Thread: A Bevel Experiment!!!!!

I decided that I had a perfect opportunity to test a theory that had been put out there from Josh and Heavydutysg135 about the most important part of honing was setting the bevel.
I totally believe this theory BTW....
I had 4 razors to hone up so instead of doing the normal one razor at a time, all the way from scratch, to shave ready.... I decided to try a assembly line process...
I started with all 4 razors on a 1k Norton and began to set the initial bevel, how many strokes on each razor is irrelevant, I just wanted to get all 4 to a sticky sharp bevel then proceed with the experiment from there....
One razor needs way more work, because of a bad toe grinding that was there when I received it, so I set that one aside and continued on...
When all 3 of the razors were at a nice sharp bevel I stopped and gave it up for the night...
The next morning I started with a freshly lapped 4k Norton each razor got 10 laps, then the stone was flipped, and they got 10 more laps...
Next came the 8k with the same type of process only I went to 15 laps
after that each got 20 very light laps on the 16k Shapton
each got the exact same stropping on the exact same strops..
Keep in mind that I am very compulsive, and have the ability to do repetitive muscle motions very well, this is not a recommended way of sharpening razors!!!!!
I am not sure that this proves with out a doubt that bevel setting is where a shave ready blade starts, but it sure worked on these 3 razors... In my mind I believe that the bevel is where it is at!!!!

This was just an experiment!!!! Do Not use this as a Honing guide!!!!!

Good advice Glen. I got a huge lesson
in setting a bevel the other night.
What a disaster. I know now that it
isn't necessarily the size of the width
of the bevel that matters. I honed
the hell out of this razor, which thank
God was a junker, until I could see
a significant bevel. Then I looked at my
other razor and noticed that the bevel
on it is barely noticeable to the naked eye.
Talk about spine wear!! Oh well, lesson
learned.

John

I am starting to see.....

Originally Posted by kerryman71

Good advice Glen. I got a huge lesson
in setting a bevel the other night.
What a disaster. I know now that it
isn't necessarily the size of the width
of the bevel that matters. I honed
the hell out of this razor, which thank
God was a junker, until I could see
a significant bevel. Then I looked at my
other razor and noticed that the bevel
on it is barely noticeable to the naked eye.
Talk about spine wear!! Oh well, lesson
learned.

John

The width of the bevel is determinded by the thickness of the blade and spine. It should not be determinded by the amount of pressure you use! Some of my sharpest razors have an invisible bevel! They are very hollow ground!

Agreed! Establishing a very good bevel is the foundation.
Without it you can do pyramids or any other approach til the cows come home without success. There is no magic wonder hone or system. But... you have got to know what your looking for in the various tests. Thats the difficult part to learn and to teach.

Great posts - thanks Glen.
I have been figuring that out as a pitfall to my own honing and have been trying to do a much better job at setting that bevel initially (instead of spending hours on the coticule!)

Ronnie - Be aware that some say when you tape the spine, you're creating a steeper angle and the bevel can actually be a double bevel and need to be worn down when you remove the tape and continue in the progression. I don't use tape, so I am only repeating what some say (who recommend against tape).

I've asked a question myself about taping and was basically told that once you tape a spine, you always tape the spine. The tape lifts the spine, albeit a small amount, and sets the bevel at a certain angle. When you remove the tape, the spine drops and the edge picks up off of the hone. Bam! Double bevel.

Originally Posted by gssixgun

This was just an experiment!!!! Do Not use this as a Honing guide!!!!!

Why not? As far as I'm aware of, you described pretty much the basics of honing a razor.
Riding a bike is easy. Just hold the front wheel steady and turn the pedals. And yet, it takes a bit of effort to learn, doesn't it?

(whispering...) I don't mean any disrespect, but... Lynn's piramids actually got me very confused. I'm sure they work for him and many others. Being Belgian, I wanted to use the Belgian hones, and I thought I had to adopt the pyramids to my honing system, which turned out to be a wrong assumption, for me anyway.
My mistake of course.

Last Friday, I honed up three razors together with two other newbies. We followed the same approach as what you described and the result was three very smoothly shaving razors. (I 've posted extensively about it in another thread, titled:" 1200-blue-yellow questions... questions...) I shaved with the one I honed again yesterday night, and it shaved even smoother. The extra stropping from that second shave probably even smoothened it out some more.

So yeah, David's premise from the "honing experiment" is right.
The only premise I would like to add is that there are many pitfalls to mess up such a straightforward honing job, and guys like me tend to visit those pitfalls one by one before they get it.

Good luck on bringing back that 4th razor...

Bart.

Originally Posted by gssixgun

...
This was just an experiment!!!! Do Not use this as a Honing guide!!!!!

Looks like a Honing Guide to me. I use different hones with the same basic procedure. Works great (when I don't goof it up ).

*WHOA* ! ! !.......Sacrebleu !.......You guys don't know how much you helped me tonight !

John......I was in the "same boat" as you with regard to flattining out that spine ! Thanks for the post !

Marko.