Thread: Straight Razors Dull Despite Little Use

Originally Posted by CrescentCityRazors

It definitely should NOT be dull 3/4 of the way through a shave. Your shave angle might be too high. The edge might have a large fin component. The steel might be crap, though I don't remember what razor you have.

I did the math just now assuming 30 degrees is a good shaving angle, for a 4mm spine and a 1.5cm wide blade. You would definitely want about 1.5 spines of space between the bottom of the spine and your face to get that angle, certainly not 1 spine or less (unless it's a different shaped razor or you are deliberately going for a more aggressive angle, of course.) In any case, I besides the mustache area that is kind of impossible to shave without some degree of scraping (last time I tried a different technique I cut my lip in two), recently I've been decent about keeping a ~30 degree angle although I probably was more like 45 in the past which could have dulled it.

Paul did not sharpen the razor in question, I do have one from him though that I ought to go back to and see how the properties of it are throughout a shave compared to my DOVO. This one was at one point sharpened on a wheel, which didn't work at all due to weird blade geometry, so I got a local guy to do it. I don't have enough confidence to say whether he did an objectively good job or not, but it certainly was sharp initially.

I don't bother with any sharpness tests at this point really, I just try to shave my arm hair with it using different parts of the blade, and if it cuts it cuts. I know that all parts of the blade would do fine on a hanging hair test immediately after stropping, but the toe would fail miserably at that test after a shave.

I'll try to get the edge back next weekend, I have an appointment with this local knife/razor maker for some lessons anyway.

Originally Posted by rickytimothy

I did the math just now assuming 30 degrees is a good shaving angle, for a 4mm spine and a 1.5cm wide blade. You would definitely want about 1.5 spines of space between the bottom of the spine and your face to get that angle, certainly not 1 spine or less (unless it's a different shaped razor or you are deliberately going for a more aggressive angle, of course.) In any case, I besides the mustache area that is kind of impossible to shave without some degree of scraping (last time I tried a different technique I cut my lip in two), recently I've been decent about keeping a ~30 degree angle although I probably was more like 45 in the past which could have dulled it.

Paul did not sharpen the razor in question, I do have one from him though that I ought to go back to and see how the properties of it are throughout a shave compared to my DOVO. This one was at one point sharpened on a wheel, which didn't work at all due to weird blade geometry, so I got a local guy to do it. I don't have enough confidence to say whether he did an objectively good job or not, but it certainly was sharp initially.

I don't bother with any sharpness tests at this point really, I just try to shave my arm hair with it using different parts of the blade, and if it cuts it cuts. I know that all parts of the blade would do fine on a hanging hair test immediately after stropping, but the toe would fail miserably at that test after a shave.

I'll try to get the edge back next weekend, I have an appointment with this local knife/razor maker for some lessons anyway.

One mistake is assuming that 30 degrees is a good shaving angle. That is a pretty high angle, and if the razor needs that high an angle to cut whiskers, it is not very sharp. 30 degrees is pretty close to what I would call scraping rather than shaving. I use about a half spine thickness, normally. I get very little irritation, and I get a decent shave in a single pass. I probably couldn't do that with your razor, and I would have to hone it, because I simply will not go over one spine thickness on the shave angle.

For under your nose, first of all stretch your nose up, in a "piggy face". Second, approach it from the side, if you can't get the angle down.

In this shave, I break a lot of rules, but I break them because I CAN.


There are plenty of guys on this board who would do a better job honing your razor than your knife guy.

If you went in solid with the way I hone, assuming the razor is not all warped and twisted and frowney, you would get a good edge by your second attempt. The catch is, if you want my results, you have to do my way exactly and precisely my way with no departures, exceptions, ommissions, or substitutions. If you are not good at following directions, if as a kid you sucked at "Simon Says", your results will be only mediocre at best.

Even following the tired old "pyramid" method will eventually get you in the ballpark. The essential element is FOLLOWING AN ESTABLISHED METHOD, and not leaning to your own guesswork or imagination, or mix & match with elements of different systems.

If you want a particular honer's results, follow his method, exactly like he does. A few honing styles take longer to master, but even Jnats are not out of the question for a motivated student who has a mentor that doesn't mind micromanaging your efforts, if you will just FOLLOW his instructions with the same techniques and tolls that he uses. I know, I have recommended a lot of beginners to stick with good quality synthetics or lapping film, but the possibility of learning to hone with Jnats, slates, coticules, etc can't be disregarded. But nobody is going to waste his time tutoring you if teaching you is like herding cats. Be prepared to follow blindly if you want fast results.

Are you in the US? What state? There may be someone willing to help you out within driving distance.

So the razor in question is a Dovo? If it is an entry level Dovo, and has never been honed by a knowledgeable honer of razors who actually shaves with a straight razor daily and understands how to beat warped and twisty razors into shape, then you are starting at a disadvantage. Entry level Dovos need to be initially honed by someone who really knows what he is doing. A Bismarck or other mid to upper level Dovo will be much more geometrically consistent and easier to hone.

Remember, shaving arm hair is a good test for a pocketknife, but a poor one for a razor. I don't have a single kitchen knife that won't shave arm hair easily, but not one of them is fit to shave my face. A razor with just a well set bevel straight off a 1k Naniwa will shave arm hair, but it will perform underwhelmingly on your face, and the experience would not be a pleasant one.

Lessons are good. Just be very sure of the teacher. Remember, the best you can ever do, following your teacher's instructions, is the results that he gets, and apparently those results are not very good. Just sayin.

I can see you really want to succeed. I also sense an undercurrent of stubbornnes there, which can be good in that you won't give up easily, but could work against you by making you lean to your own incomplete understanding and dismissing established methods and dogma that tired and old fashioned and arbitrary as they may seem, WORK.

If I had any razors ready to ship, I would probably at this point send you a loaner or even a keeper, just to show you what is possible even with a "crap" razor. Anyway, keep an open mind about simply duplicating someone's style in the hope of duplicating his results in a minimum amount of time and expense. Good Luck, and Happy Shaves in your future!

Originally Posted by CrescentCityRazors

If I had any razors ready to ship, I would probably at this point send you a loaner or even a keeper, just to show you what is possible even with a "crap" razor. Anyway, keep an open mind about simply duplicating someone's style in the hope of duplicating his results in a minimum amount of time and expense. Good Luck, and Happy Shaves in your future!

I do agree that 30 degrees seems a little high, my previous shave I did with significantly tighter angles than that, and got much better results than usual. I do have a loaner that was perfectly honed by @PaulFLUS, which I'm using as the frame of reference for the results I'm getting with my honing on other razors, mostly I haven't been able to compare well lately because my stropping technique was/maybe still is poor, and so is my shaving technique, so it's not necessarily obvious to me yet when a razor is ready.

I'm in Winnipeg, Canada, there is no one here as far as I know. There was this guy who mostly sharpens knives and scizzors, but he lost his eyesight and was never very good with razors to begin with. It took me months of aggressive searching to find literally anyone else willing to do it here, which was primarily the reason I got a well sharpened razor from paul, there simply was no one here to do it otherwise, so I was going to attempt it myself with no in person teacher. The knife guy is young, doesn't usually shave with straight razor, but he understands metal pretty well and gets the idea close enough. I have not actually had any lessons with him yet, so timje will tell how much I can learn from him. I had an online lesson with gssixgun, but there's only so much you can see over webcam, and the details are everything with this.

As far as following an established master goes, it seems like a lot of them directly contradict eachother with their strategy and information, and on top of that, it is readily apparent that a lot of masters are not good teachers, they can get an insane edge, but maybe don't exactly understand how to translate their abilities to another person in a learnable way. I think I'll be able to figure it out eventually. So far a big part of the problem is that if you have no straight razor shaving skill, all straight razors are unpleasant to use (if I were to try to do it as you do in your video, I would have cut myself 10-12 times at least, my face and neck are full of dimples and little nooks and crannies,) and it's much more unpleasant with a badly honed razor, which leads to a negative feedback loop where you can't learn to shave well, which means you can't verify the results of your honing well either.

Lately I'm just powering through trying to get decent shaves with an awful edge to at least get used to the difficult contours of what I'm shaving, so that once I do have a good edge I can do something with it.

As an aside, I just had the opportunity to compare my Belomo 10x loupe with my Chinese "30x" loupe.

It is really impressive how much clearer the Belomo is. Turns out the Chinese is clearly also 10x, as everything looks to be exactly the same magnification between the two of them, so they lied about that I guess, but mainly the quality difference is crazy. Looking at some little gold frills on a ring with the belomo, all the details staind out, little smudges of oil from fingers, subtle grind marks on curves, little bits of texture here and there, it's all so perfectly visible, and the correct color too, the chinese loupe makes everything look dull, as well as gives metal a yellow aura, with subtle details being basically not visible.

Looking at the razor's edge with Belomo I can pretty clearly see where there is a double bevel, I can clearly see the straight line marks from the sharpening stone, I can see every microscoping chip in the blade, every bit of slight curvature. Almost all of these details are invisible with the Chinese loupe, I can slightly make out where the bevel begins, maybe a blurry outline of a curve or a chip, very blurry barely visible lines from the stone.

Night and Day.

Originally Posted by rickytimothy

As an aside, I just had the opportunity to compare my Belomo 10x loupe with my Chinese "30x" loupe.

It is really impressive how much clearer the Belomo is. Turns out the Chinese is clearly also 10x, as everything looks to be exactly the same magnification between the two of them, so they lied about that I guess, but mainly the quality difference is crazy. Looking at some little gold frills on a ring with the belomo, all the details staind out, little smudges of oil from fingers, subtle grind marks on curves, little bits of texture here and there, it's all so perfectly visible, and the correct color too, the chinese loupe makes everything look dull, as well as gives metal a yellow aura, with subtle details being basically not visible.

Looking at the razor's edge with Belomo I can pretty clearly see where there is a double bevel, I can clearly see the straight line marks from the sharpening stone, I can see every microscoping chip in the blade, every bit of slight curvature. Almost all of these details are invisible with the Chinese loupe, I can slightly make out where the bevel begins, maybe a blurry outline of a curve or a chip, very blurry barely visible lines from the stone.

Night and Day.

Good. Seeing what you got, and knowing what you need, gives you a lot to work with.

What razor are you currently working with? Pic?

Yes, there are many different ways to hone a razor. There is much disagreement on which way is best, because several years in, nearly everyone is getting good edges, and so a particular honer's way for him, even if he diplomatically concedes that the next guy's method works, is the best, and the other guy doesn't quite get it. But the fact remains that if you pick ONE person to follow you will waste less time and spend less money to get good results. Pick a way, and follow it exactly. Trust me, it is better than randomly cherrypicking this little trick and that technique and this tip and that invention. Random technique gives random results.

You say you see a double or compound bevel. Well good. Now you know that no matter what, you MUST set a proper bevel first thing, and there is no point in trying to bump up the grit until you have a good bevel. Paint your bevel and your stabilizer and shoulder with a sharpie and hone just a couple of laps, no more, and see where the ink has been honed away. It will tell you a lot. You must not let the shoulder ride up on the hone. That lifts the heel end of the razor off the hone, and pushes the toe down into it. All of your honing pressure and contact go to the toe, so half your razor will never get sharp, and half will wear prematurely. If you are having problems keeping the shoulder off the hone, you need to reprofile the heel and it isn't all that difficult. I use a belt sander and many guys use a Dremel with a sanding drum. You CAN use the side of a coarse stone, and I need to point out right now that the edge of a razor is thin, and heats up VERY easily. It is easy to overheat the thin steel of the edge with power tools. In fact, I almost guarantee it will happen to you early on, and in fact again, I actually recommend that you deliberately overheat the edge of a cheap razor or maybe one with a crack in it, just to see how quickly you get the BSOD, or Blue Stain of Death, from overheating. Meanwhile, just using a stone or sandpaper will gitter done, safely. There is at least one thread on this forum on doing this. Take a coin and line it up so that the stabilizer and the edge are tangent to the circumference of the coin. If you don't have a coin, a washer will work. Draw an arc at the heel, using the coin as a template. You now remove all steel outside that arc, smooth off any burr with sandpaper, and proceed to set your bevel. It's not set until it's set. Don't guess. KNOW. This is important. If you don't fully and properly set your bevel, further work will only be a waste of time and a source of frustration.

If you look on my website, there are two closely related methods for setting a bevel. They WORK, if you do it right. You can also simply hone hone hone until you definitely have a set bevel, and it is visually perfect, and shaves arm hair with EASE.

So you got your loupe. Hopefully you have some good stones, particularly and immediately a good bevel setter, properly lapped, in the 600 to 2000 grit range, and a sharpie marker, and a way to keep your stones lapped. Next, post a pic of your razor and your bevel setting stone along with any relevant info on them, do the sharpie test, bob the heel if indicated, SET THE BEVEL, and pick someone to follow. Stay right in his tracks and do not deviate. Give us something to work with if you want more advice. If simply laying the razor aside for a few days or weeks seems the thing to do, then do that. No need to rush into this and no need to cut corners. You can do this. But first, get that bevel set, from heel to toe.

Originally Posted by CrescentCityRazors

But first, get that bevel set, from heel to toe.

I don't have a good camera on me right now, so I can't take any nice pictures, I believe I posted some in this thread already, or maybe that was my other thread, those were all with a good camera.

The double bevel was intenetional I believe, it would have been Paul taking a razor that had a bevel set without tape, taping it, then resetting it, that one is in very good shape.

Both of them have a pretty decent bevel as far as I know, the one Paul sent me and this Dovo. The Dovo had an uneven spine originally but that was already fixed.

Currently I'm not really worried about sharpneing either, the one Paul sent me is very solid, the Dovo is having issues, but I don't want to practice on it. I'm going to get lessons and try to learn on a Daisy brand razor I have, where I will be trying to reset the razor and make a good edge from scratch. I was really just reporting results because I recently changed my stropping technique significantly. I will find someone to follow start to finish soon.

Originally Posted by rickytimothy

I don't have a good camera on me right now, so I can't take any nice pictures, I believe I posted some in this thread already, or maybe that was my other thread, those were all with a good camera.

The double bevel was intenetional I believe, it would have been Paul taking a razor that had a bevel set without tape, taping it, then resetting it, that one is in very good shape.

Both of them have a pretty decent bevel as far as I know, the one Paul sent me and this Dovo. The Dovo had an uneven spine originally but that was already fixed.

Currently I'm not really worried about sharpneing either, the one Paul sent me is very solid, the Dovo is having issues, but I don't want to practice on it. I'm going to get lessons and try to learn on a Daisy brand razor I have, where I will be trying to reset the razor and make a good edge from scratch. I was really just reporting results because I recently changed my stropping technique significantly. I will find someone to follow start to finish soon.

I have never heard of the brand. Is it vintage? Do you know that it is not an RSO? Anyway good luck with it.

Originally Posted by rickytimothy

I've been using my straight razor much more frequently lately. Some things I've observed:

-Unquestionably the razor gets unusably dull about 3/4 through the shave, it will start off quite smooth, but then pull hairs hard at that point.
-By the very end of the shave, the toe specifically gets so dull that I cannot clean up stray hairs at all, the razor will just glide over them harmlessly.
-Stropping mid-way through helped a lot.

Which leads naturally to some questions:

-Is stropping mid-shave risky? I have heard people say in the past that it risks chipping the razor considering the heat from water, but working in metallurgy this seems ridiculous.
-Does the dramatic decrease in sharpness throughout one shave sound like more of a sharpening problem, a shaving technique problem, or maybe just the result of coarse hair?

I know a lot has been said since this post and frankly some of it got a little long and I didn't read every word but sort of skimmed some as I was getting eye cramps. What I find with edges that are not quite there is that they will shave fine on the cheeks because that hair is not as coarse and not as thick. Once I get to the chin where the hair is more coarse AND more dense on the face it will tug a lot. It's not losing keenness as I once thought. It just is not there to begin with.
Here's my advice. Take it as worth what you paid for it:

1) get that thing honed by a razor honer. Nothing against your knife guy but get Mike or Glen or a number of others including myself to hone it up to, without question, shave ready. Most of us will do it for a reasonable price and it will be a good comparison to your other ones. If you want to pay for the shipping I will offer you a free of charge honing to "WOW! I didn't know they got that sharp!" keen.

2) there is nothing wrong with stropping mid shave. DO IT if your edge is lacking but start on that pasted strop that I gave you and do at least 30-40 laps. Sometimes I will tape and hone then strop mid shave if necessary. I keep several barber hones ready for that reason. That's what they are made for.

3) get some lessons from a razor honer. I have given lessons via Skype with good results. Also, I'm with CCR here in that you need to, if for no other reason than curiosity, to put aside the desire to take control and just listen to your teacher. It's not a criticism. I think it's natural to want to assert your own handle on it. Those of us who are old guys that learned to drive before antilock brakes had to learn to let off the brake when they locked up. It's counterintuitive but you have to trust the process, not your instincts. That is in essence what I mean.

You might actually try the 4k/8k pyramid. Just be willing to outgrow it. I actually got pretty good results from that method. The main thing I learned from it was stroke and pressure control and also stone prep. This is, as CCR said successful IF you trust the process. Again, I would offer a honing lesson session if you want.

Originally Posted by PaulFLUS

1) get that thing honed by a razor honer. Nothing against your knife guy but get Mike or Glen or a number of others including myself to hone it up to, without question, shave ready. Most of us will do it for a reasonable price and it will be a good comparison to your other ones. If you want to pay for the shipping I will offer you a free of charge honing to "WOW! I didn't know they got that sharp!" keen.

This is a very generous offer from Paul. He will provide you with a true 'shave ready' razor. I believe you may be amazed at just how good a shave can be. I would very respectfully advise you to accept the kind offer and start enjoying your shaves. By the way if you do take up Paul's offer, when you do receive the razor, don't strop it before the first shave, just use it as it is.

Originally Posted by PaulFLUS

I know a lot has been said since this post and frankly some of it got a little long and I didn't read every word but sort of skimmed some as I was getting eye cramps. What I find with edges that are not quite there is that they will shave fine on the cheeks because that hair is not as coarse and not as thick. Once I get to the chin where the hair is more coarse AND more dense on the face it will tug a lot. It's not losing keenness as I once thought. It just is not there to begin with.
Here's my advice. Take it as worth what you paid for it:

1) get that thing honed by a razor honer. Nothing against your knife guy but get Mike or Glen or a number of others including myself to hone it up to, without question, shave ready. Most of us will do it for a reasonable price and it will be a good comparison to your other ones. If you want to pay for the shipping I will offer you a free of charge honing to "WOW! I didn't know they got that sharp!" keen.

2) there is nothing wrong with stropping mid shave. DO IT if your edge is lacking but start on that pasted strop that I gave you and do at least 30-40 laps. Sometimes I will tape and hone then strop mid shave if necessary. I keep several barber hones ready for that reason. That's what they are made for.

3) get some lessons from a razor honer. I have given lessons via Skype with good results. Also, I'm with CCR here in that you need to, if for no other reason than curiosity, to put aside the desire to take control and just listen to your teacher. It's not a criticism. I think it's natural to want to assert your own handle on it. Those of us who are old guys that learned to drive before antilock brakes had to learn to let off the brake when they locked up. It's counterintuitive but you have to trust the process, not your instincts. That is in essence what I mean.

You might actually try the 4k/8k pyramid. Just be willing to outgrow it. I actually got pretty good results from that method. The main thing I learned from it was stroke and pressure control and also stone prep. This is, as CCR said successful IF you trust the process. Again, I would offer a honing lesson session if you want.

Originally Posted by Tathra11

This is a very generous offer from Paul. He will provide you with a true 'shave ready' razor. I believe you may be amazed at just how good a shave can be. I would very respectfully advise you to accept the kind offer and start enjoying your shaves. By the way if you do take up Paul's offer, when you do receive the razor, don't strop it before the first shave, just use it as it is.

I literally have this, Paul sent me a perfectly shave ready razor. It may be slightly duller now, which is why I made this thread in the first place, but it's quite literally exactly what you are describing haha. I'm going to try it again tonight for comparison, because I've been using my worse Dovo exclusively lately. I won't send another razor out, it just isn't worth it, especially considering the current reality that my stropping/shaving technique appears to be ruining good edges within weeks anyway.

Also to be clear about my point of view on learning, I understand that it makes sense to follow someone's process start to finish instead of trusting myself to be able to cherrypick, I also understand that I probably won't get decent by just experimenting myself. My complaint is basically that it's difficult to pick one, as a lot of the guides I've looked at so far blatantly don't know what they're talking about, whether they are great sharpeners or not, they often just invent all of their own terminology. Given this fact, and the fact that most of them directly contradict one another, and the fact that none of them live near me, so I can't test their results myself, so basically I'm just going to be picking based on if they sound credible or not.

I'll do it though, if It takes 50 hours of trial and error to get a good reliable technique where I can consistently get decent results, that's not a big deal to me. I'm going to start from the local knife guy, and if his technique won't get me consistent sharpness, I'll promptly move on. I like learning.

The daisy is just one of those middle of the road vintage razors from Germany, I'll get pics later on, it appears to be in good shape and be made of decent quality steel, so it should be by far the best one I have to practice on. I won't practice on Paul's razor because I don't want to mess up his work, and my Dovo was expensive.