over the Norton 1K enough to get a solid 1K edge on it, stropped it, and shaved a few patches on the right side of my face. Now I understand why the 1K shave challenge is limited to a single round rather than a week, month, or year!

Kidding. It wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. I felt tugging and a little discomfort on the more sensitive areas. It was surprisingly smooth on the more rugged/insensitive parts. Once I joined and reset the edge it was a little bit better. Going to try the 4K now that I've dried and prepped the blade to move forward.

Update: As expected the 4K was a noticeable improvement. Still not something I'd want to shave my full face with, but I feel like someone with more experience could probably get an acceptable edge off a Norton 4K. Then again, things were still rough with the 8k, so it seems the bevel is still not quite set. It felt really close though, minimal tugging and was able to get a close shave with no razor burn.